If you own a website, you may eventually encounter a situation where you will need to change your domain name. This is not something that occurs all that often, but it can and does happen. According to experts in the field, it can be a little challenging to change domain names, especially if you’ve never done so before and there are lots of opportunities to make serious mistakes along the way. (By the way, you can visit my website for good domain names for sale.)
However, it can be done and if you’d like to know how to change your domain name without causing yourself too many problems, read on to see how it’s done.
One of the simplest ways of changing domain names involves using mod_rewrite and your .htaccess file. Please note that this is something which is applicable to websites with dynamically generated content (like WordPress and other content management system based sites); the process could be somewhat different with static HTML/XHTML websites, depending on your webhosting firm’s setup.
So what is mod_rewrite and for that matter, what’s an .htaccess file?
Mod_rewrite is an Apache module which handles the rewriting of URLs before they’re displayed to the user. This is a simple and straightforward method of customising the address the visitor to the site sees, rather than a method of changing domain names as such. When you use mod_rewrite on your website, visitors will navigate to your site using the usual address, but once they arrive they will see the URL of your choice in their browser bar; this allows you to make your website a little easier for visitors to make their way around as well as more search engine friendly.
An .htaccess file, on the other hand, is a file which contains Apache-specific commands for redirects, security and other issues as well as error handling. This file is necessary when changing the URL displayed to your visitors and since Apache is a very common server which is used by many great websites; on sites which use Apache, this file makes changing domain names (or displayed URLs) a much smoother process.
Before you begin working on changing the domain name that your visitors see, you need to ensure that your web hosting company supports mod_rewrite; you will also need need to register and activate the new domain name for your site. As long as the site’s structure remains unchanged, the transition should be relatively smooth.
If you are changing your domain name, you will need to create a new .htaccessfile. You can create or edit this file using any text editor you like (notepad works fine). The file does not need any extension; it is just called .htaccess. Keep in mind that when you change domain names, your old domain name will appear in the browser’s title bar, but the content will be viewed under the new name. There are other issues involved in changing domain names, but they’re a matter for another day.
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