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Creating a DNN Parent Portal 

This post was inspired by a question in the dotnetnuke.com forums and continues our “DNN for Beginners” series.

I am new to DNN and I am looking for instructions on installing one portal per domain name. These portals are independent of each other. I want them to use the same SQL Server database and use the same DNN code base (the same Dlls).

The ability to run multiple websites from one DNN installation has been touted by many as the number one feature over the years (especially in DNN’s infancy), even though I beg to differ. That’s food for another post though.

DNN allows you set up a second website or portal on your install as a “parent” or “child” portal. The only real difference is that parent portals have a unique domain name, whereas child portals run off of parent portals such as mysite.com/childportal.

To get back to the above question, here is how to create a parent portal. Login as SuperUser and navigate to Host | Portals. Here you’ll see a list of all portals running on this DNN install. From the action menu choose Add New Portal.

DNN Portals

“Parent” is checked by default as the Portal Type, so no need to change that. Next, enter the domain name the new site will live on into the Portal Alias field such as my-new-site.com. A word of caution. When it comes to parent portals, the “my-new-site.com” domain name must already point correctly to your DNN install, otherwise the parent portal creation will fail. Most hosting providers support multiple domains pointing to a single IIS website at no additional cost.

Add New Portal

The Title, Description and Keywords fields are optional at this point. You can always enter these once the new portal is up and running. You do have to choose an install template though. For this discussion let’s go with the default DotNetNuke template. I’m currently working on a post that will shed some more light on DNN install templates and how to create your own.

Up next are the Security Settings. Pay attention in this section, because the user you specify here will be the initial administrator for the new portal. Once that’s done, click “Create Portal” and if everything goes well, a “fresh” DNN portal will appear. First thing you should do is log in with the admin account you just created. After logging in successfully, you can safely assume that your new parent portal is alive and well.

Do you have anything to add? Feel free to do so in the comments. And if you like this post, consider subscribing to my full feed RSS or get blog updates by email.




Comments

Vasilis Vasilis says:

A closer look into the installation templates will surely be very useful too! And not just for newbies :) Keep it up buddy!

Jeff Kershner Jeff Kershner says:

What does this mean:
When it comes to parent portals, the “my-new-site.com” domain name must already point correctly to your DNN install, otherwise the parent portal creation will fail. Most hosting providers support multiple domains pointing to a single IIS website at no additional cost.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Jeff - that means that the “my-new-site.com” domain name must point to your hosting providers name servers and a DNS entry must be in place to point the domain name to your website ... all with the goal of reaching your DNN install via my-new-site.com.

Let me know if you have further questions.

Jeff Jeff says:

So my doing a nslookup for my domain name: doorywebsolutions.com, I see that it resolves to my hosting account. Looks like step 1 works...

You mentions that a DNS entry must be in place to point the domain name to my website. Well, when I create a parent portal in DNN, is my website the the install directory to my dotnetnuke (www.azlocals.com/dotnetnuke) or do I need to point it to a sub directory in that installation?

Thanks for your fast reply!

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Point all your domains to the root of your DNN install. DNN will sort it out from there.

Jeff Jeff says:

I have my www.doorywebsolutions.com mapped to my DNN installation directory (www.azlocals.com/dotnetnuke).

I created a parent portal for doorywebsolutions.

But when I visit www.doorywebsolutions.com, my browser just goes to www.azlocals.com/dotnetnuke.

What might I be doing wrong?

Dan Cernese Dan Cernese says:

same here!

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

And you guys are sure that you added the domain name of your new parent portal as a DNN portal alias?

pucca pucca says:

how to point the alias(e.g. my-own-web.com) to your root(127.0.0.1) in XP? what file I need to update.
How to create a new portal template? Thank you so much.

Pucca

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Edit your Windows host file to tie my-own-web.com to 127.0.0.1. See mvps.org/winhelp2002/hostsfaq.htm for more info.

The default portal template (DotNetNuke.template) is located in \Portals\_default. So just open that file in a text editor, make your desired changes and "save as" your own template.

