Syncing iWeb files across Macs
It probably is no secret that I use Apple’s 6 year discontinued software iWeb to create this website, but that has created some issues for my modern needs. I use this site for hosting of many things, but one of them is recording all the ridiculous quotes that my friends say.
This means I need to have access to the site from anywhere, even though I started out creating this on my Mac Mini server at my house.
Instead of trying to use Back to My Mac to screen share the Mac Mini, I set out to find a way of syncing the Domain.sites2 file.
There are a lot of tutorials out there that recommend just dragging the file to the Dropbox folder, and double clicking that to open the site. That doesn’t work, because iWeb will only read the file from it’s native directory.
There is an app, called MacDropAny, which supposedly creates symbolic links and allows you to sync files with any cloud source, but it seemed to only recognize them as an alias, and couldn’t sync the files back.
In the end, my solution was a bit of terminal work. First, on the source computer where the original file resides, create a symbolic link of the .sites2 file to iCloud drive. (Or whatever hosting solution is best for you.) Paste this command into the Terminal app (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app)
ln -s ~/Library/Application\ Support/iWeb/Domain.sites2 ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs/iWeb/Domain.sites2
Then, on the other computer(s) that you would like to access the file from, create a symbolic link from iCloud Drive to your local iWeb folder. (make sure there is not already a file with the same name in the local iWeb folder.) Paste this command into the Terminal app (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app)
ln -s ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs/iWeb/Domain.sites2 ~/Library/Application\ Support/iWeb/Domain.sites2
Caution:
Do not use this for collaboration, or attempt to work on this from two computers at the same time. This could severely corrupt your entire Domain.sites2 file. Make sure that you make regular backups, as well. I am not responsible for if your multimillion dollar corporation’s site crashes, or if you have a severe breakdown because you couldn’t blog the latest gluten-free, vegan, free-range, organic kale salad that you just ate.