If you use IIS you can setup a new website to do such a permanent redirect, but that solution doesn’t scale well. For example, we run 42 websites using one install of umbraco, and consequently one IIS website. We’d need 42 new websites in IIS to use the built-in redirect feature.

One example site is http://en.culturalcare.com, and I want to make sure that if someone types in http://www.en.culturalcare.com they get redirected properly. The solution is to write a little generic URL re-writer yourself using the global.asax file.

< %@ Application Language="C#" %>
<script runat="server">
protected void Application_BeginRequest(Object sender, EventArgs e)
		{
			string domainName = Request.Url.Host.Replace("www.", "").ToLower();
			string sOldPath = HttpContext.Current.Request.Path.ToLower();
			string sPage = "http://" + domainName + sOldPath;
			Response.Clear();
			Response.Status = "301 Moved Permanently";
			Response.AddHeader("Location",sPage);
			Response.End();
		}
</script>

As you can see the code removes “www.” from the url and 301 redirects to the non-www version. It also passes the full path.

You could modify the code slightly to add www’s instead of removing them if that’s the desired effect:

< %@ Application Language="C#" %>
<script runat="server">
protected void Application_BeginRequest(Object sender, EventArgs e)
		{
			string domainName = Request.Url.Host.ToLower();
			string sOldPath = HttpContext.Current.Request.Path.ToLower();
			string sPage = "http://www." + domainName + sOldPath;
			Response.Clear();
			Response.Status = "301 Moved Permanently";
			Response.AddHeader("Location",sPage);
			Response.End();
		}
</script>

Download a full example for use with IIS.

To implement:

• create a new site in IIS and add host headers for all of the domains you would like to redirect
• extract the zip above to the directory setup in IIS
• setup wildcard application mapping in IIS to let the global.asax file handle all requests (not just ones that end in .aspx, etc). On windows server 2003 just go to Home Directory -> Configuration and paste in the aspnet_isapi.dll location in the wildcard application maps section. By default the path is C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_isapi.dll (uncheck “Verify that file exists”)

Here’s how to create a very simple Umbraco macro (using a c# user control) to allow you to insert arbitrary HTML code that won’t interfere with TinyMCE:

Create a visual studio solution and create InsertHTML.ascx with the following code:

< %@ Control Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" Codebehind="InsertHTML.ascx.cs"
    Inherits="YourNameSpace.InsertHTML" %>
< %=HTMLCode%>

The code-behind InsertHTML.ascx.cs just needs to have:

using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.Security;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts;
using System.Web.UI.HtmlControls;
 
namespace YourNameSpace
{
    public partial class InsertHTML : System.Web.UI.UserControl
    {
        private string __HTMLCode = "";
 
        public string HTMLCode
        {
            get
            {
                return __HTMLCode;
            }
            set
            {
                __HTMLCode = value;
            }
        }
 
    }
}

Build your DLL, drop it into the umbraco bin folder, and put the .ascx file in the \usercontrols\ directory. You’re almost done. Go to Developer -> Macros and create a new macro called “Insert HTML.” Point it to the user control on the server and be sure to check “use in editor.” Lastly, on the “Parameters” tab add a textMultiLine parameter and call it HTMLCode.

You should now see the “Insert HTML” macro as one of the options when you click the macro button in the TinyMCE editor. And we’re done.

Here’s a solution file extracted from my project:
Download Solution

We’ve done several things to control this issue, though a true fix has yet to be developed:

1. We applied the suggested fix of changing the umbraco.presentation.cache.CacheRefresher() constructor (this seemed to have no effect):

   public CacheRefresher() {
      if (System.Web.HttpContext.Current != null)
       {
           this.Url = "http://" + System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Request.ServerVariables["SERVER_NAME"] + "/umbraco/webservices/cacheRefresher.asmx";
       }
   }

2. We removed the future publishing functionality from the UI (umbraco/presentation/umbraco/editContent.aspx.cs in umbraco 3.03):

