Moving Vanilla from Subdirectory to Subdomain

aery · March 2012

I have vanilla forum as subdirectory along with my blog at www.gtricks.com/forum

After the recent panda attack and talking to few SEO masters, they advised me to move to subdomain as it will be treated differently by Google and help me recover.

I have some 200 threads and 1000 users on the forum which I would like to move to a subdomain.

Effectively, I want to move from www.gtricks.com/forum to forum.gtricks.com

Does Vanilla provides this functionality like the wordpress? What should I do. Is simple htaccess modification like shown below enough?

RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^forum/(.*) http://forum.gtricks.com/$1 [R=301,NC]

x00 · March 2012

I would do

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*)? http://forum.mysite.com$1?redirection=1

then in /dashboard/routes -> Add

Route Expression: (/?[^\?]*)\?redirection=1
Target: $1
Type: Permanent (301)

After this do another one

Route Expression: \?redirection=1
Target: /
Type: Permanent (301)

This is for those that are using friendly urls, it will redirect everything, if there is an additional query string it will just redirect to the method and parameters minus the query arguement.

badlearner · March 2012

Moving a forum from a directory to a sub-domain should be easy, let me try to help. From what I know, there are two ways to move a Vanilla Forum from a sub-directory to a sub-domain.

Make a backup of your forum first. I don't want you to complain if anything goes wrong.

METHOD-1: The Easy-Peasy way — If it works, it works. So, try this one first.

[1] First create a sub-domain relative to the vanilla forum installation directory, so that http://sub.domain.com points to http://domain.com/vanilla/. This should be very easy of you have Cpanel control panel installed.

[2] Change the code in the .htaccess file inside your vanilla forum directory to this. Yes, it should be exactly this:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
   RewriteEngine On
   # Certain hosts may require the following line.
   # If vanilla is in a subfolder then you need to specify it after the /. 
   # (ex. You put Vanilla in /forum so change the next line to: RewriteBase /forum)
   # RewriteBase /
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php\?p=$1 [QSA,L]
</IfModule>

Do you see the difference from the existing code in your .htaccess file? It's the 6th line. It should just be / and not /forum because you are actually going to access your forum from a sub-domain, which in a way, works like a domain.

Now, go to your forum from http://sub.domain.com and login to your dashboard. Do you see Here's how to get started: section? Inside that, you'll see something like this:

2. Where is your Community Forum?
Access your community forum by clicking the "Visit Site" link on the top-left of this page, or by clicking here. The community forum is what all of your users & customers will see when they visit http://sub.domain.com/.

If you see http://sub.domain.com/ there, you can consider that your forum has moved.

METHOD-2: The hard way, but almost guaranteed to work

You'll need to make a fresh install of Vanilla Forum on a sub-domain, then import the tables, and static files (images & others) from your existing forum.

This is meant to be a pointer. I am not explaining this hoping that METHOD-1 will work for you.

EDIT: You also need to setup 301 redirection from domain.com/directory/ to sub.domain.com if you don't want to lose any pagerank or traffic coming from search engine-indexed links.

I repeat, I am not 100% sure of these methods. I didn't even try these. But when I checked the differences between my two forum installations — one on a sub-domain and another on a sub-directory, the .htaccess files were (almost) the only ones that were different.

Hope that helps!

aery · March 2012

For the benefit of others, this is my current htaccess code that automatically redirects subdirectory to subdomain on my forum gtricks.com/forum

#making subdomain permanent
RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) http://forum.gtricks.com$1

#Redirects www sub-domain to non-www version
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{http_host} ^www.forum.gtricks.com
RewriteRule ^(.*)? http://forum.gtricks.com/$1?redirected [R=301,L]


   RewriteEngine On
   # Certain hosts may require the following line.
   # If vanilla is in a subfolder then you need to specify it after the /. 
   # (ex. You put Vanilla in /forum so change the next line to: RewriteBase /forum)
   # RewriteBase /
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php\?p=$1 [QSA,L]

many thanks to @badlearner and @x00 without whom this wouldnt have been possible.

hbf · March 2012

i use virtual server definitions in apache config to accomplish this.

aery · March 2012

Can you please post the guide to accomplish this? It would be very helpful for other too.

x00 · March 2012

host file (/etc/hosts)

127.0.0.1 sub.localhost

httpd.conf (/etc/apache2/httpd.conf/)

