So, finally we have reached a stage where we are going to learn on how the camouflage, known as the domain name, works for a site. Integrating a domain with an hosting account is one of the most essential part when it comes to building a web site. In this chapter we ‘ll try to understand on how we can connect a domain to a hosting account following a few few easy steps.

What is to be camouflaged?

As mentioned in the previous chapters, the original stuff is stored at an IP address such as 192.0.0.1. But hiding these sets of numbers using domain names makes it more user friendly. You certainly wouldn’t like to use 74.125.127.100 instead of google.com. Yes! If you type 74.125.127.100 in your browser’s address bar, you’ll surely be directed to google’s site. Google.com points to 74.125.127.100 which eventually points to the google’s site.

Let’s integrate

This is no mathematical integration, its just the connection between the domain and the hosting we are talking about. Let’s do it:

What do you need?

These are the stuff that you should have by now if you are following this tutorial, right from Chapter 1. This is nothing new, you should have encountered them at least once by now:

1. Domain name: If you got one, its good or else get a co.cc. Refer to previous chapter for more info.

2. A hosting account: Refer the related chapter for more info.

Now a little information, you should have been provided in your welcome mail from you host, includes your login info, name servers, etc. It might include a shared ip address and some other info which might come handy in chapters coming up.

We just need to know the nameservers for now.

What is a name server?

Just wonder one server per website. Well that should be ok if you got a money tree or if your site is profitable enough to support such a server. So the point is that most of the servers usually host more than one domains.

And this is where name servers come into play. A number of domains can point to a single name server assigned to a particular hosting server.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In computing, a name server (also spelled nameserver) consists of a program or computer server that implements a name-service protocol. It maps a human-recognizable identifier to a system-internal, often numeric, identification or addressing component.

For example, on the Internet, a special case of name servers, so called Domain Name System (DNS) servers, are used to translate a hostname or a domain name (for example, ‘en.wikipedia.org’) to its corresponding binary identifier (the IP address 145.97.39.155), or vice versa.

How to use name servers?

Now if you have a domain, you must reach to your domain control panel provided by your domain registrar. The procedure can be different with different panels but only think you need to find is something like “Edit Name Servers”. Instructions for some popular domain registrar’s is given below.

Steps(for name.com i.e., if you bought you domain using name.com):

1. Log into your Name.com account.
2. Click on the ‘Account’ icon at the top of your page.
3. At your ‘Account’ page, click on the domain name you wish to modify.
4. Be sure that your domain is unlocked; to unlock, click on the padlock icon.
5. On the ‘Manage Domain Name’ screen, click ‘Edit Name Servers’ in the ‘Control Panel’ on the right of the screen.
6. ‘Remove’ the old name servers, and ‘Add’ the new.

https://www.name.com/faq/change-name-servers

Steps(for godaddy.com):

1. Login to your GoDaddy account.
2. Click My Account
3. Click Manage Domains
4. Click the domain name.
5. There is a Host Summary option in the lower left of the page. Find it and click Add.
6. Enter the information from the welcome email
7. Click the Nameservers icon that’s on top.
8. Change the nameservers to the new ones.
9. You’re done

Steps(for 1and1.com):

1. Login to your control panel.
2. select [Domains | your domain | DNS | Edit DNS settings]
3. Enter Name servers
4. click OK

Steps(for the free co.cc):

1. Login in to your co.cc account.
2. Domain Settings > Manage domain > Select your domain.
3. Click “setup” button > Manage DNS.
4. Input NAME SERVER of your hosting registrar.

Now you are finally through on how to integrate your domain and hosting.

Note:

1. Name servers may take upto 48 hours to take effect so you have be patient.

2. Changing nameservers usually deprives you of few features that your registrar has to offer. No need to worry because there are ways to get back working again for you. We’ll talk about such features, their use and how to work them out in the following chapters.

When I started with blogging, I had a pretty unclear picture in mind on how to go about blogging. So the result was … mistakes. Human tendency to play and mess around with things is too high that no one gets started in the first go. You need to get through a lot of trouble.

Well mistakes cause problems and problems may lead to mistakes. Here are a few:

Domain with a typo

What if you are with limited resources and buying a domain. While entering the domain you typed “yourdoman.com” instead of “yourdomain.com”. They look pretty similar, right. (If still didn’t find the difference, they differ by just an “i”) Anyone can misjudge this to be right and carry on with the registration. But after registration , you’ll know that you wasted a domain and your 10 bucks. Such a situation sucks. Right?

No Backup, no blog

Well, I have been in such a situation several times now. Some mis happening may lead you to a dead end. Thinking positive, you didn’t take backup, and next day you loose your blog. You’ll be left with nothing expect two options. First to start all over again and second to quit.

What the heck, installation

Installation is fun once you are familiar with it. But for the first timers it can be a hell of a job. I’ll illustrate a few situations :

a) You installed wordpress and but forgot to note down the password provided to during installation. In such a situation, an experienced person would surely change the password using phpmyadmin or do something similar. But a newbie would probably reinstall the whole thing.

b) This happens with many of us, not only bloggers, I’ll say everyone. You downloaded, uploaded and are ready to install a software. And now while installing you come to know that your host wont support all the features and now you need to look for a new host. That is really annoying right!

c) In due to course of installing something, you have a power cut or your computer hangs. Then you’ll surely want to bang your head against the wall that now you gotta start all over again.

d) While installing you come across a field that has to be filled but you don’t know what to exactly fill. eg. you need to enter your mysql username. You created ‘user’ using control panel but you didn’t know that your host add some thing to it like “cpuser_user”. You’ll have good trying “user” when it wont work.

