SharePoint 2010 - Change SiteCollection URL

Question

Is there a easy way (like a PowerShell Command) to change the URL from a SiteCollection?

Or is the only way to export SiteCollection -> delete SiteCollection (Because the GUIDs)-> import SiteCollection?

Solution 1

Yes that is correct. My script to move sites looks something like this:

stsadm -o backup -url "http://domain/sandpit/site" -filename "c:\site.dat"
#delete old site collection
#run gradual site delete job
stsadm -o restore -url "http://domain/sites/site" -filename "c:\site.dat"

Solution 2

You can not really change the URL of the site collection easily as Sharepoint is heavily intertwined with the IIS in special ways ;-)

There are two possible ways to change the URL:

• Extend the web application (as shown in this SO post) to another URL [quick & dirty]
• Recreate the site collection by first exporting it and restoring it (stsadm -o backup and stsadm -o restore) [the "real" method]

There is a nice writeup for Sharepoint 2007 here, though it still holds valid for Sharepoint 2010.

PS: As you asked about Powershell, you can use Backup-SPSite (MSDN) and Restore-SPSite (MSDN) to do the same things you can do with stsadm (which is deprecated)