Creating Environments

Rudel offers several ways to create sandboxes, depending on how much of your host site you want to bring along.

Blank sandbox

The simplest option. Creates an empty sandbox with a fresh database and a bare wp-content directory:

wp rudel create --name="my-sandbox"

The sandbox gets the default WordPress tables, an admin user, and a "Hello World" post, but no themes, plugins, or uploads from the host. This is the fastest option and the right choice when you want to start from scratch.

Cloning from the host

If you want your sandbox to mirror the host site, you can clone the database, content, or both.

Clone everything at once:

wp rudel create --name="full-clone" --clone-all

This is equivalent to --clone-db --clone-themes --clone-plugins --clone-uploads. The database cloner copies the data and rewrites all URLs to point to the sandbox automatically.

You can also be selective. Clone just the database when you want the host's posts and settings but plan to set up themes and plugins fresh:

wp rudel create --name="db-only" --clone-db

Or clone specific content types without the database:

wp rudel create --name="themes-plugins" --clone-themes --clone-plugins

Cloning from another sandbox

You can also create a new sandbox by copying an existing one:

wp rudel create --name="copy" --clone-from=my-sandbox-a1b2

This duplicates the source sandbox's database and wp-content directory, then rewrites all URLs and table prefixes for the new sandbox. Both sandboxes must use the same engine.

Creating from a template

Templates are frozen snapshots of a sandbox that you've saved as a reusable starting point:

wp rudel create --name="new-project" --template=starter

The new sandbox starts with the template's database and content, ready to go immediately. See Templates for how to create and manage them.

Choosing a database engine

By default, sandboxes use MySQL with an isolated table prefix. This gives you full plugin compatibility and fast native cloning. Two alternative engines are available for specific use cases.

# MySQL (default): isolated table prefix in the host database
wp rudel create --name="my-sandbox"

# SQLite: standalone database file, portable and exportable
wp rudel create --name="portable" --engine=sqlite

# Subsite: WordPress multisite sub-site (requires multisite host)
wp rudel create --name="network-sandbox" --engine=subsite

All three engines provide the same wp-content isolation. Each sandbox always gets its own themes, plugins, and uploads directory regardless of which engine is used.