We run our own server (Debian) with many virtual domains. For many of the newer sites using Drupal, we've followed the protocol of installing Drupal -- in /home/drupal/public_html -- with each site getting it's own directory in /home/drupal/public_html/sites/mysite.com.
For all modules and themes we install in /home/drupal/public_html/sites/all/modules (or themes) and that works very well.
Works very well as long as we point mysite.com to /home/drupal/public_html in Apache vhosts.conf. All this certainly takes a load-off from reinstalling updates in each domain.
However we have a few domains that are quite old (mid-90's) and have extensive hierarchy of static files. We would like to upgrade those sites to Drupal over time. So here's the question...
I could overlay Drupal in /home/old-site/public_html, then use Front Page to keep the old site look & feel and even use menus to point to older pages and use this setup while -- over time -- we would convert old material to Drupal pages. And vhosts.conf would stay as it is for that domain.
But doing so would require doing twice the number of core/module/theme upgrades, a pain I'd rather avoid.
Alternatively, could I install all the old site content files under /home/drupal/public_html/sites/mysite.com - and then change vhosts and get the benefit of single upgrades?
Or (third option) could I use symbolic links under /sites/mysite.com that link to the old site files and directories?
Are there other ways to approach this dilemma? Thanks for any thoughts on this.
Jeremy