Redirecting only the top level URL in a domain

[hermionewazlib]

I used to be a COBOL mainframe programmer, so all this newfangled PC stuff is Greek to me, but I have knocked up a couple of websites for my boss and he wants something annoying.

Our first website is ourdomain.info and it went live first and is static and everything from ourdomain.info/museums/ downwards is just to show to clients, and the top level URL is already Googleable.

Then our eShop went live into ourdomain.co.uk

My boss doesn't like that the ourdomainsite shows on Google, allowing people to sneak into his museum section, and wants a redirect on JUST the ourdomaintop level URL to the top level URL.

All links and lower pages still have to work, and the only way to reach the ourdomainite is to be from a link on the eShop.





to redirect when you click on the ourdomain.\\

This works fine, with a fraction of a second to display a 'please click link' if the computer is powered by hamsters in a wheel and can't redirect.

There are no years of stats to be lost if a spider doesn't follow a redirect; he just wants all customers to be dragged to the shop.

I tried a subliminal redirect using a 301 redirect in a .htaccess, but using

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on


redirects all pages.

So.

What do I put in a .htaccess to redirect ONLY THE TOP LEVEL URL, and still be able to access the rest of the site???

[Steve123]

To create a .htaccess file, open notepad, name and save the file as .htaccess (there is no extension). The RewriteCond directive defines a rule condition. Preserve a RewriteRule with one or more RewriteCond directives. Depending on your server configuration it can be necessary to change the examples for your situation. Always try to understand what it really does before you use it. Bad use would lead to deadloops and will hang the server. To do this correctly we have to use an external redirect, so the browser correctly requests subsequent images etc. If we only did a internal rewrite, this would only work for the directory page, but would go wrong when any images are included into this page with relative URLs, because the browser would request an in-lined object. For instance, a request for image.gif in /~quux/foo/index.html would become /~quux/image.gif without the external redirect.