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Using Host Headers in IIS - brought to you by sdesign1 - IIS specialists

Host Headers are used on the Windows platform to enable you to run multiple sites by using a subdomain of your choice. For example, if your website is http://mydomain.com, then you can setup numerous custom subdomains using Windows, such as http://mycompany.mydomain.com. Note: these subdomains are completely custom and are not purchased via your domain company. You will also need to have setup your IIS server as a DNS Server for your specific domain.

The intial requirement of this, is that you have a record setup on your domain, for any wildcard characters. This is represent by an asterix * and will be a CNAME value. It should look like the following in your domain panel:

*      CNAME     mydomain.com.


When someone types in http://anysub.mydomain.com - then it will automatically take them to mydomain.com and look for a website with the host header of "anysub". Though this may seem confusing now, we will explain how to setup this site using WIndows IIS.

• Log into your server
• Click "Start"
• Click "Run"
• Type in "inetmgr" and click "Ok"
• Locate your website in the tree console (this will be the website you want to be reached using a subdomain)
• Right click and click "Properties"
• Click the "Web Site" tab
• Click "Advanced" (next to IP Address)
• Double click your entry which should say

IP address - all unassignedHost Header value: anysub.mydomain.com

• Click on "Ok" and "Apply"

Once you have done this, you have setup your server so that any requests for http://anysub.mydomain.com will be instructed by this host header, to show the site that you have applied the host header to.

You can do this for as many sites as you like on your IISs server. If you have not setup your host header correctly, then it will automatically display the "Default Website" that is configured in IIS.

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