: DNS entry to redirect constant url to changing directory name I have static content that is regularly updated that I'd like to maintain 100% up-time for when switching over to new content. Ideally

@Mendez628

Posted in: #Cloudflare #Dns #Redirects

I have static content that is regularly updated that I'd like to maintain 100% up-time for when switching over to new content.

Ideally I'd like to provide a single url such as:

static.mydomain.com/tiles/


that actually redirects to something like

static.mydomain.com/tiles-2016-03-01/


then when I roll-out a fresh update I can quickly update the DNS record to redirect to the new files

static.mydomain.com/tiles-2016-04-28/


Is this possible with DNS alone? Perhaps there's an alternative non-DNS solution I can use?

BTW I have numerous tile sets so would prefer to host them all under static.mydomain.com.

At present I deploy my new content to

static.mydomain.com/tiles-NEW


I then rename the existing "tiles" to "tiles-OLD", followed by renaming "tiles-NEW" to "tiles". Unfortunately this process takes a while due to the huge number of files held under each directory, so renaming via FTP or the web based control panel (my only options) results in a fair amount of downtime. As the site is popular at least some users are always going to experience issues during my renaming process.

Also using a quick DNS change would allow me to quickly roll back to an older version of my files if a problem was discovered with the update.

I'm using CloudFlare for my DNS if this has any relevance to potential solutions.

Alternative Solution

As this is outside the abilities of DNS I solved it using a simple web.config file on IIS (a .htaccess can be used instead on Apache):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<configuration>
<system.webServer>
<rewrite>
<rules>
<rule name="tiles">
<match url="^tiles/(.*)" />
<action type="Redirect" url="tiles-20160428/{R:1}" redirectType="Found" />
</rule>
</rules>
</rewrite>
</system.webServer>
</configuration>

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