How do you resolve to the "www" URL version

[leo721]

Hi All,
It is my understanding that if you don't set http://my-site.com to resolve to http://www.my-site.com, you are not maximizing your page rank because if other sites link to one version, the other will not get credit for the link. Therefore, you are potentially cutting your inbound links in half (because they are divided between the www and non-www versions).

So my questions are as folllows:
1. Is this true
2. How do I set my non-www URL to resolve to the www version? Is this something that is done through coding or perhaps with my hosting comapny?

I'm new to the forums so this question might seem basic and perhaps has even already been covered somewhere in the other posts (I did search for them without luck before posting this) Hopefully, someone out there will be nice enough to walk me through this in simple terms. It would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

[unreviewed]

There are only two reasons, (that I know of), for setting up a redirect "to resolve to the "www" URL version".

1. You believe that a 301 redirect will cause Google to transfer PR from wayward links.
2. You have a very, very large web site, and you don't want to waste server resources with the possibility that engines will spider the same content twice.

Reason 2, is a very good reason. If you look at the server response code for web sites such as microsoft.com, ibm.com or apple.com, and even directory's such as business.com, you will see they chose to use a 302 for this purpose.

Reason 1, is not so clear. Apparently, GoogleGuy "hinted" at one time that using a 301 would perhaps transfer PR from wayward links. I have personally found that to be false. And add to that, currently Yahoo has admitted to problems with 301s.