https redirect

Add the following line to your httpd.conf file:

Redirect permanent / https://<address>/

Select allOpen in new window

Where <address> is the web address that you want redirected. Make sure to restart Aapache afterward.

I am not a server admin so I cannot restart the server.

To handle this using a .htaccess file will require that the mod_rewrite module is loaded within Apache (if you are on shared hosting this is normally the default) then create a .htaccess file containing the following:

Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} !=on
RewriteRule .* https://%{SERVER_NAME}%{REQUEST_URI}  [R=301,L]

Select allOpen in new window

Once the .htaccess file is written it's working,  there is no need to restart Apache

This gave an error.  Is there something I should have changed in the copy you provided?

The site is on a dedicated ip address.  Does that make a difference?

Server admins tell me that mod-rewrite is enabled on the servers

Try a different approach:

Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} 80
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://<yourdomainname>/$1 [R,L]

Select allOpen in new window

You should replace <yourdomainname> with your actual domain name.

One last way that I've found which does not use mod_rewrite and gets around some "double login" problems that can occur if you use authentication:

SSLOptions +StrictRequire
SSLRequireSSL
SSLRequire %{HTTP_HOST} eq "yoursite.com"
ErrorDocument 403 https://yoursite.com

Select allOpen in new window

Replace yoursite.com with your domain. This also does not tie it to a specific port if your site is being hosted on multiple ports.

Thank you both for helping with this.  I still need to test the last solution but this one worked
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule (.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI

The other took me to google search and brought up the domain at the top of the search.