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Changing domain name of lemmy server (lemmy.borlax.com)

submitted 1 year ago by borlax@lemmy.borlax.com to c/lemmy_support@lemmy.ml

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Hey everyone, I am looking to change the domain name of my self hosted instance and had a question.

I used the Ansible installation instructions originally and am now curious if it would be as easy as editing the “hosts” file and the “config.hjson” file before running the playbook again?

Will this overwrite the necessary configurations and grab a new SSL while keeping the content of the instance intact?

My main concern is breaking federation.

Thanks for any insight.

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[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 6 points 1 year ago

Bump for this, I'd like to change mine but I think it'd ruin everyone who subscribes to my instance. Also worry about potential conflicts in other people's databases with duplicated posts or communities

[–] PartyCat@lemmy.best 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's more complicated than that, and it will completely break federation for all instances that have already federated with yours.
https://join-lemmy.org/docs/administration/backup_and_restore.html#changing-your-domain-name

[–] borlax@lemmy.borlax.com 2 points 1 year ago

Yeah, I did skim over that as well and was hoping maybe my post could trigger a discussion that could lead to a possible solution. This is what i was worried about tho.

[–] Max_P@lemmy.max-p.me 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

My guess is that it'll break federation pretty bad: a lot of things in Lemmy shares URLs for where to send ActivityPub notices: everything your users subscribed to, people sending DMs to your users as the username will change, remote instances subscribed to your local communities as well most likely.

I don't know if Lemmy honors 301/308 redirects, but honoring them and saving them for future use would probably be a nice feature to have, but probably pretty low on the priority list given the scalability issues being worked on at the moment.

[–] borlax@lemmy.borlax.com 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah, that was my concern as well, figured this post could spark a discussion and maybe someone would have a solution or at least some extra insight. I know there is a LOT going on with development right now, so I don't expect a priority here, especially because they are definitely working within the confines of ActivityPub functionality when it comes to federation. Thanks for your input!

[–] liori@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'm surprised federation isn't based on asymmetric cryptography. Let the public/private keys identify instances, as opposed to domains that risk being blocked by governments or bought by malicious third parties if the instance owner forgets to prolong it.

With that, implementing a change in domain names would be simple.

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