Let me know if I should blog more about that process.

pucca pucca says:

Tom,
thank you for the information. I have new in the setup the portal in DNN. here is what I tried for the portal alias:
1. go the hosts file enter one entry
127.0.0.1 my-own-site.com
2. go to IIS control to set up
2.1 a virtual directory to my-own-site.com and mape to the real directory
2.2 right click the directory, go to the property ->directory security tab ->authentification control -> browse -> andd IUser and ASPNET user
3. bring up the DNN ->host ->protal -> alias=my-own-site.com custom the directory to the directory I set in the IIS.
But it idoes not work. Can u tell me what is the problem?

Can you paste more detail information one the portal template part. I would like to set up couple options templates(beside dotnetnuke) when I create a new portal. Thank you So much.

pucca

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Pucca - did you ever resolve the above?

Club1Ten Club1Ten says:

I am trying to add a portal. I go through all of the steps as outlined above, but when I go to the new address, it defaults back to the primary portal. I can't find anywhere to access the new portal.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Club1Ten - has the DNS been set up correctly, meaning “my-new-site.com” points to your DNN install?

Travis D. Falls Travis D. Falls says:

When you say set up your DNS, should I point the DNS at my folder for my parent portal, or for the DNN install? Meaning should I point my dns at the portal/01 dir?

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Travis - point the DNS to your DNN install ... DNN will sort it out from there.

Vengaboys Vengaboys says:

This blog post http://dnchannel.blogspot.com/2008/07/programmatically-creating-dotnetnuke.html shows how to create a portal programmatically using the DotNetNuke API.

Barry Barry says:

This does not work as advertised, and I cannot find a detailed, accurate, effective piece of documentation on this feature anywhere. It is quite frustrating.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Barry - what exactly did you run into?

Barry Barry says:

I take that back! I actually just got it to work!

Barry Barry says:

Well, when I first set it up, i followed the advise in the top of this thread and it did not work. I just got a .NET application error, but then I realized that I had not set my new site to use .NET 2.0 in IIS. I tweaked this setting in IIS (I'm running Win Srvr 2003 Std ) and it worked.

Now, I have several sites running on the same dotnetnuke install.

URL1: www.enecms.com
URL2: beta.pauline.org

Both running on the exact same DNN install. Latest version, by the way, with SQL 2005 SP2

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Well done Barry and thanks for sharing.

Amrit Ray Amrit Ray says:

When you say update the DNS and point it to your DNN install, do you mean, 1. Change the name servers on the domain to your hosts name servers, and 2. create an alias for your new domain to your DNN install website?

The new domain surely needs physical hosting on the same server as your DNN install if you wish to create emails on your new domain.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Amrit - that's exactly what I meant. Thanks for elaborating on it.

mark mark says:

RE: "...the “my-new-site.com” domain name must already point correctly to your DNN install..."

I wish to create a new portal from my DNN installation v. 04.05.05.

I want to start developing a parent site before it goes live - so I don't want to point it to the DNN install location just yet.

How can I get around this?

website:
www.sypensions.org.uk (this is the site to be revamped and pointed to DNN - but I don't want to point it to DNN webhost area until I have completed the site.)

When you say:
"it must already point correctly to your DNN install..."
do you mean point to it in IIS - creating a virtual directory?

thanks,
mark


mark mark says:

further to the above comment,

I have since reason to believe that I need to setup a host header in IIS to create another site...

but I'm still having problems.

My DNN installation is on a virtual directory called www.sypensions.org.uk/dnn (the first site is working ok), but I can't create another site.

When creating the host header - I can not right click on the name of the virtual directory (which is called dnn) - this is where my dotnetnuke installation points to.

I can only cretae a host header (in IIS 6) from right clicking on the level above (on sypensions.org.uk website).
New host Header called - 'development.sypensions.org.uk'

I then created a new portal and alias also: 'development.sypensions.org.uk'

When I visit www.development.sypensions.org.uk - I get an error:
"430 Not found, Unable to resolve name"

I also tried development.sypensions.org.uk/dnn as an alias, but this does not work either.

