hiding plus.net urls for redirected domain

[#1]

Hi,
I'm in the process of setting up a website using the plusnet webspace but with a redirected domain from 123-reg. Ideally, I don't want the visitor to (easily) see that the domain is being redirected and I'm guessing I need to use htaccess to achieve this so this leads me to my questions:
1. does .htaccess work for webspace or just for the cgi space?
2. if it does work (I haven't been able to get it working so far) is it possible to get my links (images, etc) to reference the redirected domain?
3. bonus question: how can I get the full page name e.g. www.directeddomain.com/secondpage.html to appear in address bar?
Apologies if this has been answered elsewhere. I did look.
Cheers,
Adam.

[#2]

See this
http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,82792.msg681295.html#msg681295

[#3]

thanks for the reply but if I've read it right I think the link explains how to do the website redirection from 123-reg. I've managed to get that far - I can go to www.redirecteddomain.com and see my plus.net webspace. The problem I am having is trying to hide the plus.net information when I hover over links.
Adam.

[#4]

When you hover over links it shows the HTML anchor (href) information built into the page. You can change that to whatever domain URL information you want to be shown.
Then ensure your .htaccess file contains mod_rewrite rules to internally rewrite the URL if necessary to match where files are stored. You might have to set RewriteBase to ensure any URL created for redirection matches the domain name format you want to be shown on the address line.

[#5]

Still struggling. Just to make sure I am not missing something obvious, here's my setup.
1. domain redirected from 123reg using "Framed web-forwarding"
2. .htaccess put into htdocs directory of webspace (via ftp.plus.net)
3. htaccess tested with
RewriteEngine on
ErrorDocument 404 "<b>Page Not Found</b><p /><br /><a href="index.html">Return to homepage</a>
4. Tried to add the following but always get an error:
Options +FollowSymlinks
5. html pages containing references to pages in the root directory, like the following, always get redirected correctly
<a href="http://www.123regdomain/index.html">Home</a>
6. Any images that go through the lightbox jquery plug-in don't work if 123regdomain is referenced (they work fine for relative or absolute plusnet references).

[#6]

Framed web forwarding is a very bad idea. Google will not see your website at the proper address but instead at the Plus Net address.
I had exactly the same setup many years ago but changed for this reason.
Your best option is to use a proper hosting company for the domain and the webspace. I had some issues with 123-reg several years ago. I would personally recommend moving everything to a small hosting package with Eukhost for about £30/year and £6/year for the domain. Then you would have cPanel and all the features and options that comes with that.

[#7]

Thanks for the advice Sean. Having signed up with 123-reg for the year and with plus.net being my ISP, I think I'll attempt to make the best of it for the moment. One thing I was wondering was the difference I'd see if I got plus.net to host the domain rather than use it as a redirect. Because the webspace is still <username>.plus.com could I (now) do absolute references to my123domain.com and not see any references to <username>.plus.com? Likewise, should it improve my google visibility?

[#8]

I used to use the framed web forwarding from 123-reg to my PlusNet webspace but, as you've found, it's a bit tatty. I got PlusNet to host my domain, and as far as I'm aware it's now working pretty much as required and expected, so it can be done.
It was some time last year that I did this so I don't remember the details fully, but I think you first need to set your domain name (at 123-reg) to use the PlusNet name servers (I think you've already done that). You also need to get PlusNet to host the domain, and have the DNS records at the PlusNet end set such that your domain name points at the PlusNet web server. I think at least some of this has to be done by raising a ticket rather than being able to DIY because the web server has to be set up to expect requests for your domain or something.
I've tried looking back through My Questions to get the details but I can't see how to view the entire thread of a given ticket. That's unfortunate because I seem to recall that it was mucked up a bit and it would be useful if I could get at the details of what went wrong. If anyone can tell me how to view the entire threads of a raised Question I'll take another look.
Take a look at this thread for a bit more information.

[#9]

Quote from: Boxersoft

I've tried looking back through My Questions to get the details but I can't see how to view the entire thread of a given ticket. That's unfortunate because I seem to recall that it was mucked up a bit and it would be useful if I could get at the details of what went wrong. If anyone can tell me how to view the entire threads of a raised Question I'll take another look.

When the Help Assistant was updated the facility to 'expand all selected tickets' was removed. I understand it placed a high load on the server since lots of database queries were needed. This makes it more difficult to locate a particular ticket if the exact date isn't known.
However once the required ticket is located clicking the ticket number (or view on the right) shows the entire history for me.

[#10]

Thanks - the items I looked at seemed to have a single comment per ticket number, but I've found the relevant one now and it does indeed have the full history.
The steps seem to have been:

• Change domain's nameservers (at 123-reg) to the Force9 (PlusNet) ones.
  


• Request domain transfer in, HOSTING ONLY

And, if pointing at the ccgi server:

• Raise a ticket requesting the CGI service to be changed to 'basic' (whatever that means)

Note that although it should apparently take no more than 4hrs for the nameservers to respond to the domain once 'brought in' to PlusNet, it took 12+ hrs for mine.
The problems seem to have been related to setting up the DNS records so that both [domain] and www.[domain] pointed where I wanted them (the ccgi server). I don't have a record of what was tried but the settings that worked were:

Left field	Type	Right Field
[domain name]	A	84.92.1.4
www	CNAME	ccgi.plus.net. [Note the trailing full stop]

If you want to point at a server other than the CGI server, change the IP address accordingly.
Hope that's of some use.

[#11]

So far so good - thanks for the advice everyone. I did the name server transfer, raised the ticket for the hosting, and now everything looks how I want it (not a plus.net reference to be seen anywhere on my site).
My final step is to get a form mail page going. I'm sure someone must have been through the pain of setting this up from scratch before. Can anybody point me at something (forum post, tutorial, example, etc) that works well with the plus.net set up? Boxersoft talked about changing the DNS records to point at ccgi.plus.net. Is this necessary when hosting an external domain?
Adam.

[#12]

Quote from: adaml

Boxersoft talked about changing the DNS records to point at ccgi.plus.net. Is this necessary when hosting an external domain?

Depends what you want to do. If you just want static HTML pages then the Home Pages platform would be fine. It may provide some off-the-peg snippets that you can bolt on to give some dynamic capabilities, but I don't know. I wanted access to a programming language and database for creating dynamic pages, so I pointed at the ccgi platform that provides those services.