Changing the domain name of a WP multisite installation?

I’d really appreciate a step by step explanation.

Yeah, there isn’t one. I keep saying I’m going to write something up, but it’s complicated.

Moving WP Multisite to a new domain name is … a pain in the ass. It’s NOT as easy as regular multisite.

I THINK if you do a full database season for symposium.local and replace that with symposium.mysite it might do it. You basically have to look for every instance of .local and change that :/

Uh, jeez …

And what do you mean by ‘full database season‘?

And how can I search and replace these mysql tables under Windows?

Also: what is the different between a ‘regular multisite’ and a ‘WP multisite’? I’m using that new ‘network’ feature in WP3.

Thanks!

You basically need to do a database dump, search & replace, then put the db back.

… I have no idea where ‘season’ came from. That was supposed to be search.

Going for More Coffee.

Also: what is the different between a ‘regular multisite’ and a ‘WP multisite’? I’m using that new ‘network’ feature in WP3.

Nothing. There’s regular (i.e. one site) WordPress and there’s WordPress MultiSite (activated via the network feature). That’s it.

Andrea:

You basically need to do a database dump, search & replace, then put the db back.

How would I do that (on Windows)?

Thanks! I really want to get this multi-site WordPress installation going now …

Ok, everything works fine now. I’ve simply edited the HOME and SITE URL in all 4 sites using phpMyAdmin. And I’ve used the UpdateURL plugin to get the media links right.

??

You also need to update the following line (added as part of the network configuration) in wp-config.php:
define( ‘DOMAIN_CURRENT_SITE’, ‘yourdomain’ );

You also need to update the following line (added as part of the network configuration) in wp-config.php:
define( ‘DOMAIN_CURRENT_SITE’, ‘yourdomain’ );

Are there any other plugins that you would recommend to help with this process? (or is the dump, search and replace all done within phpMyAdmin?)

I’m considering changing over our URL of a new potential launch and really don’t want to collapse the ‘house of cards’ I’ve put together over the past few months.

Thanks for this thread. Very valuable!

(or is the dump, search and replace all done within phpMyAdmin?)

I would recommend doing it with phpMyAdmin instead of a plugin. That way, you can search and manually edit when you need to.

Hello,

I had everything running smoothly with a static IP. My multisite was working great until I decided to launch and point DNS to an actual domain. Please let me know what exactly needs changed. I havce tried the lines for the URL in config file, database areas that had the ip address, but everytime, I have the multisite code lines in the wp-config, i get the error of no database connection. If I remove the lines, I am able to run one of the sites in my network (main one) and everything connects just fine.

I am needing help to know what I am missing.

Thanks to all!

database areas that had the ip address,

All of them?

Hi,

This is my situation: WordPress 3.1.2 on a Mac. I am a visual designer with basic skills in coding but getting better as I work on this stuff.

I have a multisite WP installation running perfectly on localhost/wordpress with 2 subsites that are set up like this: localhost/wordpress/, localhost/wordpress/site2, localhost/wordpress/site3.

This will be my second time trying to move my multisite to an external host. I am starting clean and was wondering if someone who has done this can share any step-by-step directions to do this successfully. As I said, Multisite works fine locally. How do I move it to my new primary site url?

The same way you move a single site.

EXCEPT.

take you db dump, find and replace all instances of “localhost” with your full domain name.

Thanks for your reply Andrea. I did that in all three sets of tables for options, blogs, site, and sitemeta. I will check that again.

Wouldn’t I at least have something other than an Internal Server Error page on my url if everything else was done right but that? Network Solutions tells me to wait for 2 hours after I redirected to the root directory but still no sign of my site.

Do you recommend that I do the search and replace in a text editor and then re-import again? I am afraid my phpMyAdmin skills might be the problem as I don’t know how to work with the dump file within phpMyAdmin.