I'm trying to improve my skills in PHP by creating my own CMS infrastructure, probably based on a lightweight framework like FuelPHP.
Because I think it's better to have a goal, I would like to use this opportunity to build a multi site CMS.
It would be a CMS for a game.
Basically, here the workflow:
Somebody create an account on the main site (http://www.mainsite.com), then create a site for his server (http://my-beautiful-server.mainsite.com). People from his server would then come to the subdomain and register to interact with the forum, the gallery, updating their account, etc.
Is using subdomains a correct approach ?
If I use a wildcard for my DNS, how must the vhost be configured to redirect on the correct folder based on the subdomain ? Can I not use a folder system for each site and use only one app to handle everything by just "passing" the subdomain as a variable to the app to tell it on which site I am ? Is it reliable ?
If in the future I want to propose custom domain names, is it possible with this approach ? I would only need to handle domain name registering myself and add a vhost configuration to redirect on the correct folder ?
I'm a little lost on the correct and most robust approach.
Today I have the domain name and I will take a little VPS for testing.
Thanks a lot for any help to guide me in the good direction and sorry for my broken english, I had trouble finding ressources on the Internet.
Is using subdomains a correct approach ?
It is a perfectly acceptable approach.
If I use a wildcard for my DNS, how must the vhost be configured to redirect on the correct folder based on the subdomain ?
You use a default vhost to capture all the requests for the different hostnames.
Then you can shuffle them around using mod_rewrite or by examining the requested hostname at the application level.
Can I not use a folder system for each site and use only one app to handle everything by just "passing" the subdomain as a variable to the app to tell it on which site I am ? Is it reliable ?
Yes.
The variable will already be available to your PHP via $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'].
If in the future I want to propose custom domain names, is it possible with this approach ?
Yes. There is no practical difference between a domain name and a subdomain as far as a webserver is concerned.
I would only need to handle domain name registering myself and add a vhost configuration to redirect on the correct folder ?
You wouldn't even need a specific vhost configuration. Your default one would suffice.
Related
We have a php project / php web-application where users can create profiles which more or less looks like a website on a sub-domain URLs like robert.blogger.com. Now this user also has a domain of his own example robert.com. Now we want every request for robert.com to redirect to robert.blogger.com without changing the URL.
The URL should show robert.com/home.html, robert.com/aboutus.html etc. but actually code should be run from robert.blogger.com/index.html, robert.com/aboutus.html etc.
Please note that the project is hosted on a dedicated server with dedicated IPs & we also have access to the Control Panel of the user's domain.
We have tried htaccess but that only redirects, we want masking / mapping to work.
Is this possible? If so, how can this be done? Would appreciate much !!!
The solution would depend on what kind of server software you're running, but in Apache you'd do this by mapping the default vhost for the IP to the application (and then letting people point their domain to that host), and in your application use HTTP_HOST in $_SERVER to look up the valid domain (which you're probably already doing to map the subdomain to user accounts). This would be the exact same thing, as long as you keep all links relative in your HTML (and don't think "i mapped it to this user, so the domain should be user.example.com").
To give a more specific answer you'd have to be more concrete in your question.
It should be possible to use ProxyPass in htaccess, if you have permissions to use it. Try something like this.
ServerName robert.com
RewriteRule ^/(.*)$ http://robert.blogger.com/$1 [L,P]
Or you can map it in your application, depends if that server is yours and you can do anything you want to setup.
I really appreciate any answer to my question because I am searching for this about two weeks. My goal is to create directories using PHP and displaying them as a virtual subdomain (All procedure should have done automatically).
For example :
example.com/test/index.php should be considered as :
test.example.com/index.php
The only way I was able to do such thing was using a wildcard subdomain. If your server supports that, it's just a matter of using a front controller to manage the requests.
You cannot do this solely with PHP. You need dynamic shell scripting to create the DNS zone files for each subdomain.
EDIT:
Probably #Robyflc is right, you can base conditions on the host name in PHP. It is not clear form the question if you want the subdomain or just some logic like create a URL user1.domain.com and then find the folder depending on the value of it.
To do that, I recommand you to buy a VPS server
it's possible with URL Rewriting.
I'm trying to setup some rules for ExpressionEngine that will automatically make an entry accessible (and display) like a subdomain. The standard URL path for an ExpressionEngine entry would be:
http://mysite.com/post/entry.title
But I need it to be accessible and appear as:
http://entry.title.mysite.com
This only has to be for one particular channel and using one specific template group/template. It does have to be dynamic though, so that whenever a new entry is created, it can automatically be accessible at http://entry.title.mysite.com. I understand that this might be possible through a wildcard in .htacess but I'm not sure how to do this.
Search the Qs here for HTTP_HOST. Lots of examples which answer this generic Q :-) Note that how it works depends on how your hosting provider has configured the use of subdomains. Some always use the DOCROOT for all subdomains, some provide an admin panel to map them to subdirectories. You will need to find out which your host does from its FAQs.
I am on the way of building a SaaS application using Zend Framework on PHP. Here is the basic information of the project. Its Project Management System on SaaS model. When the user registered on the site, they will get a domain name like the format:
user_name.pms.com
user_name - The chosen User Name when the user registered on the Project Management System (pms)
pms.com - is the main SaaS Server.
