Moving from http to https: I need an Idiot's guide!

I have two http websites made about 10 years ago with RW. I have gone through some of the related messages on this forum but I have difficulty understanding the technical language. As far as I have understood:

  1. First, I need to get an SSL certificate installed. I assume I need to get this from my web host. My sites are hosted by Little Oak. How do I get this certificate? Can I go to my account control panel and “install” it ? Do I have to email them to do so?

  2. Then, I need to change my Rapidweaver document file. My website was made with RW 5.4 !!! (Come on, it has served my purpose, so far!). I assume I’ll need to upgrade to the latest RW version (Will it load my RW doc?). Once it is loaded, what exactly do I change to make it https? (I may not be able to use the old theme, etc, right? I may have to redo the site?)

  3. Then, I test, using one of the tools available. I don’t have externally stored data, so this step shouldn’t pose many issues, right?

  4. Redirect from http to https? Can I do this from account control panel? What exactly do I do?

Thank you for any help,
Sri

  1. I’d use the Let’s Encrypt option available for Little Oak.
    https://www.littleoak.net/knowledge/2112.html

  2. You do not need to upgrade RW just to enable HTTPS. After you have the certificate installed, just change the Web Address from http:// to https:// in Site Setup and republish.

  3. I would check for mixed content (content that is loaded by your pages from non-https sources. You may need a theme update. Use a site like: https://www.whynopadlock.com to check your pages.

  4. Little Oak can help with this, as it’s not RW specific. If not, post back here and we can help with the proper rules.

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Thank you, Don, for your help!
I’ll try it and report back if I hit a snag.

Regards,
Sri

Here you go!

3 Likes

Thanks, Joe!

Hi Don:

I followed your recipe and it worked (I think). The https:// is on, but so is http:// (that is, if I just type in “my-website.com” in the URL area, it takes me to the http site. If I type the full address, https://my-website.com, then it takes me to the secure website.)

What do I need to do to make sure that all visitors are taken to the https site. Do I need to do some redirect and if so, how do I do that? (By the way, are there two sets of websites stored on the host server, or are the same files served up securely or insecurely, depending on the request?)

Thanks for all your help,
Sri

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If you are sure you have fixed any active mixed content then you should be ready to do the redirects.

Here’s one of several posts that gives you the htaccess changes to redirect all requests to Https:

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One set of files. It just serves them with/without the SSL encryption.

Doug provided a great link to address your other question.

Little Oak has this widget to specify redirect (it is supposed to edit the htaccess file). What do I fill in as source? Just a “/”, since everything from homepage down needs redirecting? Destination should be “https://smart-ears.com”? Type “temp” is ok? (alternatives are “permanent” and “seeother”). No exact match, right? Sorry for these rudimentary questions. I have never done this before.

LOhtaccess

Temp = 302
Perm = 301
RW8 has a built in htaccess editor (in publishing settings).
The little oak thing you’re showing is for single page redirects not for redirecting an entire site to https.

Take the code from the post above and paste it into the htaccess file in RW8.

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Unfortunately, I have RW5.4 !
(Hoping to upgrade one of these days)

A plain text editor and an ftp client then.

Yes, that’s what I finally did! It’s actually working!
A big thank you to Doug, Don and everyone else who helped me through this.

Regards,
Sri

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