How do I enable version 1.9 maintenance flag with admin access

Question

Because I do not see Maintenance Mode in the version 1.9 UI System > Configuration, I dropped a maintenance.flag file in the site root. However that also blocks my admin panel access. Can someone tell me how to maintain site maintenance mode with admin access?

Answer 1

Here's one solution:

Open index.php in root and add (remembering to edit the ‘allowed’ array to contain the IP’s you want to be able to access the site);

$ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];

$allowed = array('1.1.1.1','2.2.2.2'); // these are the IP's that are allowed to view the site.

then change the line

if (file_exists($maintenanceFile)) {

to

 if (file_exists($maintenanceFile) && !in_array($ip, $allowed)) { 

Simple. Now you can access the site (admin + front end), while others see its maintenance mode.

Source: http://inchoo.net/ecommerce/magento/maintenance-mode-in-magento/

Answer 2

There's handful of extensions that do just that. However they are still just a temporary workarounds as maintenance.flag functionality is still there. To remove it you must be manually edit 'index.php' file which in turn may cause issues with upgrades.

if (file_exists($maintenanceFile)) {
    include_once dirname(__FILE__) . '/errors/503.php';
    exit;
}

This is how 'maintenance.flag' functionality is implemented in 'index.php'. However since you need to edit 'index.php' you could as well do something more elaborate, such as:

if (file_exists($maintenanceFile) && strpos($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'], '/admin/') === false) {
    include_once dirname(__FILE__) . '/errors/503.php';
    exit;
}

Please note the the code above is quick and dirty hack. You could develop it further, as I just check if '/admin/' exists in url.

Answer 3

And if your behind a load balancer that is passing the client IP in the HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR header make sure to account for it like this:

// account for load balancer that passes client IP
if (isset($_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR'])) {
   $ip = $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR']; 
}
if(empty($ip)) {
    $ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];
}

// whitelist your ips
$allowed = array();
$allowed[]='WHITELIST.IP.ADDRESS.#1';
$allowed[]='WHITELIST.IP.ADDRESS.#2';

if (file_exists($maintenanceFile)) {
    if (file_exists($maintenanceFile) && !in_array($ip, $allowed)) { 
        include_once dirname(__FILE__) . '/errors/503.php';
        exit;
    }
}

Answer 4

You can set up your own maintenance page and use ErrorDocument 503 to send the maintenance page. Exclude your IP-address via RewriteCond so that you can access the page anyway and don't get redirected:

RewriteEngine On
ErrorDocument 503 /errors/503.php
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^4.3.2.1 [NC] #your IP
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^4.3.2.2 [NC] #other IP if needed
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^127.0.0.1 [NC] #localhost maybe needed depending on server setup
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/errors/503.php
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/media/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/images/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/css/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/js/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/skin/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/index.php
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/admin #your admin path
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/admin/
RewriteRule ^(.*) http://www.yourwebsite.com/errors/503.php [L,R=503]

Please note that it can also be necessary to whitelist additional services like Payment Gateways for testing.