Shared SSL Access

Last modified: Friday, March 16, 2007

Gcom Internet provides shared SSL to its hosting clients at no additional cost above their standard hosting fee.

On each hosting server, a special purpose SSL certificate is installed on a generically named subdomain which forms an alias over the entire server.

By accessing your existing site structure under the SSL encryption offered by our shared certificate, you can provide full SSL to your own end users without the cost or complication of purchasing and installing your own certificate.

The first step in providing SSL access to your site is to determine which server you are hosted on, and therefore which shared SSL prefix you need to use in your URL references.

To determine which server is currently hosting your site or service, and which shared SSL prefix applies, you need simply browse to...

http://www.gcom.net.au/servername/

...and enter the domain or subdomain concerned.

The information provided is obviously only relevant if your domain is actually hosted by GCom Internet.

Once you have the relevant shared SSL prefix, you can reference your site under the security of SSL by way of the following URL format...

https://sslxx.servers121.com/~admin00/

...where "https://sslxx.servers121.com/" is replaced with the previously obtained shared SSL prefix for your server, and...

...where "admin00" is replaced with the primary CPanel administrator login name for your site.

Important...

• Remember to include the tilde "~" character before your CPanel administrator login name.
• A trailing slash "/" is required at the end of the URL unless a specific file is referenced.
• Please only use SSL references within your site's coding where they are actually required.

Examples of valid shared SSL URL formats...

• https://sslxx.servers121.com/~admin00/ would direct to the default file (usually "index.html" or similar) in the "public_html" folder. A trailing slash "/" must be provided to terminate the URL since it points to a folder.
• https://sslxx.servers121.com/~admin00/sales/ would direct to the default file (usually "index.html" or similar) in the "public_html/sales" folder. A trailing slash "/" must be provided to terminate the URL since it points to a folder.
• https://sslxx.servers121.com/~admin00/sales/contact.html would direct to the specific file "contact.html" in the "sales" folder. The URL must not be terminated with a trailing slash "/" since it is referencing a specific file

Because SSL performs encryption processes during data transfers, it adds a load to the CPU's of the server. SSL should only be invoked during data acceptance or delivery where sensitive data actually requires encrypted protection.