[Plugin: W3 Total Cache] Installation on 3.0 Multisite WordPress MU Domain Mapping on Shared Host

OK, I’ve got w3TC set up with self-hosted CDN on the primary site. How do I configure the other site? Do I also set this up as self-hosted CDN with an additional subdomain?

You would need additional subdomains for each site for easiest maintenance. W3TC must be enabled for each site manually. What are your other specific questions? WordPress MU Domain Mapping is not fully supported right now.

Both sites are now successfully running W3 Total Cache with:

> Self-Hosted File Transfer Protocol Upload
> WordPress 3.0.1 multisite
> WordPress MU Domain Mapping

Multisite users of W3TC need to be aware that you will not see any performance improvement until the plugin is enabled and configured on ALL sites! I was initially disappointed to see no improvement after enabling and configuring my primary site. After setting up the 2nd site everything really popped! Speed and performance WAY up on BOTH sites! Very impressive!

@ Frederick- When you say “WordPress MU Domain Mapping is not fully supported right now” what exactly do you mean? It’s working beautifully for me right now on both sites (except for the unrelated NextGEN slideshow problem).

@ Frederick Townes-

Your generosity in responding so promptly to the various inquiries about W3TC is impressive and surely appreciated by all, but I would like to respectfully suggest that you could save yourself and the users of this fabulous plugin LOTS of time by providing better basic documentation and installation instructions.

Having successfully setup W3TC with self-hosted CDN on 2 sites using WP 3.0 Multisite & Domain Mapping, clearly I have aptitude for this sort of thing, but very little experience with web/tech issues.

I had to consult various third party guides, with often conflicting information, for initial set-up, but there is lots of information out there about this.

Information about setting up self-hosted CDN was harder to find, and information about setting up self hosted CDN + multisite + domain mapping was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

It would be a huge help and time-saver for everyone to have a basic guide for non web-tech-heads that includes:

> Gathering information about your server
> Setting up self-hosted CDN

(Particularly the configuration panel- it took me forever to determine the correct information for the various fields, especially for FTP path, which in my case needed to be left blank in order to work!)

> Gathering information about your host/server
> Basic setup for various server/host types
> Basic setup – No CDN
> Basic setup – Self-hosted CDN
> How to create a subdomain in cPanel
> How to create an FTP account in cPanel
> NOT to use network activation in multisite
> Must be activated and configured on ALL sites!

I’ll bet that for every hour you might spend pulling all this information together in one place you will save yourself and your users multiple hours of time and effort!

I posted a reply to this post that has never appeared. There are not as many support questions as you would imagine. If you want to contribute some FAQ entries or edits, that would be welcome. What no one seems to understand is that every site is different because of theme, plugins, server, objectives, skill level etc.

Of course “every site is different because of theme, plugins, server”, but objectives and skill level are a different matter.

I still maintain that there is a lot of good universal information that is inefficiently scattered all of these forums and other sites, that could be gathered together into one extremely useful tutorial.

Thanks so much for this impressive plugin. While there is much about how it works I will never understand, I can see the results!

I’m sorry, I’ve done a tremendous amount of work. If you would gather relevant information from your perspective, skill level and objectives that would help your wish come to pass faster than asking me to do even more work and guess what issues you’re referring to. ??

@robnalexpress Do you have any notes on this you could share – and which might save other people time?

I could sure use help in configuring W3TC with WP3 multi-site + domain mapping.

I tried a few configurations until I found one that didn’t break my website (the default config throws things all awry, including putting one of my sub-blogs meta TITLES, CONTENT, and THEME onto my primary blog/website’s home page!).

Once I found what I thought was working (visibly at least), I found the following problems still existed:

• broke my ability to use Coda as my page editor (hangs up every time it loads my website)
• Admin login was persistently being redirected so I couldn’t log in (login redirects back to login)
• errors showing on my site after 2 days (plugin errors all over the page, no content showing)

I was forced to delete the plugin so I could once again manage my sites.

Do I need to create sub-domains for each blog and put the db.php, advancedcache.php, etc. files into each sub-domain folder?

What is recommended for all the config options in this scenario?

Help?

@MileHighTechGuy- Any problems with domain mapping before installing W3TC? Did you activate and configure W3TC separately for every site? Are you using the same Theme for every site? Some themes don’t work with multisite. I got around this by using a different version of my Headway theme for each of my 2 sites.

@MileHighTechGuy- Any problems with domain mapping before installing W3TC? [No.] Did you activate and configure W3TC separately for every site? [I tried activating it on MOST but not ALL of the sites separately. I want it working before I potentially break many other sites.] Are you using the same Theme for every site? [No. I have nearly 12 sites (many more to come) each with different theme. If that is what is required I’m not willing to go there.] Some themes don’t work with multisite. I got around this by using a different version of my Headway theme for each of my 2 sites.

I found that while W3TC didn’t “break” anything when only installed on one site, it didn’t really work until installed on both sites. Are you using sub-domains or sub-directories for your additional sites?

I’m using sub-folders configuration.

I don’t think W3TC works using sub-directory config. You need to use sub-domains.

I actually have one of each type of installation: sub-directory and sub-domain.

I’ll try working with the sub-domain for now until everything works there.