Managing your domains in cPanel
July 18th, 2008 Posted in Building my websitesWelcome to my domain
There are many wonderful things you can do with domain names, and cPanel helps you to do them all extremely easily.
Before looking at the how, let’s look at the what … ie what are all these different things you can do with your domains?
I host all my domains with nativespace.co.uk on a multi-domain hosting package.
However, when I signed up to nativespace.co.uk I had to give a top level domain to start off the account.
This was done via this domain name … a domain name I don’t use for public consumption, it’s a just a place to park a few bits and pieces which are password protected.
Subdomains
First to subdomains, which are separate sections or off-shoots of a main domain.
This is my top level domain but I can add lots of sub-sections to this domain.
cPanel describes subdomains like this:
Subdomains are URLs for different sections of your website. They use your main domain name and a prefix. For example, if your domain is xxxxxxx.co.uk a sub-domain of your domain might be ’support.xxxxxxx.co.uk’
As you’ll see below, all of my websites can be reached as subdomains, but because of the type of hotsing package I have, they are also addon domains.
Addon domains are always much better than subdomains if you’re pointing people to a completely different website.
However, if you’re pointing people to a different section of your website ie support.xxxxxxx.co.uk, training.xxxxxxx.co.uk, payments.xxxxxxxx.co.uk then they’re fine.
Addon domains
All my other other accounts are linked to one multi-domain account … with this domain name at the top level.
My hosting package allows me to make these ‘addon domains’, which is much better and neater than endless subdomains, particularly as all my sites have their own editorial integrity.
cPanel describes addon domains like this:
An addon domain allows you to reach a sub-domain when entering the name of the addon domain into a browser. This means that you can host additional domains from your account, if allowed by your hosting provider.
It basically means that on a multi-domain account, you can add the prescribed number of domains, and you will be able to reach them directly from a regular URL.
So for instance, because this is your top level domain , you can reach scrap-yard.co.uk via the regular route and via this less familar link, which is actually what a subdomain would look like.
Well if you click on that link, you’ll see that it actually works.
It takes you to the original holding page I made when creating this site … the main live site has a redirect on it which now takes you away from this page, but it’s still there hovering in cyberspace.
However, as the cPanel description suggests, the difference with an addon domain is that you don’t have to access it via the rather tortuous route, you can actually go straight to the proper domain name (ie scrap-yard.co.uk ).
All of the following domains are hosted on the one account, and they’ve all been added via cPanel.
I’ve added the ‘weird’ subdomain URLs after each web address, to show that you can still actually reach those sites via the more cumbersome route.
Note though that most of these live sites now have a redirect in place (more on that later!) so in many cases you’ll be taken to an index page which is no longer accessible via the ‘live’ sites.
Redirects
Every website should start with a page called index, and every sub-folder within a website should start with a page called index (though they often don’t!).
It might be index.html, index.shtml, index.htm etc, but it must be called index at the highest level of the site, and should be called index in sub-folders.
When you click on the URL http://laptopmanpaul.co.uk you are actually taken to the page http://laptopmanpaul.co.uk/it_chat/ … that’s because I’ve put a redirect in place.
Normally your browser would take you to http://laptopmanpaul.co.uk/index.htm (or .html, or .shtml etc) but in this case, no such page exists because I’m using Wordpress.
When you click on http://laptopmanpaul.co.uk the redirect tells your brower to go to http://laptopmanpaul.co.uk/it_chat/ instead … it’s an instruction I’ve made in cPanel.
You can often write this instruction on the header of a web page, but cPanel makes it easier to set up and manage these redirects.
Click on some on my websites above and you’ll see that many of them have redirects in place.
cPanel describes redirects like this:
Redirects allow you to make a specific web page redirect to another page and display the contents of that page. This way you can make a page with a long URL accessible by a page which has a shorter and easier to remember URL.
Parked domains
cPanel describes parked domains like this:
Parked Domains (Domain pointers) allow you to “point” or “park” additional domain names to your existing hosting account. This will allow users to also reach your website when entering the “parked” or “pointed” domain into their browsers.
My trips4kids.com website is a good example of a parked domain.