Currently we provide the Sub Domain on our Server. And for big firms, it won't look good and they may prefer to get their own domain instead of this default one. So there may be:
user_name.pms.com [Always Present]
user1.com [ The custom or independent domain of the User ] This custom domain needs to link into the default user url.
The full website is planning to develop using Zend Framework.
On Zend Framework, we are having following HTAccess on the root folder for its working and is below:
SetEnv APPLICATION_ENV development
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule .* index.php
Here are my questions:
Do I really need to create Sub Domain like profile url for all users once they registered on the site ?
If it need to create Sub Domains, can PHP check whether the chosen sub domains exists or not and can create Sub Domains from the Script itself ?
If there is no need to Sub Domain, can we achieve the same goal using HTAccess in Zend Installation ?
Can you provide the HT Access code which does the following:
"user_name1.pms.com" need to redirect to "pms.com"
"user_name1.pms.com/contact" need to redirect to "pms.com/contact"
ie any request on the Sub Domain like URL must redirect to main website with the format: pms.com followed by Query String.
Very Important:
Important 1:
When I said the redirect to main website, I need to keep the sub domain like URL on the address bar but the request will be served by main website.
ie "user_name1.pms/contact" is going to be served from pms.com/contact but on address bar we still see the url "user_name1.pms/contact"
Important 2:
Whenever we uses the HTAccess to redirect the request to main Zend Server, can I identify the actual url entered on the address bar ie "site1.pms or site1.com" ?
Another Question of Custom Domain Redirection:
The custom domain name like "site1.com" or "site2.com" need to redirect to either:
Option (a): "pms.com"
Option (b): "site1.pms.com
to serve the request. Here also, I need to keep the url on address bar same like the one user entered.
Which above option is better (a) or (b) ?
Which technology does this work, domain mapping or CName ? Or Any other technology for make this working.
There are several ways to get you at least near to what you want... but to get all of the way there, you're going to need to get a little more depth.
First of all, your questions:
You may need to actually set up a whole virtual host for each user, if you intend for them to be able to interact with your site through their own domain. If you just want them to have their domain redirect to yours that can be done at their registrar (and if they can successfully use masking, which I've always found problematic, it may work completely without doing this. If you ignore the custom domain requirement, then you can manage subdomains completely through mod_rewrite without having to actually set them up.
Probably the best architecture for your site is to proactively set up whatever needs to be set up the moment that the user signs up. Don't try to do it "just in time" when the user first tries to access it, and therefore it's just as simple as displaying an error when someone, say, types in usre.pms.com rather than user.pms.com.
You can use htaccess, or the config file for your site (which is better for performance, but just strictly for "getting done" purposes, htaccess will work fine).
Google
Very Important Point #1: this is how mod_rewrite works. No worries.
Very Important Point #2: yes, so long as you include that information to be passed along in your mod_rewrite rule
Your Last Question of Custom Domain Redirection:
This is where things get complicated. You can't serve site1.com from pms.com without apache being fully aware that it's looking for site1.com (unless you get forwarding with masking to work without issue at the registrar). Generally speaking, if you're using forwarding of some sort, then you'll want them to forward to the subdomain, and all will be good completely through mod_rewrite. If they are directing the domain straight at your server, a CNAME record is probably the right choice, directing to the subdomain, but you'll still have to learn about virtual hosts and how to properly set it up to get everything to work.
I think you may be signing on for more than you realize by letting your clients have their own custom domain. You can learn how to do what you want with subdomains probably in an afternoon or a couple days tops. Figuring all of the ins and outs to working with custom domain names could take a lot longer.
The sub domains can be handled using some technique in CPanel. To add vurtual sub domains from CPanel, do the steps:
Select "CPanel - Sub Domains"
Enter star and choose your domain name
Choose the directory to which you need to redirect
And handle the redirection from your page.
To develop a SaaS application using Zend, check the tutorial SaaS application development using PHP in Zend Framework
I have one site completely working for one client , now I have some more clients want same thing replicated for them , Is there any way , that I can use this site as base site , as I plan to access this site from there domain and providing database for each client.
I am using PHP and MYSQL.
Thanks for any support , I appreciate your point of view also in this process. do I have right approach
I have been told that there will be SEO issues if I use one site for multiple domain. I have no competent person available which can direct me on domain name linking. I have www.xyzuniversity.com and 85% data is fetching from database. now i have to create abcuniversity.com and I want that I just create new database and ready to use and I think I can make multiple sites like this , if I succeed
Thanks
You can point multiple domains to the site. You can get the domain name from the server vars ($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']) and choose you database through that. Make sure you dont have any absolute links.
Put the shared code into a shared directory and give each domain it's own database configuration, so the database configuration is not shared.
Then start your application with the different configuration based on the domain, e.g. by server environment variables like the hostname.
If your design does not support a configuration that can be injected into the application, you need to maintain two code-bases, one for each domain, e.g. in source-code control with one branch per domain.
However I suggest that your code is that modular that it supports configuration for the parts that need configuration according to your needs. If it's not yet, think about coming closer to it and make the changes.