Any ideas?

regards,
mark.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Add development.sypensions.org.uk to the same place where the sypensions.org.uk host header is specified.

mark mark says:

Thanks, I gave up on the host header method - as I couldn't get a new site created this way.

I am thinking that the problem could be due to our firewall perhaps? This mabe why I could only get DNN working in a subfolder of our internet in IIS.

The only way I could get a new site created was to create a new virtual directory in the same IIS subfolder as our original dotnetnuke site with the same path (not sure if this makes sense.)

I then created a new parent portal in DNN with the following address: www.sypensions.org.uk/development/ (our first DNN site was: www.sypensions.org.uk/dnn if you were thinking it looks like a child site).

Is there any reason why not to use virtual directories like this to create a new site?

mark.

apple17 apple17 says:

I have a site where my base install of DNN is at http://www.mysite.com/mydnnsite .

Now I want another portal at http://www.mysite.com/myNEWdnnsite using the same dnn install and database.

Seems to my that this is another PARENT site, but I don't know how to make this happen. Can you advise?

Thanks!

Jonathan Jonathan says:

We also have the same problem of parent aliases all returning the user to the main portal.

Could this have anything to do with our DNN instance being the main IIS website rather than a virtual directory?

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ apple17 - did you try to follow the steps in the post above?

@ Jonathan - the process of creating DNN child / parent portals never requires any IIS involvement such as virtual directory creation.

jed jed says:

Hi tom,
I read your article and I have a question here, how to point the domain name to the DNN install?

Thanks,
Jed

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Jed - you point the domain name to the DNN install by mapping host header values to the website's IP address in IIS. That obviously assumes though that your DNS is set up properly (domain name pointing to your web server.)

I hope to have a screencast version of this blog post as soon as next week.

Tuff Tuff says:

Creating aliases with same domain works fine. Adding another domain name for a child portal only points to main portal. If I direct my new domain to the virtual directory of the child portal, the portal then gives an unrecoverable "Runtime Error" even if I remove the new domain. Help!!!

jmajor jmajor says:

Hi,

I'm still in the dark....sorry.

So, I have an original install of dnn at: www.web-site-ecommerce-consulting.com and logged in and made a parent portal and alias of www.wvosvo.com and wvosvo.com and went into my domain manager and pointed my Arecord to the IP address. When I type in www.wvosvo.com it resolves to: http://www.web-site-ecommerce-consulting.com/websitedesign/

What am I doing wrong?

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Jmajor - Besides configuring your DNS, you also need to go into IIS and add www.wvosvo.com and wvosvo.com as a host headers. If you do not have direct access to IIS, you should be able to do this via your hosting control panel or have your hosting provider do it for you.

Deep Deep says:

Hi Guys,

We are planning to launch one On Demand Portal Solution, based upon DNN 4.9 and the idea is to use multiple portals on single site. But i found one article scaring me to hell while doing this.

http://www.powerdnn.com/AtomicSLA/InformationCenter/tabid/333/ServiceID/3211/Default.aspx

I'm looking for your views and advices on how to mitigate these risks or what is the best way to handle this situation.

Thanx in Advance.

Regards,
Deep

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Deep - I do share some of the concern mentioned in the PowerDNN article in regards to multiple websites on one DNN installation.

What exactly do you have in mind for your "On Demand Portal Solution?"

Deep Deep says:

We have created one HR Portal [custom built app on top of DNN 4.9] and we would like to offer it On Demand model, means companies can just register online [we create a new portal] for trial and after one month if they like it, they pay the subscription and continue using the application. Our model is to offer the solution at low reccuring fee and if we have to setup new instance of DNN for every new free trial, the whole economics will go bit hay wire.

Not sure what is the good way of have the ease of automatic online setup and cost control.

regards,

Manish Manish says:

I have site called

itexnora.org/dotnetnuke

now i want to create new site for V2 in same installation of DotnetNuke

i have another domain
ngogaurdian.org
which is pointing to the dotenetnuke folder of root directory where i have my whole dotnetnuke installation

i have created new portal but it is pointing to same site still
now

how can i resolve

its running on hosting server if i need to do any setting please guide me.

