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Mapping a domaine from an existing godaddy website

  1. chicagopainter
    Member

    Hi,
    I want to map my domaine from my existing website at godaddy (stephangiannini.com) to replace my wordpress blog (chicagopainter.wordpress.com). Another words change the name of my blog to stephangiannini.com

    I understand the procedure: pay, change nameservers, etc. But so at what point do I tell godaddy to stop my hosting. What happens to my two sites while the process is occurring? The help page said something about 72 hours.

    On a slightly unrelated topic: Why doesn't wordpress accept domaine name transfers. It would be so much easier for me if everything is happening under one roof. And since I don't always interact with my blog, is there email notification of when bills come due? It seems like a not difficult system to set up as almost everyone else does it.

    The blog I need help with is chicagopainter.wordpress.com.

  2. chicagopainter
    Member

    If it was not clear I am planning to pull down the existing godaddy site leaving me with only one site, my blog, now called stephangiannin.com

    Thanks, Stephan

  3. thesacredpath
    Staff

    This will get you what you want.

    http://en.support.wordpress.com/domain-mapping/map-existing-domain/

  4. chicagopainter
    Member

    Thanks for responding , but I did read that help page and understand that process.

    But from that page:
    "When a new domain is purchased or when name servers are updated, it can take some time for the change to take full effect (up to 72 hours, but normally much less)."

    So my question actually still is:
    "But so at what point do I tell godaddy to stop my hosting. What happens to my two sites while the process is occurring? "Full effect"...."72 hours"?

    What does that mean. Does the change happen suddenly at some point and then my godaddy sight disappears and the name on my blog just suddenly changes? Or does my blog disappear during the transition? It's not clear.

    Thanks for your help.
    Thanks again!

  5. thesacredpath
    Staff

    I would make the DNS change and wait at least 3 days to make sure everything is stable and make sure everything here is working as it should be. I would then do a complete backup via the backup wizard in the cPanel at GoDaddy and download that backup to your computer for safe keeping. A complete backup through the cPanel will include not only all the web files, but all the images, etc., and the entire database. Once you have all of that done, then you can tell GoDaddy to cancel your hosting.

  6. chicagopainter
    Member

    I'm not trying to preserve the go-daddy site . That's not what I'm worried about.

    Perhaps I'm stupid , but what I still don't understand is the process, the logistics of it.

    1.How does it work at the wordpress.com end of it. When I change the name of my WP site are there two sites up with the same name until the process is complete? Of course not! What does that 72 hours mean?

    2.Or does the change just happen

      suddenly
    at some point within that 72 hours and chicagopainter disappears and becomes stephangiannini.com

    Thanks

  7. motre
    Member

    The wordpress.com site will always exist. It is the core method of managing the content. The mapping is a means to translate your domain name internally to the wordpress.com site name to find the content. But you can also go to the original wordpress.com name, but it knows the mapping is in place and it does a web redirect over to your official site name (the domain you mapped to).

    When you do the mapping, wordpress.com becomes your DNS hoster. If you have the domain from another registrar, you have to put in the "name server hosts" info to your registrar. But if you signed up the domain through wordpress.com they take care of that. In either case, the lookup of domain names to get IP addresses is answered by wordpress.com DNS servers for both your domain name as well as the wordpress.com site name.

    Once the web browser has the IP address it can make the network connections and tell the web server what site name it wants, and the rest of the URL. With this information wordpress.com servers look up the site name to know what to deliver.

  8. chicagopainter
    Member

    Thanks, that's helpful.

    I think my question/worry
    really is:

    Is there some point when the two sites are down before the process is complete?

  9. thesacredpath
    Staff

    The reason I suggest doing the backup of the godaddy site is just for safety reasons. I've seen times when something went wrong and if there had been a backup of the previous site, it would have been much easier to recover stuff, but do as you wish. It is your data and your work. As a web designer I've listened to a lot of crying over the years because they hadn't done backups.

    1.Until the DNS change is complete (up to 72 hours) one person might visit your URL and see the new site and one might see the old site. This is entirely dependent on the literally hundreds of thousands of ISPs around the world and is something nobody has any control over. Some ISPs update their nameserver caches frequently and regularly, and some not so much. That is why things say "up to 72 hours."

  10. chicagopainter
    Member

    OK. That's clear now.

    Ive already moved all my content to the wordpress.com site, which is why I'm not worried about the old site. But it's a good idea to back up the old site ( which is a wordpress.org site). Who knows, I may want it back at some future point.

    Thanks guys, for your responses and advice.

  11. thesacredpath
    Staff

    You are welcome.

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