How To Park A Domain

Telling your host to do a park is easy - just tell them to point the domain at your IP address. If you use a shared IP, then they will also ...


Telling your host to do a park is easy - just tell them to point the domain at your IP address. If you use a shared IP, then they will also need to tell the webserver to respond to the domain, as well - but if they use shared IP's, they will probably know that. Using a typical domain control panel, you simply go to the "Add new Domain" menu (or something saying basically the same thing) type in your new domain, and then make sure it's pointing at your current websites IP address.

You'll know it's working when you type in the new domain and it goes to your current website, but the new domain stays in the address bar.

Checklist
Register your new domain (or acquire an existing one)
During the registration process, you will be asked for at least 2 nameservers (DNS) - either type in the ones that are being used by your current domain or ones under your control.
Now that the domain is pointing at the nameservers, you need to point the nameservers in turn to your target webserver. you do this by going to the nameserver controls, which are not usually near the domain name registration area - it's a totally different area, and usually controlled by your web host or ISP. Tell them what your domain name is (make sure you spell it correctly for them!) and have them point it to your website's IP address, or do it yourself if you know how.
If you have a dedicated IP address, skip to step 6.
If it's a shared IP, then go to your webserver and set your website to respond to the new parked domain by adding the domain to the Host Headers for the site.
Once enough time has gone by for the DNS servers to be updated (anywhere from a few minutes to 3 days, depending on where you live and your ISP), test the park by typing in the parked domain. You should go to the website, and the parked domain should stay in your browsers address bar.
Done!
Absolute and Relative Link Issues with Domain Parking
One clear indication of a park is that the domain name does not change in the address bar to the second site. It stays with whatever you typed in. Now, what happens if you click on a link in the website?

There are 2 possible ways to link within websites - relative or absolute. A relative link just links to the other page in relation to the current page. A relative link to this page, in code, looks like this:


Look closely at this - do you see www.mcanerin.com (this website) showing up anywhere in this code? No.This is just a link to a page, and it's only in relation to the other pages in this directory. This is what we mean by a relative link. In general, good website design uses relative links. That way, if you change a domain name you don't have to go back and change every single link in the website.

If you park a domain on a site with relative links, the domain name in the address bar will remain whatever you typed in and only the path and page names will change.

Now look at what this link would look like as an absolute link:


You see that the entire web address is spelled out.

Now, what would happen if you went to a page using a parked domain and then clicked on an absolute link? Why, the link in the address bar would change to the new address, of course! Just as if it were a new webpage on a new site.

Therefore, in practice, if you use relative links your parked domain stays with the visitor for the entire session, but if you use absolute links the domain changes to the hard-coded one as soon as the user clicks on any link. This behavior is very important to understand, since it can affect your branding and geolocation.

Source: By Ian McAnerin, from mcanerin.com