Thanks
Manish



Robert Robert says:

Hey guys,

I have the same problem as Manish!
I've created new portals but I can't access them, only the main domain, the one that I used when I installed DNN.
I've tried to explain it to my hosting company(ixwebhosting), but they don't get it... they advised me to set up alias or redirect but non of those worked...

Please post if you have any solution!

Thanks,
Robert

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Robert - send me your contact info using this form and I'll be in touch to help you out with this.

Once resolved, I'll post the solution here.

manish manish says:

DHi tom

My mail id is
manish.agravat.it@gmail.com



John Vetter John Vetter says:

I am trying to setup multiple portals and I'm running into a strange problem. I have the Parent portal setup and it goes to a domain like somedomain.com/dnn. I have a second portal setup and I have the domain point to the dnn folder but the domain is like mynewdomain.com. When I try and go to the new domain it keeps saying resource not found. When I put in mynewdomain.com/dnn after switching it in the portal setup and point my domain to the root it works. Has anyone seen any issues like that before. Any help would be appreciated.
John

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ John - somedomain.com/dnn is NOT a parent portal, but a child portal. Parent portals have their own domain names like mynewdomain.com.

Ismet Dumlupinar Ismet Dumlupinar says:

I have updated my tutorials for Godaddy users,
It will let you have,
DNN installed at root path of your hosting account.
Multiple parent portals with your own unique domains.
And free support from me as well :)

ergolargo ergolargo says:

Hi Tom

Rather than organising the DNS record in advance of creating a parent portal, would it be sufficient to have an entry in the HOSTS file on the web server hosting the DNN instance - could this be a method to resolve a parent portal's URL to the correct IP address, to allow the parent portal install to complete successfully. In other words, does DNN just need to check that the URL name resolves to the right IP address during the parent portal creation process, and therefore the HOSTS file entry could be used to short cut this verification, in the absence of a DNS record on a name server. This would allow the portal to be created in DNN, and development to proceed, BEFORE the URL is registered on an external name server - of course the web site would only be accessible from machines on the local LAN with the correct HOSTS file entry.

Am I understanding this right?

Regards

Sh@wn Sh@wn says:

Child Portals - get rid of the "?alias="

Let's say that on your corporate intranet, you decided to use the childportal feature of DNN. Unfortunately, when you navigate to the child portal at www.myportal.com/child, you get a URL that says www.myportal.com/default.aspx?alias=child. This isn't the end of the world, but it looks all codey.

Boring Background Information
The reason this happens is that child portals are handled initially by IIS. When you navigate to what IIS sees as a child directory with no page associated, the URL Rewriter module never sees it. It looks straight to the file system and when it doesn't see the folder there, we are going to get a file not found error. In order to get around this, the clever folk who created the sub-portal feature, made it so that when you create a child portal, the system actually creates a physical folder in the file system with a default.aspx dropped in to send you back to the main default.aspx with the alias attached as a parameter and viola, the rewriter module picks up the request and we are back in business. Pretty clever, huh?

Easy Trick
Find the file folder that the child portal creation made (in this case the folder would be called "child"). Inside you will find a file called "default.aspx". Open the default.aspx in notepad and look for the lines of code that say (it should be near the bottom).

DomainName = ServerPath & "Default.aspx?alias=" & DomainName

Response.Redirect(DomainName,True)

Remark out the response.redirect line and replace it with a server.transfer call like so:

'Response.Redirect(DomainName,True)
Server.Transfer(DomainName,True)

Save the file and navigate to your child portal. Now the location change happens on the server instead of the client and the result is an unchanged URL. If you want to make this change permanent to this installation of DNN and have this be the default behavior for all child portals, you can edit the subhost.aspx file in the /Portals/_default/ folder and make the edit there as this is the file that the framework uses to copy into the created folder.

Have Fun!

from: http://www.arrownuke.com/Blog/tabid/295/EntryID/18/Default.aspx

Rapid Sahre Rapid Sahre says:

I am using Plesk and having big trouble getting my additional portals to work. My original portal is impetusgroup.ca. I am trying to configure another portal using DOTNETNUKE. As per your words above I have created alias and then attemped to create shafiq.islam.impetusgroup.ca. However, when I type in address in address bar it brings to my original site.HELP!!!

