Multiple hostnames for my Confluence server

[C_ Douglas Miller]

I have an onprem Confluence install that hosts both our publicly available Knowledgebase and our AD integrated corporate intranet. This VM also hosts a Jira install... for SSL reasons both are on non-standard SSL ports.

A decision has been made to move the public knowledgebase behind an authentication system so our IP is at least password protected to our clients only. We are having issues getting this setup operationally... and I suppose it all boils down to "Can Confluence respond to multiple hostnames?".

Until recently all users connected to knowledgebase.***.com directly. We have recently tried to get clients connecting through a proxy site (for login purposes) that hosts our in house authentication, that in turn redirects successful logins to the Confluence site. Internally we tried to get employees to connect to a different hostname (confluence.***.com) but since I cant seem to find how to configure a 2nd hostname within Confluence (& the SSL port is non-standard) things are simply not working for both internal & external users at the same time.

We have reverted all changes and are running now, but still looking for a 'Good' answer. Any help would be appreciated. Thx.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Confluence only works on one url, there's no way to do what you're asking here.

You could put a proxy in front of it with a different url scheme, but that will cause gadgets to break, and all the links will be on the base url as well.

[C_ Douglas Miller]

Thx for your reply.

[Bill Bailey]

As @Nic Brough -Adaptavist- says, it won't work. My suggestion is to have two different Confluence instances, with one to have just public information (even if it is behind login). Then using a publishing plugin (such as comala-publishing) to push public content developed in your internal Confluence externally.

This twin instance solution has to advantage of enabling what you want to do, plus it segregates internal (which can be behind a firewall) and public data. It also means that external customers only see published versions of pages, and not any intermediate versions.

[C_ Douglas Miller]

I took a quick look and will dig a bit deeper... but can Comala publish to sites outside of a Confluence instance or will I need 2 instances? Thx for the reply.

[Bill Bailey]

Well if you want two host names, that equals two instances. But since the public instance would probably have anon access enabled (just behind a proxy login), you only need a 10 user license.

But the Comala plugin will support publishing to different spaces within a single Confluence instance.

[Jorge Merino]

Hi!

Comala Publishing can synchronize entire spaces inside the same instance. 

However, Comala Workflows Remote Publishing is able to publish pages to a remote instance. This app is a free add-on included in Comala Workflows.

If you have any question or doubt about Comala products do not hesitate to contact here.

Best regards,

Jorge.