Note: This article is old and may not be revised to reflect changes with the product terminology etc. This was written for WSS/MOSS 2007, Windows 2003 and IIS 6.

Change your existing host header in SharePoint ( WSS or MOSS 2007 )

Do you want to publish your SharePoint intranet or internet site to your users with a nice friendly url (or hostheader)?

This article can be also used if you want to rename your web application.

You would have to change the Alternate Access Mappings in SharePoint.

In SharePoint Central Administration, Click Operations.
In Operations, under the Global Configuration area, click Alternate access mappings

Next to Alternate Access Mapping Collection, click on the down arrow and click on ‘Change Alternate Access Mapping Collection’.

 

Select your Web Application

Click on Edit Public URLs

Then type in your desired URL (hostheader) in the Internet field as shown below:
For Example: http://www.mysite.com

Alternatively, you can change the Intranet field for SharePoint intranet deployments. Those are just labels for various “zones” in SharePoint.

Click Save and youre done!

Next step is to add the host header in IIS.
Update: 29th July 2013:Thanks to “AbuBenAdam” for pointing this out.

But before you go, make sure your DNS resolves to your web server IP address. Ping and make sure that works. You could also modify your hosts file to test this out.

You have now successfully enabled SharePoint to resolve requests to your new URL.