Member Avatar for Ritesh_4

Hello, is there any reliable tool which can help save a website's folders and files on a pc for offline use? I've tried HTTrack but it does not save all the folders for the website i want to have offline...

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Quick, practical plan for the scenario described and the point raised: get the server-owner to produce a backup first, and if that is not possible, fall back to caches and a static rescue while planning to rebuild anything dynamic.

  1. Immediate, high‑value requests to the host
  • Provide proof of ownership (domain WHOIS, invoices, signed letter) and ask the host to supply a full account backup: site files (the web root), database export(s) (.sql), email mailboxes, SSL certs/keys, cron jobs and any attached git/repos or raw archives. Ask for the backup as a single downloadable ZIP or a cPanel/Plesk full backup so you get server-side files and DBs intact.
  1. If the host cannot or will not cooperate
  • Recover public content from caches and archives (Wayback Machine at https://web.archive.org/), and search engine caches. These recover static HTML and assets but not server-side scripts or databases.
  • Mirror the live public site (pages and front-end assets) for offline use. A robust command-line mirror will fetch rendered pages and resources; remember this does not recreate server-side code or the database.

Example mirror command:

wget --mirror --convert-links --page-requisites --adjust-extension --no-parent https://example.com/
  1. Rebuild considerations
  • Dynamic sites (CMS, e‑commerce) need the database and server code. Without those you must rebuild templates, import static pages, and recreate functionality or contact the original developer for source code.
  • Look for other backups: the client’s email, previous developers, cloud storage, or their registrar/third‑party services.

Checklist to request from host: full account backup, all database dumps, mailboxes, SSL private keys, repo access or archives, and any billing/account records proving ownership.

Cautions: obtain written authorization from the client before interacting with the host. Crawling public pages is fine for an owned site, but it will never replace a true file + DB backup.

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Member Avatar for drjohn

If it is a site you own, you should have the development oroginal copy on your pc.
If it is a site you are taking over to edit, use ftp to download the entire site.

If it is a site you wish to examine that belongs to someone else, HTTrack is your best bet, but if it does belong to someone else, why do you want a local copy?

Member Avatar for Ritesh_4

in fact the website is for a new client, who has got some problems with the existing hosting service provider, and the latter has cancelled the client's ftp login account. the host provider is also the one who the client had hired previously to create the website. however the client wants the same website to be done again and hosted on a new server, but does not have any copy whatsoever of the site, thus asking us to try get all the files hosted there and move them locally temporarily until he decides the new hosting service to be used.

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