Change of Root Domain

[korsakov]

Is there any golden strategy how to safely exchange a Root Domain without harming the attached Sub-Domains? Thank you!

[iceflatline]

Not sure exactly what you mean by "exchange," but if you mean rebuild/replace the site at maindomain.com, your addon domains are located in their own directories so you should be okay as long as you leave those alone.

[korsakov]

I need to transfer the current Root domain to a former client and therefore have to replace the current Root domain with another domain. If I do this I am afraid that I will lose the current content of the Sub-domains.

[farcaster]

Back up your material to your local PC, including any databases that you may have used. Don't forget any .htaccess files that you may have modified.

If you created any email accounts, you will have to temporarily delete those and recreate them under the new domain name.

In the new domain recreate the addon/subdomains and reload your scripts/databases/support material, etc. Re-make the email addresses.

There may be a few other items you'll need to take care of depending upon your situation. Once you have everything functional you should be able to go back and safely delete the information from the original domain, if that is part of the deal.

[korsakov]

Thank you so much!
So, what does it mean to temporarily delete the email accounts? I assume that the content will be lost!?

[farcaster]

Yes, it would be lost. But you could always retrieve them to your local email client. Then you have them locally - which is what you should be doing anyway so you don't run into the 50K file limit later.

[korsakov]

Thank you! Btw, I just found a good help link: http://helpdesk.bluehost.com/index.p...article/000345 . Maybe it'll be helpful for other people.

[felgall]

One way to transfer email accounts without losing any email addresses that can be used provided that you have another email address you can redirect the emails to temporarily.

1. Create the email addresses on the new server with the same names as on the old server.
2. Set up the email addresses on the old server to redirect all mail to a separate email address not being moved.
3. Now change the nameservers to redirect the domain to the new hosting.

While the domain propagation is in progress emails received on the old hosting will be redirected to the separate account while those received on the new hosting wiill be delivered to the new account. (You may need to update your hosts file to make sure your computer goes to the new hosting throughout).

[korsakov]

Thank you, Stephen! Great post!