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Rapid

You need to ensure that impetusgroup.ca and shafiq.islam.impetusgroup.ca point to the same IP address by adding the appropriate CNAMEs to your DNS record.

charles charles says:

Hi,

I am having the same problem as some of the others. I am allways redirected back to my home portal from my parent portal.

I am quite confident I have followed the correct procedures for setting up a parent portal, including my dns setup.

Any suggestions?

Are

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Charles - do you see the newly created portal under Host > Portals?

charles charles says:

I see the newly created portal under hosts.

The Portal Alias for the this portal is: redmondgadsby.ca

I am using Dotnetnuke Version 05.02.02 (73).

charles charles says:

I am beginning to think that my install is incorrect. I have tried all suggestions in this post.

One thing I do notice though, is that when I create a new portal, I do not have a default.axpx file created.

Could this have something to do with my permission

charles charles says:

I am still having difficulties. I can only access my new portal through the portal editor ie host->portal.

Not sure where to go from here.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Charles - to assist you further, I need to take a closer look at your site. Use the Contact link at the top of the page to get in touch.

Bill Swanson Bill Swanson says:

Many thanks for the help! I was about 1/3 of the way down, before I comprehended what needed to be done.

To point IIS to the new portal:
Computer Management
Default Web Site (using virtual directories)
New:
Virtual directory
Alias: New Site Name
Path: E:\Inetpub\wwwroot\dnnv5
Permissions: Read

Cheers!!!

Wil Wil says:

Is it possible to change a child portal to a parent portal after creation?
I am currently developing a new micro site off a main website which will later (after development) will have its own domain. Thanks!

Jim Jim says:

I'm stuck on a one last detail on my new portal. Running IIS6.1 on Win Server 2008R2, and DNN5.4.1 hosted on my network for an Intranet application. The installation worked, I created a portal through the interface, and can view the file system it generated. In IIS, I added a new site for the portal, but can't figure out where to point it. When I set the physical path to the portal folder, the site doesn't load. I created a default.htm file, and that will load.

So, my question is, what do I need to do to host the portal as its own site?

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Jim - point IIS to your DNN root folder, which looks something like this.

Let me know if you have further questions.

Jim Jim says:

Thanks for looking into this. My folder structure is different, and I don't have a User Controls folder. I downloaded DNN through the MS Web App gallery - just checked, and the version there is 5.2.3 Community Edition, release date 5/3/2010. Not sure where I saw the 5.4.1.

Any ideas?

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Don't worry about the UserControls folder ... you do have a root folder containing admin, bin, DesktopModules, etc.

Jim Jim says:

Again, I really appreciate it. Now, the page that loads appears to be default.aspx, but it just displays "DotNetNuke Error" and "Windows Server 2008". No codes or other hints at what the problem is.

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

That's progress, but from here on out I would have to look at your box / configuration as it could be any number of things. Sorry.

Aman Aman says:

hi Tom,
just a general question when we set up a new portal as a child . it doesn't bring all the parent modules in the child portal. do i have to change any settings or copy some modules to the new one. i think i am using DNN 5.01.02. when i create a new portal it basically creates new folder in portal folder with an id and another folder under the dotnetnuke directory eg. localhost/usertest. but when i open up the new child portal it doesn't show some of the modules specially the horizontal menu and vertical menu , footer module that i created .
any solution to this anybody?

thanks
Aman

Aman Aman says:

another question
none of the links works it just throws
Server Error in '/' Application.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The resource cannot be found.
Description: HTTP 404. The resource you are looking for (or one of its dependencies) could have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable. Please review the following URL and make sure that it is spelled correctly.

Requested URL: /user/search.aspx

i tried the above suggestion about changing response.redirect to server.transfer in default.aspx page but didn't work

TomKraak TomKraak says:

@ Aman - there is really no relationship between parent and child portals as far as modules and skins are concerned.

