Subdomain

[bw1z]

I just installed Zen cart with examples to a subdomain of my site.
It all works fine ( thanks ).

As I went through the configurations, I was wondering what is the preferred install & pluses/minuses?
A subdomain entirely separate, or placing it as a sub part of the main domain?

[mc12345678]

I just installed Zen cart with examples to a subdomain of my site.
It all works fine ( thanks ).

As I went through the configurations, I was wondering what is the preferred install & pluses/minuses?
A subdomain entirely separate, or placing it as a sub part of the main domain?

For starters the SSL certficate could be a minus if it doesn't support the use of a sub-domain.

Plusses are for development that way the directory structure is consistent, independent access can be given to a developer, independent .htaccess control, and I'm sure there are others.

[RodG]

As I went through the configurations, I was wondering what is the preferred install & pluses/minuses?
A subdomain entirely separate, or placing it as a sub part of the main domain?

Will it help if I told you that your main domain is a subdomain of another domain, and that what you *think* is a subdomain is actually a hostname?

example:
yourdomain.com is *actualy* a *host* called "yourdomain" in the 'com' domain.
www.yourdomain.com is *actually* a *host* called "www" in the "yourdomain" domain, which is a sub domain of "com" domain.

shop.yourdomain.com is *actually* a *host* called "shop" in the "yourdomain" domain, which is a sub domain of "com" domain.

www.shop.yourdomain.com is *actually* a *host* called "www" in the "shop.yourdomain" domain, which is a sub domain of the "yourdomain" domain, which in turn is a subdomain of the "com" domain.

Yes, it can be a little bit of a headscratcher, but the important thing to note is that the leftmost part of the name is the hostname, and as such, you never actually have a host/site/server feeding pages from a subdomain (regardless of whatever your gleaned from elsewhere).

Now, the next thing to note is that not one of these hosts, domains. or subdomains specify *where* the web files are actually *stored* on the host server. To a large degree this is an arbitary decision made by the server administrator and the owner of the site itself, and this is what I am assuming you mean by "sub part of the main domain".

IOW, you have a 'host' at one end of a URL, a file path at the other end. and everything in between is of little or no concern, other than the fact that it will be part of the registered domain name.

On this basis, it is impossible to say that one or the other is 'better' than the other or that there are actually plusses or minuses involved at all.

mc1->8 stated that the SSL certificate (if used) could be a consideration, and he is right up to a point. Only thing is, traditionally and typically, SSL certificates are only issued for hosts and not domains or subdomains. In fact one of the original purposes of SSL was/is to prevent one host from being spoofed by another - Something that isn't possible with the 'newer' SSL's that DO support subdomains. Needless to say, this 'new' method negates 99% of the 'protection' that SSL was designed to give. (Encryption is the other part of what helps keep things secure, and sadly, is the only thing people really consider these days). Simply put, the entire SSL system is now seriously flawed and undermined by these 'new' certificates.
However, it still seems to keep a lot of people happy to think they are doing the right thing by using it (foolish people).

mc1->8 also makes a somewhat valid point about independant developer access too, it IS easier to maintain such isolation using 'sub domains' than it is using file locations, but that doesn't mean the latter isn't possible.

Consistent directory structure is also a valid consideration, but the difference between (say)

www.mydomain.com/this_site/this_folder/ and
www.mydomain.com/that_site/this_folder/ isn't really much different than

www.mydomain.com/this_site/this_folder and
www2.mydomain.com/this_site/this_folder

In either case, when moving one to the other, there is still these minor differences that need to be taken into consideration.

At the end of the day there really aren't any *real* plusses or minuses for *either* method, other than what you want the end user to see/use for the site URL.
My general rule of thumb though is to keep the folder paths as short as possible, so on this basis, my argument would be that

http://site.mydomain.com/ is a little more "user friendly" than http://mydomain.com/site/
However, that is just my personal opinion.

What you should avoid, is creating a site that ends up looking like
http://site.mydomain.com/site/ or
http://site.mydomain.com/site/site/ or
http://site.mydomain.com/site1/site/ and http://site.mydomain.com/site2/site/ (for two sites on same server).

All are valid and possible - it just looks bad, again, in my opinion.

In short, just use your personal preference for the URL that you wish to present to the world. As complicated as it may all seem this is the *only* thing that you really need to consider. Your preference is what will determine where the files need to be placed (and/or the server settings needed to access them). Sorry.. that last part is also probably a little more information than you really need to know)

Cheers
RodG