Forum Moderators: phranque
Reading through other threads here, it looks like the recommended way of doing this is with a server alias.
But isn't there a potential issue with Google interpreting this as two sites, i.e., duplicate content?
Why not use a 301 permanent? Our ISP did this, and it's working, but I want to make sure we're doing it the right way.
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> Why not use a 301 permanent? Our ISP did this, and it's working, but I want to make sure we're doing it the right way.
You cannot use a 301 redirect until the server knows how it should handle the www-less domain. That's what the alias is for. After the server is told what to do with requests for the www-less domain, then you can implement a 301 to redirect requests for non-www to www, thus avoiding duplication issues.
From what you wrote above, I'm not sure what your host did -- set up the alias or implemented a 301, but you can easily check the results using the WebmasterWorld server headers checker [webmasterworld.com]. Request for your "home page" in the www domain should return a 200-OK response, and requests for the same page in the non-www domain should return a 301-Moved Permanently response.
Jim
