[Plugin: WordPress MU Domain Mapping] Primary vs. secondary domain used for www?

wow, I was just having this issue also. Did you find a solution ?

When setting up domain mapping for a subsite, do I need to add both the www. and the non-www. URLs?

No. If you want DM to pick up both www and non then only map the non www version of the domain.

If you want to force the non www domain to the www the map the www and add a rewrite rule to your .htaccess to rewrite the non www to the www.

When I put in “domain.com”, it works. But www jumps to the non-www.

I want the www to remain that way. Is this possible ?

@ron, I am not sure I understand your second answer. I think what you are saying is to have only one mapping set up in WP, right?

Using the names in my example I would have mapping set for https://client7.com and that’s it.

Ans if I want the www. version to be the main website (https://www.client7.com) I would need to edit the .htaccess for that subsite??

I wouldn’t be able to just map to https://www.client7.com directly??

Thanks.

@Strategizer – I’ll rephrase

If you want to force https://client7.com to the https://www.client7.com then map https://www.client7.com and add a rewrite rule to your .htaccess to rewrite the https://client7.com to https://www.client7.com.

You can also do the https://client7.com to https://www.client7.com redirect in your DNS.

@ron – thanks for the clarification… I think I got it, or at least part of it.

The following setup seems to be working. Does it look good to you? I guess this is too important to not be done right….

1. At domain registrar: I set up the domain (DNS) for the subsite owner to point to the right IP address of my multisite install

*.client7.com --> xx.xx.xx.xx (ip address of my multisite)
@.client7.com --> xx.xx.xx.xx
www.client7.com --> xx.xx.xx.xx

[ignore “https://” whihc is added automatically by this forum engine]

2. On server using cPanel: Parked user’s domain (client7.com) on the server

3. In WordPress Domain Mapping: Set up domain mapping for that subsite to add “client.com” as a domain and made it primary.

This seems to be working fine and looks right. The site will be shown when a visitor goes to either:
https://client7.com
https://www.client7.com
https://random-string.client7.com

All versions will actually go to https://client7.com (without www)

Now, if the user wants their primary web address to have the www… so all of the go to https://www.client7.com

I simply add https://www.client7.com in WordPress Domain Mapping and just set it to be the primary ; that seems to be working (all traffic resolves to https://www.client7.com) Do I need to do anything else? (e.g. Park https://www.client7.com on the server too? Do anything else on the DNS side?)

Additionally I am thinking about removing the hard-wired dependency on the IP address and use the CNAME option instead but that is also somewhat unclear. If you have any insight on that, would be great!

In the DNS settings for client7.com will I need to simply point to supersite.com, like so below?

*.client7.com --> supersite.com
@.client7.com --> supersite.com
www.client7.com --> supersite.com

[ignore “https://” whihc is added automatically by this forum engine]

(or to some subdomain like redirect.supersite.com which in turn points to the xx.xx.xx.xx ip address of the supersite?)

At least on Network Solutions DNS panel it looks like I cannot set the above; it is giving me an error that A records already exist. But if I have to delete the A record in order to create the CNAME, the site will break after I delete the A and before the CNAME is propagated…

Thoughts?

In the DNS settings for client7.com will I need to simply point to supersite.com, like so below?

That works. What I was referring to above was a redirect which is different than what you are doing. What you have will send both the www & non www traffic to your WP install. If you set up the redirect then the non www will be redirected to the www at the DNS and all the requests coming into your WP install will be for the www.

Thanks for the clarification; much appreciated.