please explain exactly what you are trying to do
Sorry for the unfocused thread. I do appreciate all the help.
Goal Support an old web service client in the field with server side adjustments. The old client uses XML-RPC style of invocation. E.g.
http://www.newdomain/ws/message/ as a POST with the xml detail in the body.
Problem 1. the web service was hosted on a soon-to-be-retired SME 8 system
2. the old web service clients in the field do not support https, and cannot handle a 302 server reply as modern clients do today.
3. the field installs cannot be upgraded easily if at all.
RecapAt the beginning the task was putting a redirect in place, e.g.
http://www.newdomain/ws/message/ is passed to
http://www.olddomain/ws/message/. Got that worked out with the help here, but the 302 continued.
In the middle of all this, I thought the problem was the redirect to the old server. 302 was not wrong, exactly, just unwanted. I suspected the server setup might work better if I moved the web service handler to the new machine. Having done that I found the old web service client was still getting a 302, although along the way I had to sort out a 404.
Yesterday a colleague suggested that something other than the redirect and/or location of the web service handler was in play. It was then I remembered the change to have the http ->> https redirect be the default on the system. (doh!)
Today I was trying to direct Apache to leave calls to
http://www.newdomain/ws/message/ as is. Don't force to https. My associate, on a hunch, disabled the Force Secure Connections option on the ibay for newdomain.com and the old web service client worked!
SummaryIn reflection, the redirect and/or proxypass methods may not have been as significant as I assumed. They worked as designed. Along the way I learned a lot about the SME template system, and the resulting config is cleaner than on the old machine.
What we have now is this:
Using custom templates, the Location /ws is created. This correctly invokes the Apache mod for handling the web service calls. The iBay for
www.newdomain.com has Force Secure Connections disabled. It all works with the old clients in the field.
I would like to understand better what is happening with Force Secure Connections on an iBay in SME 9. I am wondering if having the secure connections option off is wise.