Is Cloudflare for a more technical audience?

Website, Application, Performance Getting Started
1

What is the name of the domain?

www.sensefordollars.com

What is the issue you’re encountering

I am unable to get my domain to… work?

What steps have you taken to resolve the issue?

I’ve created quite a few very low fidelity websites in the past, and when getting my domain together it’s always been relatively easy. Typically when I purchase the domain, if I want to redirect it, they make it very easy to do so. I did a quick search of top domain registrars, and Cloudflare came up. As a well known name, it made sense to use the so I went for it.

Issue I am having is that it seems like there’s 20 things I need to do before I can get the domain to work, as I navigate support articles I get linked to other articles, and the cycle continues.

Hoping I can get some support as, for the time being, I am merely looking to redirect my domain to a discord server. Previously I’ve used Powweb and GoDaddy and things like this have been outrageously easy, but seems like not so much here.

• I’ve created a Page Rule
• I’ve put in the URL as it’s typed in the example, with the * as I would redirect all traffic to the same spot
• I’ve picked setting Forwarding URL
• I’ve selected a status (301)
• I’ve entered the destination URL
• I’ve saved this page rule

It then asks me to confirm the URL is configured as a proxied DNS record, and links two articles, neither of which prove to be super helpful for me. I recognize I am not the most technical when it comes to domain registration…

When I navigate to DNS and select Records
• I click on the ‘+ Add record’
• I am met with type, name, and IPv4 address
• Name seems simple, use @
• For type, I don’t know what to select, and I am not sure where to get the IPv4 address from

Based on general research this should be doable, if not it seems like a significant gap. Again, I recognize I am not super technical when it comes to these things, but am definitely being met with a bit of shock at how much more complex this happens to be than previous service providers I’ve used.

Any help/insight would be great.

2

Use a proxied record for @ set to AAAA 100:: if you are just redirecting the domain, see…

Cloudflare is more technical than other registrar/host setups, but that’s because it doesn’t host (in the traditional way), but is a proxy service so can’t create DNS records for you. In practise for domain redirecting, even without the registrar, Cloudflare is useful as it generates an SSL certificate for the domain allowing you to redirect HTTPS requests. Most registrar/host originless redirect options only redirect for HTTP requests.

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3

Thanks @sjr - I’ve made the update you suggested, should I wait ~24 hours to see it propagate for the URL?

I’ve noticed a few surprise benefits on Cloudflare already such as free Whois privacy. I was just not expecting to have to navigate a more complex dashboard for managing the domain.

4

It should work almost immediately. The apex domain is giving a 522 error at the moment…
https://cf.sjr.dev/tools/check?7f40eb1e05974fd3a9d99610f8e76c60#connection-server-https

Can you show a screenshot of your Page Rule?

There’s no DNS record for www so if you want to redirect that as well, add the same DNS record and make sure your Page Rule covers it.

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Here is a screenshot of the Page Rule

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6

Second post due to image limitation for new users.

I’ve added the dns for www

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image1286×137 7.4 KB

7

Looks like they both work now thanks to your input! (I added another rule for the non www link)

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8

You can do it with 1 rule by specifying the URL as *sensefordollars.com/*

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