Copying a Magento site

How easy/hard is it to make a carbon copy of a Magento site?

My company have developed a UK site for a client using Ma开发者_StackOverflow中文版gento. This has proven to be popular, so the client has now they've requested for a US version of the site be made. So far as I'm aware, the site will be 99% the same, just pointing to a different database (for different products), and maybe a few copy changes. There will not be any integration between the two sites, which will both be self contained entities.

The problem is that the developer who built the site has left the company, so I've been given the task of making this copy.

If there is any sanity in the world, then it should be a case of copying the files/database, updating a couple of config items, and bob's your unkle - but with everything I've heard about Magento, it's not going to be this easy.

Can anyone point me in the right direction please? Thank you :)

UPDATE: I don't know if this makes any difference, but we're using the Community Edition of the site.

it should be a case of copying the files/database, updating a couple of config items, and bob's your unkle

Yep, that's basically it.

You'll have to change the domain name in the database table core_config_data, adjust database connection parameters in app/etc/local.xml, delete the contents of var/cache, and you're ready to roll: Log into the backend and change what you want.

Why would you?

Magento is designed to use for multiple stores, each with his own configuration. Just create a new store view for the US webshop and customize specific configuration in the backend.

If you make a copy you will need to maintain two repositories which makes maintenance hard