iWeb FAQ - Having and managing multiple websites
iWebFAQ.org
How can I have multiple websites? And how can I publish just one of them instead of all of them or none of them?
I may explain first that there's a difference between domain names (personal domains) and domain (or domain.sites2) files. Domain names are used to reach your website on the web, like yourdomain.com. Domain files instead are on the computer and used by iWeb to store its files. They are NOT directly linked to each other. You could still use your different personal domains with leaving all the sites in one domain file. Just point the personal domains to the site it applies to. There’s no need to have separate Domain files to be able to use different personal domains. For infos about personal domains yourdomain.com go to this page.
Chapter 1: Managing and editing (for all chapters, not needed for chapter 2a) and 4) unless you want it)
Chapter 2: Publishing, to same MobileMe
Chapter 3: Publishing, to different MobileMe accounts
Chapter 4: Publishing, to same server
Chapter 5: Publishing, to different servers
Remember to always have a Backup of all Domain files. Also make a Backup before going through Chapter 1. It's REALLY important to have Backups!
Chapter 1: Managing and editing
There are two ways for managing and editing two or more completely independent websites. But before trying any of these methods back up your Domain file (see Note 2 and link for backup at the end of the page). Here we go:
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-You can do it manually by having two or more Domain files. One for each site. If you already created all websites in the same domain file you just have to duplicate (triplicate, ...) the Domain file where iWeb stores its files (Macintosh HD/Users/Username/Library/Application Support/iWeb/Domain.sites2). Select the file and hit Command(Apple)+d. Now on one copy you delete one site and on the other you delete the other and so on. Be sure to not overwrite one website with the other, place the two domain files into two (or more) different locations (folders). If you want to rename each domain file you can do it. This name only displays on your Mac doesn't have anything to do with publishing to web. On the web each Domain file will publish a folder named with the name you give the site in iWeb. To edit one or the other Domain file just double-click on one or the other. The Domain files are now completely independent from each other so a change on one will not apply to the other as well.
Old Toad made a workflow on this here.
- With a freeware application which splits your Domain file into many Domain files called iWebSites
Note 1: If you have multiple domain.sites2 files the CNAME using personal domain will redirect to the site for which you last did a ‘publish all’. As long as you just hit ‘publish’ the site to which you get redirected inserting the personal domain using CNAME doesn’t change. The same happens entering web.me.com/username/
If you have multiple domain.sites2 files and publish them to the same folder the same thing is happening. As you can see the result of the publishing is an index.html file and a folder with the name of the site. The index.html file is the one which redirects people to the first page of your site. When you publish a second site the index.html file gets replaced with the one you published last, thus people are redirected to a new first page.
Chapter 2: Publishing, to same MobileMe
For multiple personal domains of the type yourdomain.com have a look at Chapter 4 of this page instead.
MobileMe wasn’t built for that. The idea behind MobileMe is to have personal websites to show to your friends grandparents and so on but not the kind of websites to be seen by everybody, the commercial sites and so on, ... Not last because it lacks of PHP compatibility, MySQL, and other stuff that is needed for a “real” website.
MobileMe is pretty limited whereas iWeb is much less limited than it seems. I’d really recommend you to have a real hosting instead of MobileMe. Especially for what concerns having multiple websites with multiple domains. For informations about hosting other than MobileMe see the Publishing to Folder, FTP, Hosting FAQ.
If you’re publishing different sites to the same MobileMe account each site should have another name displaying in iWeb.
a) From same user account on the same computer
You could leave the sites all together showing up at the same time in iWeb as iWeb updates only files that have been changed since you published last. That is not separating them. Simply because there’s no need to do so (the thing works different with publishing to folder... there you have to publish all you have in iWeb and that's where having all sites in one Domain file gets annoying).
However if you don’t like them to show up all at the same time you could also use iWebSites (especially if using iWeb ’06) or better manually split them. After you published entering the base URL will redirect you to the last published site. Have a look at Chapter 4 about how to make a general index site from which visitors choose which site they want to visit.
b) From different user accounts (or different computers)
When you will publish and upload to the same account entering your url in a browser you will be redirected to the site you published last.
If you publish two or more websites to the same account make a new website which will contain an index of the websites and users from there will choose which to visit (see Chapter 4). Publish this site always last.
As long as the sites are named differently there should be no problem with "intermingling".
Chapter 3: Publishing, to different MobileMe accounts
Some people find it easier to have one User account on the computer and change the MobileMe username and password each time the want to publish another site by going into the System Preferences.
Other people prefer to have two different user accounts on the computer and login to that or the other depending on the site they want to edit without needing to change the MobileMe username and password in the System Preferences each time to publish. To achieve that have a look at this.
It’s up to you to choose which way you prefer. Whether you want to change the data in System Preferences or Login to another user account on your computer.
Chapter 4: Publishing, to same server
To avoid problems with "intermingling" (and you really should do it) follow these steps:
1) Create a main index website containing a main index page. That will be the index site where people can choose which site they want to visit and the site displaying when you enter your base url.
You will publish this site from iWeb to:
Documents/Websites/
2) Make a new folder in that location named with the name of the first website displaying in the main index page (Site1, for the example)
Documents/Websites/Site1/
this is where you publish to the Site1 site from iWeb
3) Do the same thing for Site2
Documents/Websites/Site2/
this is where you will publish to the Site2 site from iWeb
4) Make the same for alll the other websites if you have more than two
5) Publish to your server all the content of
Documents/Websites/
6) Entering your url people will automatically get redirected to the index site from where they will have the links wo the different websites
So in the index page you have to put the following links: link to Site1 and Site2 as they were external pages:
http://www.yoururl.com/Site1/
http://www.yoururl.com/Site2/
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7)To summarize I make the example with my homepage:
To get to my website you enter www.alaskadream.org in your browser
-You will get to my index page, from there you can choose to visit
--Italian site
--German site
--English site
--French site
I think that’s the best way to manage, edit and publish different sites...
Chapter 5: Publishing, to different servers
If you publish to different locations/servers:
-Publish the websites from iWeb to different Folders for example
Documents/Websites/Site1/
Documents/Websites/Site2/
-Publish to your server only the content of the folder you want (be sure to not-upload the folder itself, but only the content)
If one site goes to MobileMe just publish one of the two to a folder and for the one that goes to MobileMe hit the publish button in iWeb.
NOTE 1: If the websites aren’t completely independent from each other you will have to make “external links” for linking pages between them
NOTE 2: On January 27, 2008 a new version of iWebSites was released that allows you to merge Domain.sites2 files. iWebSites merges Domain files split with iWebSites itself AND also Domain files split manually.
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- Cédric -
