Question about setting up a website within a website

[kranky]

I am running a web site for a friend which is hosted by an outside company. He said I could do anything I want with it as long as what I do on the side doesn't interfere with his regular site. Bandwidth and storage are not an issue because his agreement already covers tons more bandwidth and storage than he is using now.

In other words, he doesn't care if I host video files as long as it doesn't appear to be part of his site in any way. So if his site is www.foobar.com, nothing I host there can appear to be linked to, or hosted by, foobar.com.

How is this done?

 

[notfred]

register a second domain w/ the same IP address. then www.foobar.com and www.somewhereelse.com can both go to the same site. he uses foobar, you use somewhereelse.

 

[manly]

On top of what notfred said, Name-based virtual hosting with whatever web server he's using.

 

[TheDiggler]

And to be absolutely certain people know you're not part of www.foobar.com, register and use the domain name www.notfoobar.com! 😀

 

[kranky]

I'm missing something. If I register a second domain name (let's use TheDiggler's bright idea of NOTfoobar.com 🙂 ) that maps to the same IP, what happens if someone goes to www.NOTfoobar.com? Won't it display the regular home page of foobar.com? Eventually the DNS name gets mapped to an IP, and there can be only one default page for that IP, right?

FWIW, the hosting company says they do not support subdomain accounts. I don't know if that rules out name-based virtual hosting, but it sounds like it.

 

[joinT]

Originally posted by: manly
On top of what notfred said, Name-based virtual hosting with whatever web server he's using.

you need to get this setup.

oops, just read this...

FWIW, the hosting company says they do not support subdomain accounts. I don't know if that rules out name-based virtual hosting, but it sounds like it.

subdomain accounts I believe means something like.. http://kranky.foobar.com

but I also don't see how a web host could afford to let more than one site share an account. It's them you need to convince & I doubt you'll be able to unfortunately.

 

[TheDiggler]

Originally posted by: kranky
I'm missing something. If I register a second domain name (let's use TheDiggler's bright idea of NOTfoobar.com 🙂 ) that maps to the same IP, what happens if someone goes to www.NOTfoobar.com? Won't it display the regular home page of foobar.com? Eventually the DNS name gets mapped to an IP, and there can be only one default page for that IP, right?

FWIW, the hosting company says they do not support subdomain accounts. I don't know if that rules out name-based virtual hosting, but it sounds like it.

Most of today's web servers support something called Virtual Web Sites. It's a concept which allows you to run multiple web sites on a single web server. The web server fowards the request to the appropriate web-site by inspecting the incoming URL.

If the incoming URL is www.foobar.com, the web server uses a DOCUMENT ROOT DIRECTORY belonging to the foobar site.

If the incoming URL is www.NOTfoobar.com, the web server uses a DOCUMENT ROOT DIRECTORY belonging to the NOTfoobar site.

If the incoming URL is an IP address only (or some other undefined domain name), it'll forward the request to whatever is defined as the DEFAULT DOCUMENT ROOT DIRECTORY.

I hope this clears things up for you.

*EDIT* Forgot to mention 1 minor detail: YOU HAVE TO CONFIGURE YOUR WEB SERVER TO HANDLE THE VIRTUAL WEB SITES! :Q

 

[kranky]

Thanks for the help, everyone. Since I have no control over the actual web server, I guess this can't be done. I wish I hadn't already got my hopes up, though. 😕

 

[Superwormy]

You might be able to get the domainname to point to a directory within the website.

Alternatively, if you have access to PHP, you could edit the index.htm file to automatically redirect users accesingy www.yournewwebsite.com to a subdirectory...