   //dpRelease.ID = "releaseDate";
   //dpRelease.DateTime = _document.ReleaseDate;
   //dpRelease.ShowTime = true;
   //publishProps.addProperty(ui.Text("content", "releaseDate", base.getUser()), dpRelease);
   //dpExpire.ID = "expireDate";
   //dpExpire.DateTime = _document.ExpireDate;
   //dpExpire.ShowTime = true;
   //publishProps.addProperty(ui.Text("content", "expireDate", base.getUser()), dpExpire);

3. We commended out the publishing timer which seems to have stopped the growth without adverse effects (thought I imagine that scheduled publishing would no longer work) (/umbraco/presentation/requestModule.cs in umbraco 3.03)

   //publishingTimer =
   //    new Timer(new TimerCallback(publishingService.CheckPublishing), HttpApp.Context, 600000, 60000);

The author of ClientTools promises to release a new version which should be able to cleanup the large number of item revisions in the database.

Stored procedures useful for troubleshooting this issue include:

• find items with the most revisions:

  SELECT contentNodeId, COUNT(contentNodeId) FROM cmsPropertyData GROUP BY contentNodeId ORDER BY COUNT(contentNodeid) DESC

• manually delete an item (if you can’t find the item in the UI using http://site/umbraco/editContent.aspx?id=IDHERE):

  DELETE FROM cmsPropertyData WHERE contentNodeId = '4023'

• find lost documents:

  SELECT * FROM umbracoNode
  WHERE nodeObjectType = 'c66ba18e-eaf3-4cff-8a22-41b16d66a972' AND ID NOT IN (SELECT Nodeid FROM cmsDocument)

• find items scheduled to publish:

  SELECT DISTINCT nodeId, level, sortOrder FROM cmsDocument INNER JOIN umbracoNode ON umbracoNode.id = cmsDocument.nodeId WHERE newest = 1 AND NOT releaseDate IS NULL AND releaseDate < = getdate() ORDER BY level, sortOrder

http://www.culturalcare.com/default.aspx?utm_source=testSource&utm_campaign=testCampaign

That’s quite an ugly url for something like a postcard campaign. Luckily umbraco includes a full url rewriter that can help us easily transform that into something like www.culturalcare.com/postcard

1. Configure IIS for wildcard application mapping. This allows ASP.NET to process extension-less urls (such as /postcard/):

• right click on the umbraco website and select properties
• go to the “home directory” tab and click “configuration”
• in the “wildcard application maps” insert the ASP.NET dll (something like C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_isapi.dll ) and un-check “verify that file exists”

2. Edit /config/UrlRewriting.config in your umbraco folder

• Change the top tag to ensure that you don’t have any conflicts with other extension-less urls (like /umbraco)

  <urlrewritingnet rewriteOnlyVirtualUrls="true"
  contextItemsPrefix="QueryString"
  defaultPage = "default.aspx"
  defaultProvider="RegEx"
  xmlns="http://www.urlrewriting.net/schemas/config/2006/07" ><rewrites>
  ...
  </rewrites>
  </urlrewritingnet>

• add your rewrite rules following the example in the file or the documentation at urlrewriting.net. For example, if I wanted to redirect /postcard/ to /default.aspx?utm_source=testSource&utm_campaign=testCampaign I would add the following rule:

  <add name="postcard"
  virtualUrl="^~/postcard/?$"
  redirect="Application"
  rewriteUrlParameter="ExcludeFromClientQueryString"
  destinationUrl="~/default.aspx?utm_source=testSource&amp;utm_campaign=testCampaign"
  ignoreCase="true"
  />

• Note that the & needs to be written as & in the destination url.
• If you’d like to redirect to a different domain, virtual url and redirect need to be specified accordingly:

  <add name="offsite"
  virtualUrl="^http\://(.*)my.domain/redirect/?$"
  redirect="Domain"
  rewriteUrlParameter="ExcludeFromClientQueryString"
  destinationUrl="http://offsitedomain.com"
  ignoreCase="true"
  />

Enjoy!