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
Related
I have seen a lot of solutions that involve using .htaccess. I would like to know a way to create sub domains using only PHP. For my purposes, this also needs to work using non-host-specific mechanics so it would work on most hosts.
All I know is that I would need a wildcard CNAME record that says all sub domains point to x.x.x.x, but I don’t know what to do from here. What I think you need to do is create a folder that contains the code for the sub domains, and I have done this, but I cannot find a cross-host way to link the sub domain with the folder. There has to be a way to do this as I have seen it done, but I can not find a way that meets my needs.
The problem here is that PHP doesn't handle the request coming in, a web server (e.g. Apache or Nginx) does and it's the config for that software that determines where a request goes. Now the good news is that you can have wildcards in your config (at least for Apache and Nginx, YMMV if you're not using one of those), as long as you can access the config file (you'll need root access on the server). There is plenty of information available out there depending on what web server you are using so you can google that part.
Now, assuming you've done that part, in PHP you just need to check what the root domain for the request is. That information is stored in $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'], so you can use a simple script to figure out which subdomain has been requested and then launch the appropriate script for that subdomain. Something like this should do the trick:
// Assuming request comes from https://subdomain.mydomain.com
$subdomain = str_replace('.mydomain.com', '', $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']);
echo $subdomain // Outputs "subdomain"
This will capture multiple levels of subdomains as well, so if your request comes from https://sub1.sub2.subdomain.mydomain.com then $subdomain would contain sub1.sub2.subdomain.
Edit after comment
You can't do this with shared hosting. Basically the config panel you get with the host, when you set up a domain or subdomain it's modifying the config file on the server for you. There's no way a host would let anyone access the config through anything other than their control panel for security. It's possible that hosts will have a similar setup to your test server, where subdomains just work as they use wildcards by default, but I don't know that and there's no guarantee of that.
WordPress itself is just blogging software. It doesn't let you set up lots of separate websites with their own installations. What WordPress Multisite (I assume that's what you mean when you mention WordPress) is use a single installation to host multiple "sites", but it's still one installation, one single database. All of the posts, all the pages, they're all stored in a single database and if you got into that database you could easily include a page from one site on another just by editing some fields in the database. It's not designed for reselling or for multiple, completely separate entities. There are a whole host of security risks in doing that sort of thing. It's designed for single entities that want to split their sites up into multiple sites, but where it's all one company, or related companies. Universities with different departments is one example I read about before, each department has their own "site" and the main IT office has a super user that can access all of them as it's on one single installation.
I could do with a little more information on what you're trying to do, but it sounds like you're trying to do something like WPEngine, where they sell hosting space and install WordPress for you. But they have dedicated servers that run scripts that create the config files and install WordPress on your own individual hosting space using their servers. That's known as SaaS (Software as a Service) and from the little you have said seems what you are trying to do. People subscribe to your site and get their own instance of the software you're selling that they access through an admin portal. That's not something they can install on their own hosting, they have to use yours. That's how most companies do this sort of thing.
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.
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'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 would like to know the best way to enable custom domains when creating web applications. For instance, if you look at something like Base Camp, when you sign up for that you create your own 'sub domain' to which you use to login to your basecamp with.
Also, if you look at this like hosted ecommerce sites, you can use your own custom domain instead of using a sub domain of theirs.
Personally I can't see these web applications 'parking' each custom domain on the web apps hosting account or adding the DNS if it uses a sub domain like Base Camp does.
Therefore, the only way I can think about doing something dynamically like this is to maybe use mod_rewrite to redirect everything to a certain script that does the 'routing' based on the url. Then for the customer domains, the customer would just need to add a CNAME for their domain to something like custom.webappname.com which then in turn gets picked up by mod_rewrite and the php routing file.
If this is the best way forward, are there any performance issues with routing all incoming requests via this 'routing file'?
Sorry if im not clear, tried to explain the best I can.
Yes, your solution would be the best way. That is how other sites do it. Rerouting all requests through a central file using rewrite rules incurs a small performance penalty but it is well worth it.
In fact, in most applications you are already paying that penalty anyway. Any framework that uses the FrontController pattern already does exactly this. This includes pretty much all frameworks like Zend, Symfony 1 and 2, CakePHP, CodeIgniter an many others.
It really depends on the web app your working with.
For example we have a hosted CMS, using the cPanel API we do create an actual hosting account for each customer and install about 50KB of files on account creation including a default template, initial set-up script (handles DB install, initial population of data and basic settings amongst other things) and a few basic front end control scripts such as the contact form, in saying this we don't provide access to the hosting account, all interaction is via our web app. In our case this is regardless if a sub-domain or fully qualified domain. Our customers have the option of self-hosting their domain or we will host it, because we have complete cPanel hosting infrastructure it makes no difference to us where DNS is but if the customer has it away from us it is entirely their responsibility.
The reason we have this hosting set up is so customers can upload their own templates, for disk storage management (we aren't interested in being a file server but customers need some space for PDFs, images, etc) and to make sure the content of 1 customer doesn't get mixed in with the content of another. As a premium paid-for service our lawyers recommended a minimum of separate identifiable folders on the server for file storage.
Another example is blogger/blogspot, it is well known they use mod_rewrite for their sub-domains. This is appropriate for them to do it this way otherwise they would have to create a separate DNS zone for each blog at a minimum and this is a pain (hence why we use cPanel), plus you have all your other virtual hosting set-ups.
With mod_rewrite as you will be aware it will use a single wild-card zone to control the sub-domains and the mod_rewrite rule is easy to apply. From there it is simply creating a folder and redirecting requests for the sub-domain to it or directing to the script to control your app depending on what you're doing.
The truth is for an automated system using sub-domains I would use mod_rewrite but for something a bit more complex like a fully blown premium CMS requiring full legal conformity, quota management, suspend, terminate and file removal functions then I would recommend looking at a hosting control panel such as cPanel as a possible solution.
You've got the right idea. You keep a single codebase, running (for the sake of argument) on a single IP. You don't need to worry about virtual hosts, or even mod_rewrite (aside from whatever your application needs).
You web app simply handles any and all requests to that IP (on port 80 or 443, or whatever).
When your application bootstraps in response to a request, it peeks at $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'], and configures itself for the client associated with that domain name. If not found, it 404s, or whatever makes the most sense.