How do I create a htaccess file?

Get something in an email or live chat from GoDaddy - anything they write rather than say over the phone. I’d be interested to see what exactly they are telling you to do. Incidentally, Your email is NOT dependent upon the website - it can run perfectly well without a website being active.

I agree it sounds more like some DNS issue. Is the domain name hosted registered with Go Daddy or is it registered somewhere else? If somewhere else, you need to access it and point the name servers to Go Daddy.

OK so godaddy is no longer doing email support. The domain name for the site is www.oxbowfarmcolorado.com the primary email is charles@oxbowfarmcolorado.com and the secondary (my wifes) is elizabeth@oxbowfarmcolorado.com

This is what my last message from support chat

As I can see, there is no index file nor any content in nor .htaccess, so you need to make changes according to your website content.

DNS
GoDaddy is now the registrar for your domain. They have full control over it and the DNS settings.

https://www.nslookup.io/domains/oxbowfarmcolorado.com/dns-records/

Email
The first thing I see in those results is that your MX record (this is what a mail server will look for to know what server to deliver email for your domain to) is pointing to: mail.oxbowfarmcolorado.com

However, they do not have a DNS record setup to point that DNS name to an IP address.

https://www.nslookup.io/domains/mail.oxbowfarmcolorado.com/dns-records/

When you do a look up for the IP address of mail.oxbowfarmcolorado.com no IP address is returned. There should be an ‘A’ record with it’s IP address. This is why your email is not working. You need them to add an ‘A’ record pointing mail.oxbowfarmcolorado.com to the IP address of their mail server(s). They should know how to do this. It should have been done when they transferred the domain to their system.

Website
They did setup a DNS record for www.oxbowfarmcolorado.com which points to an IP address. When I try to access your web page, I get a permissions error. Where you able to upload your website to their server? Can you login to their Control Panel and verify that there is an index.html or index.php file in the public_html directory in the root of your account?

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They said they updated the email issue and that it takes 1 hour to 48 hours to update globally. When asked about the website issue itself this is the response I got.

Public_html is root of directory could you please ask your developer to reach us so it will be clear to him as well.

Why do they think you have a developer? You built the site yourself, right? Just tell them you are the developer.

DNS changes can take up to 48 hours to propagate to all the name servers on the Internet. Typically you can see changes within a couple of hours.

Do you have multiple domains on this GoDaddy account? I don’t use GoDaddy but different web companies have different requirements as to where you publish the root directory too.

What path is GoDaddy telling you to use to publish the site too? Is it public_html or something else? If you have multiple domains on the same hosting account, each domain would need a different path.

Doug,
Your guess is as good as mine. They know I use RW to edit our site. I have told them this since we switched things over. Good news is the email is now getting sorted out. I am now starting to get email through this domain

Website:
We do have multiple sites… this is just the first site we have fought with. Yes on the Godaddy system it is a public_html directory. In this directory there is a directory for oxbowfarmcolorado.com and crawfordimaging.com ( our other site that we have not started messing with yet)

Again, I don’t use GoDaddy, but I think the way they operate is similar to other hosting companies.

There’s often what they call a “primary” or “main” domain. That domain will sometimes point to the public_html directory(folder). There’s no sub-directory used for that domain.

Looks like you have two sub-directories in the main public_html directory. They are named the same as two domain names.

So take them one at a time and repeat.
For: http://oxbowfarmcolorado.com/ what’s in the directory with that name? There should be an index.html or index.php file. If there’s not then you are publishing to the wrong path.

As I’ve always said for most people the easiest way to set the publishing path in RapidWeaver is to clear out the path in RapidWeavers publishing settings and choose the Browse button, then select the directory from the presented window. That way RapidWeaver will figure out for you what slashes / you need where.

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Ugh…was on GoDaddy once upon a time. What a nightmare that place is. I second the suggestion to go with Chilidog Hosting. WAAAAY better and you won’t get support people who CLEARLY don’t know what they’re doing.

Is there a way I can post a screen shot of the public_html? That way you guys can see what I see.

Here’s information on taking screenshots on your Mac.

You should be able to drag the screenshots into the edit area (where you typed the reply.

If that doesn’t work you could place them in a folder on Cloud, onedrive or Dropbox a make it a sharable link.

You should be able to just drag them through. You might have to do them one at a time because there are file size limits.

Also, some screenshots of the publishing settings might be helpful.

Here is a screen shot of the public_html

Assuming we are still talking about oxbowfarmcolorado.com, will need to see what’s inside that directory, looks like the fourth directory down on your screenshot.

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Doug so inside that folder is another oxbow folder. If I click on that folder this is what I see.


Bottom photo is first

okay,

I think this problem.

It sounds like you have two oxbow directories?

As I said before I don’t use GoDaddy(and never would), and I don’t know what plan (Linux, cPanel, Plex, Windows, etc. etc) you are using, but you need to find the path that for the document root FOR THAT DOMAIN.
Here’s something from there help area for Linux cPanel:

Add addon domains to host multiple websites in Linux Hosting | Linux Hosting (cPanel) - GoDaddy Help US

Most hosting companies point the domain root to a sub directory with the same name.

So my guess is that in your publishing path you some how have added an extra sub directory called “OxbowSite”.

It’s hard to say for sure as I can’t see the full path in your screenshots.

So what I would do to try and fix this is the following:

  1. double check the document root with the domain records at go daddy.
  2. Delete the sub directory called “OxbowSite” unless that’s were GoDaddy is pointing at. I don’t know where this directory name came from, but I think that’s the problem
  3. In RapidWeaver goto publishing settings and CLEAR THE PATH of EVERYTHING) make it empty.
  4. Hit the browse button (next to the now empty path.
  5. You should see the public_html directory within that directory. You should see the sub-directory that matches the name for the document root.
  6. SELECT That sub directory (Don’t type it).
  7. Republish all files.
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You are The Man !!! That worked! Thank You!

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There won’t be any issues if the htaccess file is empty by itself. I can only assume that the host is mandating that you add something to the htaccess file to fix a problem the site would otherwise have. But there are several possibilities for this. You must enquire as to what precise problem they perceive with an empty htaccess file. Someone here will be able to offer the code to insert in the htaccess file once you are aware of what they want you to address.

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