<VirtualHost *:80>
  ServerName sub.localhost
  DocumentRoot "/var/www/sub/"
  DirectoryIndex index.php index.html index.html index.htm index.shtml
</VirtualHost>

Restart apache

~ $ sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

However I'm guessing you are are a shared host in which case you won't be able to do this.

x00 · March 2012

First of all you have to consider the impact of such a move, especially if you already have a google rank for /forum, you will need to do 301 redirect from /forum to forum.yourdomain.com.

secondly you have to figure out how you are goign to do this based on current restrictions.

lastly there are a lot of bullshitters in SEO. Yes they can be certain advantages to doing something, however there is also there overall stability of you reputation/rank to take into consideration.

aery · March 2012

I understand the risk associated with it and I am ready to take for the sake of better reputation on the long run.

For all webmasters - its better to have subdomain while making a forum on your main site as Google now heavily penalizes thin content sites and most of the forum threads are user generated content with less value to offer. Though their are exellant conversations in some threads but those do not justify all low quality content on forum.

@x00 unfortunately, i am in shared host. I am ready to take the risk and start the forum all again. I think it will be better for long run. Please advise a method to achieve this. Your help will be of great value to everyone.

422 · March 2012

Can u show evidence over subdomain vs folder. From wht i have read subdomains get penalised more.

aery · March 2012

b. If you accept user-generated content on your site (like an online forum), move it to a separate sub-domain.

via http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2012/01/12/tech-journal-five-ways-to-improve-your-blog/

Matt Cutts came on the scene Post-Panda and told HubPages to “try subdomains”

via http://www.whitefireseo.com/site-architecture/subdomain-or-subfolder-post-panda/360/

and http://www.conversationmarketing.com/2011/07/wsj-wtf-google-panda-subdomains.htm

x00 · March 2012

it shouldn't be too much hassle. Create the subdomain through your sp. Install vanilla in the sub directory. it document root should be /forum

if you have blank subdiredtory you would like to redirect e.g /forumother you need .htaccess in that folder to redirect

RedirectMatch 301 /forumother(/.*) http://forum.yoursite.com$1

I found through trial an error it is best not to use

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) http://forum.yoursite.com$1

inside the working forum (top of the .htaccess). The reason is that due to internal redirect you will get an additional query string appended (like /discussions?p=discussions). Instead make use

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) http://forum.localhost$1?

Note the ?

alternatively you could redirect to /forumother

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) /forumother$1

and have that redirect to the sub directory.

aery · March 2012

So @x00 you mean to say that

1) Create a subdomain example forum.mysite.com that points to current vanilla folder location that is mysite.com/forum

2) edit .htaccess in subfolder and write

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) http://forum.mysite.com$1?

3) Vanilla will take care of everything else.

All my articles like gtricks.com/forum/discussion/192/google-launched-google-play-the-digital-content-store/ will be automatically converted and recognized by Google as foeum.gtricks.com/discussion/192/google-launched-google-play-the-digital-content-store/

aery · March 2012

@x00 is this the correct way? Should I implement it?

x00 · March 2012

I would do

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*)? http://forum.mysite.com$1?redirection=1

then in /dashboard/routes -> Add

Route Expression: (/?[^\?]*)\?redirection=1
Target: $1
Type: Permanent (301)

After this do another one

Route Expression: \?redirection=1
Target: /
Type: Permanent (301)

This is for those that are using friendly urls, it will redirect everything, if there is an additional query string it will just redirect to the method and parameters minus the query arguement.

x00 · March 2012

It is ok to chain 301 redirect so long as there aren't too many, this was from google's own advice.

badlearner · March 2012

Moving a forum from a directory to a sub-domain should be easy, let me try to help. From what I know, there are two ways to move a Vanilla Forum from a sub-directory to a sub-domain.

Make a backup of your forum first. I don't want you to complain if anything goes wrong.

METHOD-1: The Easy-Peasy way — If it works, it works. So, try this one first.

[1] First create a sub-domain relative to the vanilla forum installation directory, so that http://sub.domain.com points to http://domain.com/vanilla/. This should be very easy of you have Cpanel control panel installed.

[2] Change the code in the .htaccess file inside your vanilla forum directory to this. Yes, it should be exactly this:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
   RewriteEngine On
   # Certain hosts may require the following line.
   # If vanilla is in a subfolder then you need to specify it after the /. 
   # (ex. You put Vanilla in /forum so change the next line to: RewriteBase /forum)
   # RewriteBase /
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php\?p=$1 [QSA,L]
</IfModule>

Do you see the difference from the existing code in your .htaccess file? It's the 6th line. It should just be / and not /forum because you are actually going to access your forum from a sub-domain, which in a way, works like a domain.

