Creating a test site for updating a CMS

I have been asked by a client to make amends to their site using the custom CS system that was built for them (by somebody else). Making the changes is not a problem but they want the changed to be viewed on a test server before going live and the only way I can think of doin开发者_开发技巧g that is by pulling the entire site down, duplicating and reconnecting databases and uploading it to a test server. Then I would have to make all the changes twice which isn't really ideal.

Does anyone know of a way to do this that isn't such a ball ache? There's hundreds of files and data tables as you would expect with a custom CMS and for changes that would only take a few hours to do duplicating the entire site seems a tad unnecessary.

Cheers, Sam

Does the CMS have "preview mode"?

Typically, in a CMS you make your changes using the content editing interface, save the changes, allow authorized users to view the changes in preview mode, and then change the status to "approved"; this then sends the changes live.

Different products call this by a different name, and have different ways of doing it - but it's worth rooting around in the custom CMS to see if there's something similar.