DotNetNuke Parent Portal and Hosting DNS Setting.

You may skip this paragraph. Taking a break of the day, Headache always killing me. My eyes is very tired a really need to keep away from monitors, thank god Chinese New Year is around the corner and I can escape from this information overloaded world.

Back to the topic (Skip this paragraph for direct guide) . In traditional hosting, you’re only able to host one domain in one hosting. The Domain Alias function is like domain redirection or domain parking which all point back to the main domain hosting account. However, with DotNetNuke, you are able to host different domains hosting under one hosting account by utilizing the Portal Alias function in DotNetNuke (DNN) and Domain Alias in your hosting.

Domain Alias which also known as Host Header in technical terms, always confuse people that search for answer on creating Parent Portal in DotNetNuke. Because Shared Hosting does not allow you to have the privilege to configure the server’s IIS, the hosting control panel often provided with Domain Alias feature to allow user to configure the IIS in restricted / safer manner.

Using Plesk Control Panel for example, Normally you will see the Domain Alias on the Domain Setting panel, click on the ‘add Domain Alias’ and you will see this:

Make Sure to Check on the 3 options provided in the first time or you will not able to access to the parent portal later.

*Apply to some version of Plesk only, if you cannot access to the parent portal later, try delete the domain alias and recreate again.

**Sometimes, you’ll need to restart the DNS Service to make it work. To do this, simply click on the button as demonstrated in the picture below:

That’s it. Below is the summarized steps and notes in creating Parent Portal in DotNetNuke and hosting DNS / Host Header setting:

Steps:
1. Login to your domain control panel and point it to your Hosting Account. It also known as NameServer pointing. Please remember to wait for the DNS propagation which takes about 12-72 hours before your domain successfully point to the right server.

*Note: If you’re in a rush, you can modify your Operating System DNS to access the website. Here’s the configuration:

I. Identify where is your workstation Hosts file.
Linux / Unix = /etc/Hosts
Windows 3.1/95/98ME = c:\windows\Hosts
Windows NT/2000/XP Pro = c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc\Hosts or c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\Hosts
Windows XP Home = c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\Hosts
Netware = SYS:ETC/Hosts
Apple = System Folder:Preferences and in the System Folder itself

II. After you have identified the location of respective Hosts File, you may open it with text editor such as notepad under Windows Operating System.
III. As for your case, kindly add the following entry to the Hosts file and it will tell your workstation to direct the domain traffic to respective server.

111.11.11.11       example.com

IV. You may now proceed to save the Hosts file and try to browse it from your web browser.
V. Once you have done the testing, you may remove the entry from the Hosts File.
VI. test it in command prompt. cmd > ping www.example.com see if the IP is same with your main hosting account.

2. On your Hosting Control Panel, Domain Alias > Add Domain Alias > Type your domain name without www, check the 3 options if you’re using Plesk.

***There’s no need to change the DNS Records for your Domain Alias, it will automatically created if you’re using Plesk or Helm.
* Try to restart the DNS service if not working.

3. Login as Host in your main DotNetNuke installation.
Go to Host > Portals > Add Portal > type the domain without www and fill out other details > Create.

* If you encounter error when creating portal, most likely it is because of the file permission problem set by your host, contact them to fix it.

4. Done.

Updates

1. If you’re creating a sub-domain, there’s no need to follow the above setting. All you need is to click ‘add sub domain’ in your Plesk Control Panel.

2. However, you do not need to create Physical Directory for your sub domain. DNN will create one for you.

3. Now, go to DNN Portal Setting (Host > Portals) to add a child portal and that’s it.

Keynotes:
1. Make sure to restart your DNS Services if your domain redirect to default Plesk Page.
2. There’s no need to configure Host Header Manually in IIS if you’re using Control Panel like HELM or Plesk.
3. Make sure your Hosting Provider allow you to create Domain Alias.
4. There’s no need to change your Domain Alias DNS Records!

That’s all. Good luck.

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4. Server Down – Maintaining a Server – Commons Problems of Web Hosting.
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