Aman Aman says:

Tom,
so what is the procedure? for eg. if i want to have all the modules available on my child portal as i have in my parent modules?

what could be the reason its throwing the application error http:404 when i click on any link?

thanks in advance

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

You need to drop the modules back onto the pages of the child portal.

Not sure about the error, I would have to take a closer look.

Aman Aman says:

anybody else has any idea about the following error:

Server Error in '/' Application.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The resource cannot be found.
Description: HTTP 404. The resource you are looking for (or one of its dependencies) could have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable. Please review the following URL and make sure that it is spelled correctly.

Requested URL: /user/search.aspx

i tried the above suggestion about changing response.redirect to server.transfer in default.aspx page but didn't work .
also checked the trailing slash in the path of home directory.

giocare ai casinò virtuali giocare ai casinò virtuali says:

it has been made fun and easy to learn these because of people like you who come up with great tools and framework like structure map to make the experience of learning and applying these principles to working projects. And more importantly share it with the community.
giocare ai casinò virtuali

aaron aaron says:

This is great info. I'm having similar problems. I have my DNN installed at carsonboy.net/home

I want to set up a parent portal with the alias c2fishing.com and point it to my installation above. I have no problems creating a portal while logged in as a host. I'm having trouble getting my domain to point to the install directory as outlined above.

Specifically, these things are confusing to me:

1. Godaddy says with economy hosting, domains can only be pointed to the hosting root directory only. Is this going to automatically screw me up? Or should it matter?

2. I'm assuming that I need to do more than just set my 1st and 2nd nameservers on my new domain to match my host? What? Should I set up ANY forwarding of the domain to a directory on my main site hosting?

3. I don't quite understand the headers and the IIS settings mentioned above. I have IIS 6 and there doesn't seem to be too many options for settings in my godaddy control panel.

What else am I missing?

Thanks everyone for taking the time to help out. I appreciate it.

manet manet says:

Hi Aaron,

Just add c2fishing.com/home as alias for the c2fishing.com portal.
1. Login as superuser.
2. Go to host > portals
3. Click on the pen all the way in the left 'Edit this portal ' for c2fishing.com.
4. Advanced settings > Portal Aliases > Add new alias, type in : c2fishing.com/home.
5. Make sure you save it by clicking on the disk right to the text box.
6. Click on the Update button all the way in the bottom.

That should be it!

aaron aaron says:

@manet

Thanks! I'll try that. But, wouldn't that just point a domain to my already existing portal? I want to create a new portal for a whole new site, but "piggy-back" it onto my already existing hosting plan and DNN install.

aaron aaron says:

Nevermind manet.....

What you said worked. I have no idea how. But it does! Sweet!

Now, how can I mask my new domain so it always shows the user as "c2fishing.com"? HA!

Thanks man!

Sid Sid says:

Hi,

I'm working on a dedicated Windows 2008 server running IIS7. I installed DNN 5.4.2 to c:\dnn and made this an application under Default Web Site in IIS7. Thus, when I go to http://localhost/DNNFIles the installation script fired and am able to login as host there.

I need to create 4 parent portals all using ths install located in c:\dnn. I created each of the 4 sites in IIS7 and each has it's own applicaiton pool with Identity set to NetworkService.

In DNN, I created a parent portal for one of these domains. When I click the portal alias in DNN I get an HTTP error to the effect that permissions are not allowed to this directory, despite the fact that Network Service has full read/write.

Can someone shed some light on what I need to do to get this parent portal, and others working correctly in IIS7?

Thanks,
Sid

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Sid - what portal alias did you enter when creating the parent portal?

Samantha Samantha says:

I have created a child portal, but it redirects back to the parent. The parent is www.accero.com and the child has and alias of www.accero.com/uk. Any suggestions on what I should try would be great. I'm running on win 2008, IIS7 and there is an ISA server in front of the web server.

TIA

Sid Sid says:

@Tom:
It turns out that I'm wrestling with Plesk 9.2 permissions. I can set permissions by RDP'ing into the server, and doing so via Windows Explorer. However, Plesk has a "special" way of doiong this.