Now, go to your forum from http://sub.domain.com and login to your dashboard. Do you see Here's how to get started: section? Inside that, you'll see something like this:

2. Where is your Community Forum?
Access your community forum by clicking the "Visit Site" link on the top-left of this page, or by clicking here. The community forum is what all of your users & customers will see when they visit http://sub.domain.com/.

If you see http://sub.domain.com/ there, you can consider that your forum has moved.

METHOD-2: The hard way, but almost guaranteed to work

You'll need to make a fresh install of Vanilla Forum on a sub-domain, then import the tables, and static files (images & others) from your existing forum.

This is meant to be a pointer. I am not explaining this hoping that METHOD-1 will work for you.

EDIT: You also need to setup 301 redirection from domain.com/directory/ to sub.domain.com if you don't want to lose any pagerank or traffic coming from search engine-indexed links.

I repeat, I am not 100% sure of these methods. I didn't even try these. But when I checked the differences between my two forum installations — one on a sub-domain and another on a sub-directory, the .htaccess files were (almost) the only ones that were different.

Hope that helps!

badlearner · March 2012

I can confirm that METHOD-1 is working! @aery tried it, and it seems to have worked.

badlearner · March 2012

@x00 : Thanks for the redirection how-to. But the last step creates a redirection loop and the second step doesn't seem to be necessary.

All I had to do was add this in '/vanilla-forum-root/.htaccess' :

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*)? http://forum.mysite.com$1?redirection=1

That's it. Your forum should now be redirecting fine. Absence of the query string in the redirection rule appears to break the friendly URLs.

@x00 Do let me know if what I am doing is wrong (or has any gotchas!). Thanks.

x00 · March 2012

ok my method has the vanilla installed on the subdomain, and that is already set up to point to /forum/

RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*)? http://forum.mysite.com$1?redirection=1

is added to to the top of the .htaccess

then you must follow these instruction to the letter:

then in /dashboard/routes -> Add

Route Expression: (/?[^\?]*)\?redirection=1
Target: $1
Type: Permanent (301)

After this do another one

Route Expression: \?redirection=1
Target: /
Type: Permanent (301)

This is for those that are using friendly urls, it will redirect everything, if there is an additional query string it will just redirect to the method and parameters minus the query argument.

the order is important

badlearner · March 2012

For those of you (you wanted this @aery ) who want to redirect www.forum.example.com to forum.example.com, here are the .htaccess rules.

#Redirects www sub-domain to non-www version
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{http_host} ^www.forum.example.com
RewriteRule ^(.*)? http://forum.example.com/$1?redirected [R=301,L]

aery · March 2012

For the benefit of others, this is my current htaccess code that automatically redirects subdirectory to subdomain on my forum gtricks.com/forum

#making subdomain permanent
RedirectMatch 301 /forum(/.*) http://forum.gtricks.com$1

#Redirects www sub-domain to non-www version
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{http_host} ^www.forum.gtricks.com
RewriteRule ^(.*)? http://forum.gtricks.com/$1?redirected [R=301,L]


   RewriteEngine On
   # Certain hosts may require the following line.
   # If vanilla is in a subfolder then you need to specify it after the /. 
   # (ex. You put Vanilla in /forum so change the next line to: RewriteBase /forum)
   # RewriteBase /
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php\?p=$1 [QSA,L]

many thanks to @badlearner and @x00 without whom this wouldnt have been possible.

chopper · September 2013

Hi, the 301 redirect works well, but specifically my problem is that I have a sub directory /community and I want it to redirect to a subdomain i created. Example www.mysite.com/community to www.forums.mysite.com. Without renaming the /community, I want it to point to the subdomain. How can I achieve this? Any help is much appreciated. is much appreciated.

sevenatoms · July 2016

The situation you’re in is something related to on-page optimization. Migrating the files from www.gtricks.com/forum to forum.gtricks.com won’t help. You need to download the infected files, refine them with better quality content and upload the files to the sub-domain location. The articles I’ve listed below should help you recover from the Google Panda update.

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-guide/google-penguin-panda-hummingbird/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Panda
http://www.sevenatoms.com/blog/how-to-stop-worrying-about-google-algorithm-changes/
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-guide/google-penguin-panda-hummingbird/

Moving Vanilla from Subdirectory to Subdomain

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