All’s well, that updates well

Suppose while updating your wordpress installation, an error shows up and your blog stops working. If you are a hardcore webdeveloper then maybe you’ll get over this but if not, you’ll have a hard time. You’ll feel helpless as you know what went wrong but really can’t do anything about it. Your blog will be nothing more than a living dead body as it would have everything but nothing would work.

This has even happened to me last year when while updating my blog, something happened and I lost everything.

No money, what to do?

If you got a job or have any other source of steady income, then this point wont bother you. But for people who are beginning or are still studying in schools or colleges then this should be a problem. You have to arrange the startup amount for the initialization by any means. And most people tend to start working as freelancers or turn to PTCs or such programs. Once you are through you’ll feel relieved as not only bloggers but everyone feel at ease if they got money around.

Time and tide wait for none

Well, its really hard to take out time if you are employed somewhere or you need to study. A blog really requires a lot of work to be done. If you can’t devote enough time to it then its gonna be difficult, both for you and your blog. With shortage of time, you can’t really interact with your readers properly, can’t post regularly(you may take my example on this). Nothing is left important when everything is important. You have focus on everything and mange your time well.

My site’s ready, what next?

So every thing’s set and you are ready to take over the world but…… how? Even when a blogger is through with his site, he is yet to face biggest challenge of all, traffic. Getting traffic is the most difficult job for a blogger, an internet marketer or even a small shop owner. To convince people to visit your blog and comment is quite tough.

Out of ideas, can’t think of anything

You have been going great guns past few months but suddenly ………….now what?

You really can’t think of anything interesting to write about. That’s a general thing to happen once you have written so much. Even when you have some ideas, there may come some stituations when you’ll not be able to exploit them. eg. You just got a brilliant idea in your head but while surfing you come across a post, by a fellow blogger, on the same topic. Well, that would be sad and in 90% cases you tend to drop that idea.

No one wants me to blog

Situations will arise when people around you will think that you are wasting your time. That would be very discouraging and some might even quit. You may lose your interest and all the inspiration. I’ve been in such situations and lemme tell you that it really sucks. One day or the other you’ll feel like, “Forget it! Blogging is not worth my time”. errr…. That was ugly.

& many more problems are faced by the bloggers.

You would have gone through similar problems or even something which I was not able to think. I know you wouldn’t mind to share your experience with me or tell about something which I can improve on in this article.

A blogger’s life is sweet, live it to the fullest.

What we were talking about was where to get hosting from and I hope you might be through with an account by now. In case, you are not, just leave a message (as a comment) and I will try to help.

You should have received the welcome mail with your hosting details. It should include the following:

1. Your account details

These include you user name and password.

2. Site details

Your site’s domain name (should be a sub domain provided by the host/domain you signed up with) and cpanel’s address.

3. Server details

These should include name servers and might include shared ip address.

You will need the server details later once you’ll get your domain name. But if the host asks for a domain name at signup, get a co.cc domain from http://co.cc.

Getting familiar with your working conditions

Once you have an account,you should get thorough with the control panel. Just wander around,click on random links, to get familiar with your control panel. You will generally find short instructions coming up for your help once you navigate to any page.

Site Initialization

Navigate to the file manager and find you main root folder its generally public_html or ht docs (depends on the service ). Now use, ‘create a new’ file option to create new html document with file ‘ index.html ‘ (don’t use any other name for this time ). For the content go for anything like ‘hello world ! Welcome to my new site’.

Now you are surely through with the hosting so now you need to learn how to set up stuff on it like blogs, forums, etc.

Next chapter will help you learn about setting up domains.

DRV

TIME TO GET HOSTED

Part-1

Well,  other tutorials might suggest you to a create a site and then host it afterwards but I find the following sequence better. As a beginner, making a fast online presence is quite important.

I don’t agree with the idea of launching a site on a particular day or put count downs. I have tried this and believe me , it just wont work. No one’s interested in your site till you really got some viewable stuff on it.

You should get started from the first day itself. Behave a little shameless and invite people to your site ignoring how bad it looks. Constant diligent hard work, maintenance  and promotion is what’s needed for a brand new site.

And now back to topic.

What is meant by hosting??

A web server is expensive and needs a lot of maintenance which, in turn, means more money and time. So we need an alternative and that’s where web space/hosting comes into play.

Hosting is a popular keyword widely used among webmasters. It generally stands for a little space on a web server which allows your files to be viewed on internet using a web browser(eg. Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, etc.).

A browser connects to the web server and displays the files user has asked for. So the first thing is to arrange for web space.

Where to get hosting from??

Just like a web server, hosting might sound to be a costly affair. But the truth is that there are loads of hosts providing web space for free. Though, they lack in a few essentials services you might need later. But for now they would do.

My host suggestions/tips:

Go with http://byethost.org. I think they should be highly suited for our purpose.

Or else.. Google’s always there for you. Search for keywords like ‘free host’, ‘free hosting’, ‘free web space’, etc. and you’ll find thousands of them. Keeping searching till you find something which suits your requirements best.

….Continued in part 2.