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#18521 Virtual domain support

Posted in ‘Admin Tools for Joomla! 4 & 5’
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Latest post by nicholas on Monday, 16 December 2013 10:49 CST

perthcity
 Hi Nicholas,

I am planning to create a website that has several variations(multisite). I would like to achieve this by creating virtual domains using the virtual domain extension. ( http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/core-enhancements/multiple-sites/7557 )

My concern is if the admin tools and the akeeba backup(cloud backups) would be compatible with this.

Any other suggestions would also be appreciated to better support this kind of set up.

Thank you :)

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
Admin Tools' .htaccess Maker is not fully compatible with multisites extensions. Everything else is.

While Akeeba Backup can backup multisite web sites it is NOT advisable. You can only backup the master site, including all its slave sites. This means that in case of a catastrophic failure in a single site you are obliged to roll back ALL SITES.

While multisites sound like a good idea you will quickly find out that the problems that come with a solution like this are much more severe than whatever problems you think you are solving.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

perthcity
Thank you for the reply.

You can only backup the master site, including all its slave sites. This means that in case of a catastrophic failure in a single site you are obliged to roll back ALL SITES.

I think I am confused with this whole virtual domain concept.

I thought I will be setting up a main joomla site.

Under this joomla site, I will have menus and templates & assign it to each virtual domain created using the freely available extension (Virtual domain). I need all the domains to have different menus and templates. (Some have same menu items).

And I want the main site to have a search function so that the other virtual domains can be searched easily...

So if the main site fails, every website will eventually fail. I understand up to this point.

If the site is broken or hacked, will I be able to recover the main site? (The main site basically has all the data from other virtual domains. )

Then install the virtual domain extension and set up the domains & good to go?

I do not even need to install virtual domain extension if the backup has already been finalised when the website(s) is set up correctly.

Please also note that there will NOT be separate joomla installations on each domain like Multisites

I do not want to have problems down the track (I cannot recover the site in case of emergency etc).

What would be the best way to solve this multisite issue?

I do not mind if I have to create fresh joomla setup on each domain if this is the best way to approach this problem.
Thank you.

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
Sorry, I think I got confused with some other multisite extensions.

Now that you explained to me how it works I better understand its description at the Joomla! Extensions Directory. Indeed, the extension you chose seems to simply redirect specific domains to specific menu items in the same Joomla! site. It is not a multisite solution, it's a clever trick which leverages core Joomla! features.

So, let me answer your questions again:

1. Is Admin Tools compatible with it? Yes, except the .htaccess Maker. The .htaccess Maker needs to know the domain name of your site to prevent redirection loops and simply because some of its features require the domain name to be hardcoded in the .htaccess File. Since your site will have multiple domain names this is no longer possible and you must not use .htaccess Maker.

2. Is Akeeba Backup compatible with it? Since you only have one site, yes, it is. As far as Akeeba Backup is concerned you have one Joomla! site. Yes, it listens to multiple domain names and serves a different page on each one of them, but it's one Joomla! installation. So yes, you can recover the entire site in a snap should there be a problem.

So, to make this clear: the extension you are using is not a multi-sites extension, it's a multi-domains extension. Joomla! already supports having multiple "sub-sites" in one installation. See the default English sample content in Joomla! 3. The extension you chose simply does a cool trick: instead of having to go to a specific menu item of the main site to see each sub-site it allows you to just use a domain name. Very neat trick, indeed. But you still have a single Joomla! site, which means that Akeeba Backup can still work with it.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

perthcity
If I cannot backup the site at all, then there is no point of setting up the virtual domains.

I will be using all other features of admintools like WAF on virtual domains...

Thank you for clearing all the questions I have had in my mind - this one was a big one!

See the default English sample content in Joomla! 3

I cannot find this on the internet. Is this the sample content comes with every fresh J3 installation?
If it is a core feature, will I still need this extension?

I will have a look at the sample content also :)

Thanks again for your support and hope you code something incredible today :D

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
> If I cannot backup the site at all, then there is no point of setting up the virtual domains.

As I said, you can backup the entire site. As far as Akeeba Backup is concerned you have a single site (which incidentally contains the data for every "sub-site" which is not really a site but a menu item and a trick to make it look as if it is a different site).

> I cannot find this on the internet. Is this the sample content comes with every fresh J3 installation?

Yes.

> If it is a core feature, will I still need this extension?

As I said:

The extension you chose simply does a cool trick: instead of having to go to a specific menu item of the main site to see each sub-site it allows you to just use a domain name.


If you want each domain name to direct to a different "site" then yes, you need that extension.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

perthcity
Hi Nicolas,

Thank you. I can sleep well tonight :)

you have a single site (which incidentally contains the data for every "sub-site" which is not really a site but a menu item and a trick to make it look as if it is a different site).


So does this mean the virtual domains are like ghost sites?

Search engines wont be able to index them?

If you want each domain name to direct to a different "site" then yes, you need that extension.


Awesome!



nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
> So does this mean the virtual domains are like ghost sites?

Technically, they are different menus on the same site. There is no such thing as a "ghost site" :)

> Search engines wont be able to index them?

Of course they will be indexed.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

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