multisite domain mapping with existing domain name

I get absolutely NOTHING for an A record when I look up thecreativepublisher.com

Bob.Passaro,

You may want to check with your hosting company to verify you are on the right nameservers. The domain thecreativepublisher.com doesn’t resolve for me at all. After you get that sorted out we can go from there. ^Colby

@go Daddy: I think the nameservers are right, but I’ll check.

Also, my host told me I need to park “thecreativepublisher.com” on top of my multisite domain. That wouldn’t explain why you can’t see an A record, though, would it?

But you guys think it would seem the right thing to change both the IP that the A record points to *and* the nameservers to the new host?

It works!

What I ended up doing was going back to Godaddy and changing the nameservers back to the godaddy nameservers, just leaving the IP address in the A-record changed to the ip of my multisite network.

Once I did that, after a few hours, the domain came back to the realm of the living and the A-record could be looked up — and it would give my host’s IP.

Then I just had to go to my host and use cPanel to park thecreativepublisher.com onto my overarching multisite domain.

I already had the mapping set up inside WP and it instantly started working. Made it the primary domain, and now that’s what shows up in the browser address bar.

Cool. And really very simple, once I figured out what the hell I was doing.

Thanks.

I have a similar problem involving GoDaddy:
I have GoDaddy as a host and two URLs registered also at GoDaddy.

I have a WordPress multisite installation successfully set up and have created several sub-sites.

Then i installed the MU domain mapping plugin and I can see my domain mapping controls in the WordPress interface.
I registered the second domain name in the GoDaddy DNS and it is showing up In the control panel.
In the domain manager control panel at GoDaddy I changed the A name of my secondary URL to use the IP address of my main site.

I then went back to the WordPress control panel and changed the domain mapping of my secondary site to use the new URL. But what I get when I load the new URL is the generic GoDaddy frontpage. So I am missing something, but I don’t know what.

I suspect something in the GoDaddy settings. There is no good documentation I could find there. Does anybody know? Thanks for your help!

It does take a while, I think, for the new A record to propagate. So you might have to wait a day, maybe two.

You’ll see in my earlier post, too, I had to “park” the domain I want to be associated with the specific multisite site on top of my overarching site — the one that is running the multisite installation.

You do this in your control panel at the host of your main site.

I’m not sure that is necessary or not at all hosts, but it was at mine.

Thanks Bob, I shall wait:)

Its still not working. I don’t know what else I should do. One weird thing is when I put in the new domain on the WordPress end the little ball spins for a very long time before the change gets done. I suspect there might be an error in my settings somewhere.

Did you turn on “Forwarding” in the GoDaddy domain control? The GoDaddy help dude said to do that. I am not having fun!

I did not use “forwarding” — I simply changed the A record to the IP of my multisite hosting account.

I’m no expert in this, but first ping the domain to see where it’s going:

https://network-tools.com/

Put in the domain, and it will show you the IP address that it’s getting sent to. If it’s getting sent to the right IP, then GoDaddy is not the problem. Then you might want to check with your multisite host (it’s not GoDaddy, right?).

Did you park the new domain on your multisite domain? If you don’t know how, you can ask your host if you need to do that and how to do it.

If the domain isn’t going to the right IP, it may just need more time. Or there might be something wrong with your GoDaddy account.

Did you change the nameservers, too? Or just the A record?

Most likely it’s the same thing, bob. I suspect ‘forwarding’ just slaps the A record.

susafri – You really should make a new post when a topic is resolved in most cases. The volunteers kind of ignore then.

DO NOT try to map your domain in WordPress. Yet.

You have to make sure the domain actually goes to the right server BEFORE you map it, or you’ll make yourself cry.

Remove the domain mapping from the plugin for now.

Thanks for your response Ipstenu and Bob,

ok I pinged my test subdomain and low and behold its going to the wrong IP address. But on the Go Daddy control panel it says its going to my main IP address ( the one I redirected it to.)
So apparently its the GoDaddy end thats not working.
Ipstenu are you saying I should uninstall the domain mapping plugin and then re-install?
Both these sites and urls are just test items to try out the domain mapping thing, so no data is lost.
Also I undid the redirect and am just using the new IP address on the GoDaddy domain control

Oh and Bob: My host is GoDaddy too. I did not change the nameservers

No no, don’t uninstall, just remove the entry for your mapped domain from within WordPress.

You need to change your nameservers, if they’re not controled by GoDaddy.

See there are two parts, in a way.

1) Nameservers tell the world ‘mapped domain points to this IP!’
2) PARKING the domain on the host says ‘Yes, I am the master of this domain! Come to me!’

If you don’t do both, it won’t work, becuase they can’t talk.

Ok I got it to work!
I registered another test domain again with GoDaddy.
I went to added it to the domain manager panel. I then just changed the IP address to my main IP and submitted it.
After that I pointed the WordPress domain manager to the new URL. When I went to my site URL it said this site is not available at this time. However once the DNS propagated a couple of hours later it was live!

So it seems I have to make sureI do things in the correct sequence. Thank you all for your help! Phew!

Glad to hear it worked.