How to setup google domain for your fastpages site (or GitHub Pages)

• Introduction
  • What you will get in this tutorial
  • What you need
• Step 1. Setup in your Github Repo
• Step 2. (Optional) You can skip this step if you are NOT using a site generator, such as fastpages, or Jekyll
• Step 3. Let your custom domain point to your GitHub Pages
• Step 4. Enable HTTPS for you GitHub Pages
• Reference

Introduction

When you publish a site with GitHub Pages, the default address will look something like this: https://<username>.github.io/<repo name>. For example, https://intodeeplearning.github.io/blog.

If you’d like to replace the default address with your custom domain, such as https://intodeeplearning.com , follow this tutorial!

What you will get in this tutorial

• Setting up a custom www subdomain, such as www.example.com, for your GitHub Pages
• having the apex domain, such as example.com, automatically redirect to www.example.com

What you need

• A GitHub repository ready for publishing, such as https://github.com/intodeeplearning/blog
• A purchased google domain, such as “intodeeplearning.com”

Step 1. Setup in your Github Repo

• Go to Settings > Pages > Custom domain, and add you custom domain name, such as “www.intodeeplearning.com”

  

Step 2. (Optional) You can skip this step if you are NOT using a site generator, such as fastpages, or Jekyll

If you are using fastpages.

• Add a CNAME file in the root of your repo.

    www.intodeeplearning.com
  

• In _config.yml set url to your custom www subdomain andbaseurl to "" .

    url: 'https://www.intodeeplearning.com'
    baseurl: ''
  

• In _action_files/settings.ini, empty baseurl.

    baseurl=
  

• You can also refer to Fastpages: using a custom domain

Step 3. Let your custom domain point to your GitHub Pages

• Go to your google domain registrar and select your domain.

• Go to the DNS tab

  
  

• Under the Resource records section, click Manage custom records

  
  

• Create a CNAME record that points your www subdomain to <your_github_username>.github.io

  

  • Do NOT include the repository name, such as intodeeplearning.github.io/blog. If you include your repository name in the CNAME record to your DNS provider, you’ll get the below message at your GitHub Settings > Pages > Custom domain

    
    

• Create an A record that points to the IP addresses for Github Pages.

  

  • IP addresses in the screenshot

      185.199.108.153
      185.199.109.153
      185.199.110.153
      185.199.111.153
    

  • Check here if there’s an update in the IP addresses.
    

• Open Terminal to confirm that your DNS record configured correctly

  • For CNAME records, do

      dig www.intodeeplearning.com +nostats +nocomments +nocmd
    

    • You should get

        ; <<>> DiG 9.10.6 <<>> www.intodeeplearning.com +nostats +nocomments +nocmd
        ;; global options: +cmd
        ;www.intodeeplearning.com.	IN	A
        www.intodeeplearning.com. 3312	IN	CNAME	intodeeplearning.github.io.
        intodeeplearning.github.io. 3312 IN	A	185.199.110.153
        intodeeplearning.github.io. 3312 IN	A	185.199.111.153
        intodeeplearning.github.io. 3312 IN	A	185.199.109.153
        intodeeplearning.github.io. 3312 IN	A	185.199.108.153
      

  • For A records, do

      dig intodeeplearning.com +noall +answer -t A
    

    • You should get

       ;; global options: +cmd
       intodeeplearning.com.	928	IN	A	185.199.109.153
       intodeeplearning.com.	928	IN	A	185.199.108.153
       intodeeplearning.com.	928	IN	A	185.199.110.153
       intodeeplearning.com.	928	IN	A	185.199.111.153
      

Step 4. Enable HTTPS for you GitHub Pages

• Go to your github repository settings page, under Settings > Pages, remove your custom domain and save.

• Then add it back and save again.

• Now you should be able to check the Enforce HTTPS checkbox

  

• Note: DNS changes can take up to 24 hours to propagate.

  • You may use dns propagation checker to check if you DNS has successfully propagated.

  • See GitHub Pages trouble shoot for more questions.

That’s it! Your website should be publishing at your custom domain now!

Reference

• Official Github Tutorial

  • About custom domains and GitHub Pages

    We recommend always using a www subdomain configurations for your site. If you configure a www subdomain, we automatically attempt to secure the associated apex domain.

    If you configure www.example.com as the custom domain for your site, and you have GitHub Pages DNS records set up for the apex and www domains, then example.com will redirect to www.example.com

    wwwsubdomains are the most stable type of custom domain because www subdomains are not affected by changes to the IP addresses of GitHub Enterprise Cloud’s servers.

  • Managing a custom domain for your GitHub Pages site
  • Configuring a subdomain