HTTP headers return 404 on non-www URL?

Question

I'm doing PHP get_headers() on an mp3 file on my server and receive HTTP 404 when using the non-www address and HTTP 200 when using www.

I can access the file from either address in the browser, so why the 404? Can I fix this somehow with .htaccess?

1) WordPress is configured to use the non-www address (example.com)

2) The files are in the wp-content/uploads area of the WordPress install

3) The www subdomain has a DNS CNAME pointing to the non-www domain (www.example.com -> example.com)

Headers for: http://lhcsj.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/2012-5-6-sj.mp3

HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 21:11:43 GMT
Server: Apache/2.2.3 (CentOS)
Content-Length: 314
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1

Headers for: http://www.lhcsj.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/2012-5-6-sj.mp3

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 21:08:05 GMT
Server: Apache/2.2.3 (CentOS)
Last-Modified: Mon, 07 May 2012 17:19:47 GMT
ETag: "9c52430-e3626f-7a1332c0"
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Content-Length: 14901871
Connection: close
Content-Type: audio/mpeg

You have the HTTP 404 when trying to access to your mp3 file or to a page? What's the exactly log? — Pier-Alexandre Bouchard, May 08 '12 at 20:27
OK I've added the headers that were returned for each file URL — Frankie Jarrett, May 08 '12 at 21:13
Hmm I get HTTP 200 when I call `get_headers('http://lhcsj.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/2012-5-6-sj.mp3')` — anubhava, May 08 '12 at 21:21
@pier-alexandre-bouchard I'm just using the default htaccess generated by WordPress: http://codex.wordpress.org/Using_Permalinks#Creating_and_editing_.28.htaccess.29 — Frankie Jarrett, May 08 '12 at 22:16
@anubhava I wonder if it makes a difference that I am using get_headers() on the same server as the file? — Frankie Jarrett, May 08 '12 at 22:17
Strange. Are you really sure that you get a 404 log for this file!? Because we don't see any errors when trying to download the mp3 file.. — Pier-Alexandre Bouchard, May 08 '12 at 22:26

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered May 09 '12 at 00:09

The fact that www.example.com and example.com point to the same IP address via a DNS CNAME entry doesn't mean that the server is configured to serve both. This server could be configured to handle a multitude of HTTP hosts and the default might not be www.example.com but something else. It would in fact be unsurprising behaviour that it returns a 404 status for a host for which it's not configured (not even a default host).

Check that there is a VirtualHost entry in your Apache Httpd configuration for each of www.example.com and example.com. The fact that Wordpress is configured for a particular host only comes into play after having passed that step.

HTTP headers return 404 on non-www URL?

1 Answers1