Add a Domain to an Apache Web Server

How to Add a Domain to an Apache Web Server

For the Apache webserver, you can enable virtual hosts. This allows you to add multiple domains.

Each domain is mapped to a document root directory which contains the files for the web pages.

On a Windows computer, you need to also add the domain name to the Windows hosts file. Check out the how-to guide via the side bar menu.

How to Enable Virtual Hosts

Open the server configuration file httpd.conf and un-comment (comments are preceeded by the # symbol) the Include for Virtual hosts to give:

# Virtual hosts
Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

To edit the file, you will need to start your text editor in administrator mode. Do this by right-clicking on the editor icon and selecting "Run as administrator".

The file may be located here:

C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Apache Software Foundation\\Apache2.2\\conf\\

Now you can enter your domain details into the httpd-vhosts.conf file which may be located here:

C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Apache Software Foundation\\Apache2.2\\conf\\extra\\httpd-vhosts.conf

A simple entry is as follows:

<virtualhost *:80>
    DocumentRoot "C:/htdocs/mysite"
    ServerName mysite.test
    ServerAlias mysite.test
</virtualhost>

Finally, restart the Apache web server, and check that your new domain is resolved in a web browser.