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Frequently
Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is....
How do I...
Web Hosting?
Web hosting is simply a term for having an internet address and
web space for you to build and maintain your web site. Once you
have a place to host your web site, people will be able to view
your site by simply typing in your domain name. A web hosting
company is a company that specializes in "renting out" web
spaces for people who are interested in having a web site on the
internet. A good web hosting company will offer many useful
features to support their customers in building and maintaining
their own web site. These useful features include web-based
control panel so that the client have more control in
maintaining their site, databases for advanced purposes, 24/7
web and FTP access etc.
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Control Panel (CPanel)?
CPanel is a fully-featured web-based control panel that allows
you to manage your domain through a web interface. The idea is
to transfer as much of the control and responsibility of
managing your web site to you. You have the ability to manage
all aspects of email, files, backup, FTP, CGI scripts, and web
site statistics.
CPanel Help.
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A Domain
Name?
All computers on the Internet have unique number (like a
phone number) called an IP address. These all look something
like 12.34.78.90. Course these are hard to remember for humans.
So we have Domain Names to help us out and make things easier to
remember.
vitronix.net is a
domain name.
The domain name service is run worldwide, across thousands of
domain name servers, using a standard known as DNS.
For more information, try
http://www.howstuffworks.com/dns.htm
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HTML?
HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language. It's a language that
tells web browsers how a page should be displayed.
Another acronymn that goes hand in hand with HTML is HTTP -
Hypertext Transfer Protocol. This an agreed "set of signals"
(like Morse Code) that are used for communication between your
web browser and a webserver. In general you shouldn't ever have
worry about HTTP though.
Further Reading
Online
W3Schools on HTML
HTML Help
Web Reference
W3 Standards on HTML
HTML Goodies
Netmechanic HTML Checker
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PHP?
PHP stands for HyperText
Pre-Processor. It's a server-side scripting language.
What does that all mean? It means the webserver does some
thinking before it gives a visitor a web page. It could be you
visit a PHP enabled site where you "log in", with a username and
password, for example. PHP would do the checking that your
username and password are correct, then send you a web page
saying "Welcome Bob"... customised to your requirements.
PHP is a very
powerful language for developing websites, and has all the
potential to build a site as advanced as Amazon.com for example.
Further Reading
Books
Build Your Own Database Driven Website
Using PHP & MySQL - awesome book - if you want a
place to get into PHP and MySQL fast, look no further.
PHP and MySQL Web Development
PHP Black Book
Php Essentials
Professional PHP4 Programming
Php Fast & Easy Web Development
PHP Developer's Cookbook
Core PHP Programming
Php Functions Essential Reference
Online
The PHP Manual
PHP Builder
Zend
Sitepoint
Devshed
PHPDeveloper
PHP Guru
Hotscripts - Free Software!
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MySQL?
MySQL is a database, ideally
suited to websites. It allows your site to have powerful
features, such as user registration, dynamic content (like a
News site) and much more.
Most of the big
websites on the Internet are powered by a database in someway.
Even this text you are reading lives in a database - no more
manually updating .HTML pages!
MySQL goes hand
in hand with PHP and is arguably the fastest and most suitable
database for websites.
Further
Reading
In general you'll find loads of information on the PHP sites
about MySQL.
Books
MySQL
Online
MySQL Documentation
MySQL at dbforums
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FTP?
FTP stands for file transfer protocol. It is another agree
"language" for communicating on the Internet and is used for
transfering files between computers.
There are many
tutorials on the Internet explaining how to use it. If you are
unsure, you could start
here.
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CGI / Perl?
CGI / Perl is a combined technology, to allow you to build
interactive websites. It is older and perhaps harder to use than
PHP, but has some features which are more powerful.
Further Reading
Online
HowStuffWorks on Perl
Ovid's Perl Course
Perl in 10 Minutes
Learn Perl
Perl Documentation
Web Developers Virtual Library on Perl
Perl Monks
Perl from O'Reilly
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CSS?
CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets. You can regard it as an
"add-on" to HTML, to give you more control over how web pages
look.
The basic idea
behind CSS is to seperate style from content, allowing you to
format your pages using the same "look" on every page, and save
time when updating the style.
One drawback to
CSS is different web browsers interpret in different ways, so
you need to be very careful when using it, "dotting your i's and
crossings your t's".
Further Reading
Online
Webmonkey CSS Beginner Tutorial
W3Schools on CSS
EchoEcho Tutorial
Web Developer CSS Tutorial
Rich in Style
CSS Pointers
Glish
House of Styles
Bluerobot
NYPL Style Guide
AListApart
Builder CSS Reference
Browser Compatibility
Browser Detection and Appropriate CSS
Generation with PHP
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Control Panel (CPanel)?
CPanel provides a complete
range of functionality to manage all aspects of your web site.
The following areas are available:
- Mail Control - The
Mail Control area allows you to manage all aspects of your
email, from adding new accounts, managing mailing lists, and
setting spam filters.
- Domain Control - The
Domain Control area deals with all the tools that you need to
control your domain using CPanel, including uploading and
managing files, maintaining the password on your web site,
creating custom error pages, and other tools.
- Backup Storage - The
Backup Storage area allows you to download the daily backup
file of your web site.
- FTP - The FTP area
deals with all the tools relating to setting up and managing
FTP accounts, as well as managing FTP sessions.
- CGI Scripts - This
CGI Scripts area allows you to use some pre-installed CGI
scripts through CPanel.
- Statistics - The
Statistics area presents you with a wide variety of
information about your web site, from the latest visitors to a
detailed monthly summary of hits, as well as providing an
error log.
CPanel 4 instruction manual can
be found
here in HTML format or
here in PDF format. (special
thanks to
Precision Documents)
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Publish My Web Site?
Firstly you need to get the files to your site then put them in
the correct place for viewing.
There are two
main ways to transfer files to your website.
From your site
control panel, you can use the web based file manager to upload
files.
You can use FTP
(file transfer protocol to upload them. You will need to point
the ftp application at ftp.yourdomain.com. If you have
never used ftp before, and are running Windows, we recommend
either
WS FTP LE or
Leech FTP, both of which are
free to download and have a friendly user interface.
When you login
via FTP, you will find yourself in your "home" directory. You
will see another directory called "www". This is the "root" of
your website. When you visit http://www.yourdomain.com/ you are
looking at files in the www directory.
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View my website Statistics?
Every account with Vitronix.net comes with a copy of Webalizer,
which allows you to view the last twelve months of site
statistics, from a webpage, giving you detailed analysis of
where your visitors are coming from, who referred them and much
more.
Stastics are
also available for download so your can peform your own analysis
on them.
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Check my Server Usage?
To check your server usage, simply login to your to your account
control panel. At the left hand side of the screen, you will see
your account information such as number of subdomains, MySQL
databases, disk usage, bandwidth usage, available disk space,
number of email accounts, email forwarders, autoresponders,
mailing lists, email filters and ftp accounts.
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How do mailing lists work?
A mailing list is a powerful tool for building an online
community.
You can create
lists which allow selected subscribers to send email to everyone
else on the list using a single email address. Messages are
archived and can be made available to visitors / members as you
choose.
There are many
more powerful features provided by the lists, to give you
control. Administration is all done via a web page.
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SSL?
SSL allows you to make parts or all of your website secure. It
works be initiating a secure, encrypted tunnel between the
webserver and the visitors web browser. It is used at sites such
as Hotmail.com and sites accepting credit card details (such as
PayPal) to prevent anyone from "listening in" and stealing
confidential information.
This article from Devshed
should make it clear how it works.
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Contact Us:
Contact us at our Help Desk
here or e-mail us at
support@vitronix.net if your
question was not answered in this Policy.
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