This site - when I get around to building it - will eventually be a travel site for an international audience, though it will start as a UK site.
All my other sites are for a UK audience, so there’s no need for the .com extension.
However, I have bought the domains trips4kids.co.uk and trips4kids.com, but I want both domains to point to the latter … they’re both the same website basically.
So in the case of this parked domain, trips4kids.co.uk = trips4kids.com.
Creating an addon domain
Most of the time you’ll want to create addon domains rather than subdomains.
However, if your package allows you to create an addon domain, you’ll actually create a subdomain automatically at the same time … you just won’t use it.
First click on the ’Addon Domains’ icon in the cPanel homepage.
To create a new addon domain, simply enter your domain into the box marked ‘New Domain Name; … no http://www is required, just enter fredbloggs.co.uk or whatever your domain is.
cPanel then does the rest … it gives you a green tick to confirm you’ve entered the domain correctly, then fills in the ‘Subdomain/Ftp Username’ and ‘Document Root’ boxes for you.
Generate your password (write it down!), click on ‘Add Domain!’ and it’s done.
Note: Addon Domains will not work unless the domain name is registered with a valid registrar and set up to point point at your hosting company’s servers.
You can’t just buy a domain name, fill in the boxes below and expect it to work … you have to set your nameservers up first.
Creating a subdomain
Remember, if your hosting package allows you to create addon domains, it automatically creates these as subdomains at the same time … you just won’t use them.
Creating a subdomain in cPanel is perfectly straightforward … click on the ‘Subdomains’ icon in the cPanel homepage.
Next, just add whatever you want your subdomain to be called … support, guides, info etc.
cPanel completes the document route box for you, all you have to do is click the ‘Create’ button … easy!
Create a new parked domain
First click on the Parked domains icon in the cPanel homepage.
Simply add your domain details - minus the http://www, click ‘Add Domain!’ and you’re done.
Remember though, domains must be registered with a valid registrar before they can be parked and they will not be functional unless they are configured to point to your hosting company’s servers.
Redirects
Remember, a redirect simply instructs a browser to go to another destination of your choosing.
When anybody clicks on http://mybusinesswebsite.co.uk you might actually want them to land on http://mybusinesswebsite.co.uk/my_business_products/index.htm … redirects are the neat way of achieving this.
First click on the ’Redirects’ icon in the cPanel homepage.
You’ll be presented with the panel below.
cPanel tells you that ‘A permanent redirect will notify the visitor’s browser to update any bookmarks that are linked to the page that is being redirected. Temporary redirects will not update the visitor’s bookmarks.
I usually make mine permanent redirects.
In the http://www. dropdown menu, select the domain that you are redirecting from in the list of options given.
If I’ve created a top level index.htm page, I usually create two redirects just to be thorough.
Redirect 1 would be mywebsite.co.uk / and redirect 2 would be mywebsite.co.uk / index.htm if I had an index page in use.
In the ‘redirects to’ box, just cut and paste the entire URL that you want to redirect users to.
Select ‘Redirect with or without www.’ as modern domain names work without or without the www.
I tend not to use ‘Wild Card Redirect’ routinely, this is for more advanced purposes than I want to cover in this post.
Click on the ‘Add’ button and you’re done.
By way of example, here’s a real-life redirect on one of my sites:
Redirect 1:
redirects to
http://www.webcumbria.co.uk/content_section/
Redirect 2:
http://www.webcumbria.co.uk/index.htm
redirects to
http://www.webcumbria.co.uk/content_section/
If you’ve any tips or questions about these processes, please use the comments form below.
And finally …
Remember: These practical tips by no means aim to replace the cpanel manual, but hopefully they’ll help to get you started really quickly and painlessly.
Also make full use of the excellent videos available within cPanel and this extremely useful unofficial guide.
Also, for much more detailed guidance, siteground.com has an excellent step-by-step guide to everything related to cPanel.
See more cPanel posts on laptopmanpaul.co.uk
Back-ups, managing files and FTP accounts in cPanel
Managing email options in cPanel
Fantastico, php and MySQL databases in cPanel
