# Easiest method of mirroring a gateway on another server

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/easiest-method-of-mirroring-a-gateway-on-another-server/95965>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Tags:** ignition81\
**Created:** [September 13, 2024, 3:32pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/easiest-method-of-mirroring-a-gateway-on-another-server/95965 "2024-09-13T15:32:45Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![atsm26](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@atsm26](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/atsm26)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2024, 3:32pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/easiest-method-of-mirroring-a-gateway-on-another-server/95965/1 "2024-09-13T15:32:46Z")

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I am trying to take a gateway hosted on server 1 and mirror it onto another gateway on server 2. We are basically doing this to have dev/test/prod environments.

What would be the best way of this? Would it be sufficient to backup server 1's gateway and restore it on server 2's? Are there things I would want to be careful of?

We are at the beginning stages on the gateway so there aren't a ton of specific things in there but there are some outgoing/incoming connections, SSL certificate installed, other small things like that.

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**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2024, 3:38pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/easiest-method-of-mirroring-a-gateway-on-another-server/95965/2 "2024-09-13T15:38:03Z")

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Using a gateway backup is the most faithful way to do this, and provides an environment with the highest likelihood of success when deploying new work from dev to production.

However, you really need to isolate the dev gateway so it cannot communicate with production resources and devices.

The technique most useful with my clients is to use no IP addresses _ **anywhere** _ in the production gateway, just DNS names of the form `something.company.local`. Then place an `/etc/hosts` file in each server with the IP addresses appropriate for prod/dev/test. Gateway backups don't include a server's `/etc/hosts` file, so no chance of clashes.