Here's what I've done thus far:
Setup 4 separate domains in Plesk.
In IIS7, created an application under each domain name pointing to c:\dnn with name DNNFiles.
I have also unzipped the DNN install package to c:\inetpub\vhosts\mydomain.com\httpdocs.
When I browse to mydomain.com\Install\Install.aspx, I receive an HTTP 404 Access Denied error.

Questions:
How do I make DNN play nice with Plesk? Specifically, what network user accounts need to have what permissions in Plesk?
Is this done on the httpdocs directory, or does it have to be done to each subdirectory under the domain's httpdocs directory?

Thanks,
Sid

Doug Doug says:

I have a question. I have tried setting up a new DNN parent portal following the instructions from above, and I am still unable to get anything to show when going to the site.

What I am trying to do is to replace an existing site (currently basic HTML) with DNN. So, I want to test this new DNN site internally and get all the data on it so once we are ready to switch over, we can do so and not lose any information that is out there currently.

What are the steps to get a new DNN site that I can work with internally?

For a little information, I have two NIC's on the server and one address is available for non-internal and the other is obviously internal only.

Could someone shed some light on this?


Thanks,
Doug

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Doug - for what you are trying to do, there is no need to get into DNN child / parent portals.

You simply need to install DNN either on your server or you could even do it on your local machine for that matter. Take a look at this DNN install guide ... it's a bit dated, but most everything still applies even with DNN 5. You may also post your questions there.

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

I already have DNN installed on the server. We have one site currently that is running on DNN. Am I able to use that installation to use DNN for an internal site?


- Doug

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Oh, I got you now.

In that case you can either create a child or parent portal on your current DNN install (as you tried to do) or you can put the new site on its own DNN install.

I'm not a big fan of running multiple websites on a single DNN install, but that's not to say that it does make sense in some instances.

See this blog post on what to consider before hosting multiple portals on a single DotNetNuke instance.

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

Thanks Tom, I will review the blog and let you know if I need any more help with this.

I will have to look to see if I will need to install DNN a second time for the second site and we can go from there. If I do that, would I have to go into the current DNN site and create a new portal? My guess is no, but I just want to make sure.


Thanks Again!
- Doug

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

If the new website will run on its very own DNN install, then you will not touch your current, first DNN install at all. There will be no connection between the 2 sites.

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

We have decided that it would be best to have a seperate DNN installation because of the different functionalities the websites that we are going to have. I have been going through the install of DNN, and have gotten through the database creation and am at the point of creating a Virtual Directory in IIS under the Default Web Site. Could you explain how to accomplish this without using the Default Web Site. We have ours stopped and are not wanting to start it.

Our other DNN install has a web site 'PutnamDNN' that is stopped, and another web site putnamcountyrecycles.com (This is the site that is currently running DNN) which is running based on the information in the PutnamDNN folder. How would I accomplish this for a new site?

Thanks,
- Doug

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

Why are you dealing with IIS virtual directories?

I assume you are on Windows Server 2003 or 2008 with either IIS 6 or 7, so simply create a new IIS website.

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

I am not sure why it said to create a virtual directory. I was just following the installation instructions that I have. I will just create a new website and go from there.


Thanks!
- Doug

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

So, I have created a new site in IIS, made sure the ASP version was 2.0.50727, and pointed it to where I installed the DNN files on my hard drive. Now, when I go to the site, I get "Bad Request (Invalid Hostname)" on my Web Server (Windows 2003 Server). I tried to get it from another machine and I just get a message stating that Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage. I tried this by using both IP addresses that are available in IIS and received the same issue. I then also used the DNS Server address (209.143.0.10\testPC) from the web server and received the Internet Explorer cannot display this webpage message.

Do you have any suggestions as to what I have done wrong that I am unable to access the site?

I appreciate any help you may have.

- Doug

Tom Kraak Tom Kraak says:

@ Doug - please email your contact info to tom AT seablick DOT com and then we can do a GoToMeeting or similar tomorrow morning.

I have to run now.

Doug Doug says:

@Tom

I would be happy too, unfortunately, I will not be here tomorrow. I will be here on Monday though. Would that work? What time of the day would work best?

I will also email you my contact info as well.


Thanks again!
- Doug

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