Smart DNS redirection service? 301 redirects without support from web host

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timmmay

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#173417 22-May-2015 11:42

I have a tricky situation. I'm moving a website onto a hosted service, and this hosted service is a bit limited, in that not all the current resources can live on the main domain.

example.com : served by new hosting platform
example.com/blog : served by new hosting platform
example.com/slideshows -> subdomain.example.com/slideshows : redirect to new subdomain on existing hosting platform
example.com/downloads -> subdomain.example.com/downloads : redirect to new subdomain on existing hosting platform
example.com/store -> store.example.com : redirect to new subdomain on existing hosting platform

Unfortunately the new hosting platform doesn't support redirects, so any redirection has to be done before it hits the new platform. I considered DNS, but DNS works at the host name/IP level, not at the directory level. CloudFlare page rules are the only thing I can think of, but at $20/month for 20 page rules it's quite expensive. 3 rules is free, of course, which might juuuuust be enough.

Are there any other smart DNS providers that have the redirection facility that are reasonably priced?

timmmay

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#1310104 22-May-2015 19:47

Anyone? I'm considering a prod deployment where I'm putting the CloudFlare CDN in front of a server that's on AWS CloudFront, using CloudFlare as a proxy for its page rules. The person who runs the new hosting platform is calling my plan "inelegant", which is likely true, but given his platform doesn't support 301 redirects properly (you can redirect files, but not folders) I'd need 19,000 redirect rules for what I'm trying to achieve.

Is putting CloudFlare in front of CloudFront totally insane? They'll be connected by a super high bandwidth connection so it's probably fine, but it's not an ideal architecture by any means. It's all because the new platform doesn't let me do .htaccess rules.

richms

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#1310160 22-May-2015 21:32

Then your new platform is rubbish. Seen this done all the time with the rewrite thing in Apache and I think there was a windows equivilant.

Are you able to put a 404 error page in for the site that is a php or something to make the redirect for you?

Richard rich.ms

timmmay

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#1310176 22-May-2015 21:40

The reason given is security and development time. Agree that the new platform has limitations, though they won't matter to 95% of people. It's not for me, it's for a customer. I personally require more flexibility and wouldn't host with them.

You can't put up php pages. You can't put up html pages in specific locations, other than by creating pages in the CMS that happen to meet that URL. You can't write htaccess redirect rules. Their 301 redirect options are severely limited. Support is fast, but brief and not overly helpful. If you want a basic website that's as fast as anything on the net with top notch SEO they're actually pretty great, but if you want to host anything else, or do anything even slightly customised, forget it.

Though let's ignore all that. Can anyone think of a good way to work around the technical limitations of the platform.

richms

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#1310187 22-May-2015 21:43

If you cant upload your own html over FTP or SCP then no, cant suggest anything.

Sounds like its a cost sensitive customer, so perhaps just cutting the losses now and saying no is a better idea?

Richard rich.ms

timmmay

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#1310306 23-May-2015 09:18

Customer isn't particularly cost sensitive. He wants to use this new platform, and other than redirects and lack of flexibility it is a good platform. It's just this customer has requirements that don't match with its capabilities.

roobarb

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#1310318 23-May-2015 09:45

timmmay: Customer isn't particularly cost sensitive. It's just this customer has requirements that don't match with its capabilities.

Nice hammer, except I need a screwdriver!

Can you make your subdomain.example.com the prime website and redirect to example.com?

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itxtme

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#1310321 23-May-2015 10:04

Hmm with the information given its hard to consider every redirection option. I am also confused by the possible need for 19,000 redirects if the end goal from is to redirect the site user to 1 of 3 subdomains. What kind of injection does the CMS support, no JS I take it?

timmmay

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#1310323 23-May-2015 10:11

roobarb: Nice hammer, except I need a screwdriver!

Can you make your subdomain.example.com the prime website and redirect to example.com?

Unsure what you mean here. The main website is on the root of the domain. I could keep the DNS pointing there so the slideshows continue to work, and manually redirect the root of the domain to the new host, but that would reduce performance and SEO.

itxtme: Hmm with the information given its hard to consider every redirection option. I am also confused by the possible need for 19,000 redirects if the end goal from is to redirect the site user to 1 of 3 subdomains. What kind of injection does the CMS support, no JS I take it?

What other information would you like?

The reason for the huge number of redirects is because there's a blogger blog that displays images on the domain. The new website platform doesn't support redirects for directories, just files, and there are many thousands of images being used.