Advices needed in setting up multisite subdomain folders with cPanel

Every version of cPanel I've used lets you specify the home directory, which it calls the Document Root. The default is to create a new directory, but when you create the subdomain, there is a field to specify a different directory. And I think you need to point it to public_html, not public_html/sites.

Follow these by the letter and you should be OK. (The steps 1 and 2 under Step 9 should be Steps 10 and 11 -- just a formatting quirk I guess)

1. In CPanel, set up the subdomain and point it to http://yourdomain.com (The DNS updates from the subdomain add/redirect can take several hours to complete.......). For the example of site1.yourdomain.com, a folder named 'site1' will be automatically created by CPanel. Delete the folder that was created.
2. Create a folder in the sites/ folder that matches the subdomain you want to create (so for site1.yourdomain.com, the folder name would be site1.yourdomain.com).
3. Create directory /sites/sitename.isalescards.com/files/ with permission 777.
4. Duplicate the settings.php file from the default folder and place it in your newly created folder from step 2.

5. Edit the settings.php file you just placed in the site1.yourdomain.com folder so that it does not point to a database. You can replace the line that has your other site's database information with this:

   $db_url = 'mysql://username:password@localhost/databasename';

6. Then give settings.php permissions of 777 (Drupal will reset permissions to 644 when it is finished with the file). This will allow step 10 below to load your database tables.

7. Use the following example to create a 'multisite.php' file and upload via FTP or CPanel's File Manager. Make sure you change the path to whatever the path to your web root is.

   <?php
      symlink( '/home/username/public_html/', 'site1' );
     
?>

8. Go to the location of the php file in your browser (such as www.yourdomain.com/multisite.php). This will create a symlink (and a new 'site1' folder), allowing your subdomain to work properly.

9. Create a database and database user for sitename.isalescards.com.
   1. Go to your subdomain and start the Drupal 6 installation process. Drupal will ask for your database information and then install the tables necessary to run the new site.
   2. You're all set to use the new site.

Just enable cPanel X3 theme and you can set the destination of your new subdomain during creation.

....setting the destination of the subdomain isn't the issue. Having a "site1" folder inside the sites/ directory won't work. It has to be named something that Drupal recognizes as a multisite, which is a completely different animal from the subdomain folder cPanel sets up.

You have to use a symlink to direct all requests for the subdomain to the common Drupal index.php, so that Drupal can process the request and send it through the settings.php of the appropriate site. The instructions above are the easiest way to do this and only take a few minutes to complete once you've done it a couple of times.

cPanel doesn't know or care that you have Drupal, even with x3 or whatever enabled.

Thanks, but I'd hate to see someone chasing their tail in cPanel for hours trying to find a way to save 3 minutes.

I have 4 sites running using this process:

1. coping drupal to public_html
2. creating 4 following folders in sites/ folder from drupal:
   fa.atie.ir
   en.atie.ir
   pmc.atie.ir
   wmpauker.atie.ir
3. I have run install.php 4 times and each time used same database with different table prefixes. Each time I moved the settings.php from default folder in sites/ to each relating folder inside sites/
4. I changed some table prefixes so that my users tables are common between all 4 sites
5. Added 4 subdomains in cPanel all pointing to /public_html

and now every thing's working. you can see the domains listed above.

I have a working Drupal 6.10 on a typical hosted server (just updated tonight, the current problem existed before this update from 6.9) in my /home/user/public_html/drupal/ directory. I also have set up multisite for 7 other sites on this codebase with separate databases and all are working. Of the 7, one is the main domain name, three are subdomains of that domain, three are add-on domains. One of the add-on domains used to be a subdomain of one of the other add-on domains, so I know I've been able to successfully add a multisite on a subdomain.
I went through the same process (I think) to add a new multisite on a subdomain that results in a redirect loop.
I created a subdomain through cpanel sub.domain.com
I created a directory /home/user/public_html/drupal/sites/sub.domain.com and renamed default.settings.php and copied it to this directory
I deleted the /home/user/public_html/sub directory that cpanel created via ftp client
I created a new database and database user for this site.
I created a symlink in public_html via ssh with "ln -s /home/user/public_html/drupal/ sub"
Now, when I go to http://sub.domain.com or http://sub.domain.com/install.php I get a "Redirect Loop" error.

I have read others suggest messing with .htaccess, which I have not done.
I can't figure out what step I missed.

You have made this step false:
"I created a directory /home/user/public_html/drupal/sites/sub.domain.com and renamed default.settings.php and copied it to this directory"
you should not rename and copy default.settings.php, you should install the site using Drupal installer and copy the resulting settings.php to that subdirectory.

I wanted to make sure the db settings were not those of the original install, because I have a separate db set up for the subdomain site. It seems to be working fine now. But on the next one, I will try copying the settings.php from the default folder (instead of copying and renaming the default.settings.php file) and just change the db information in the settings.php file for the new site.

Thanks for the advice.

Carol