Excuse the Geek Talk...

[flo]

and speaking of Geek - (now no offense, please) all the above sounds Greek to me.  However, I am learning more about computers everyday.  I can open my own e-mail and turn the durn thing on and off.  AND find the Howard Forum .  - Oh, so much I don't know about webs (except spider) and etc

[kdfrawg]

Flo, there is just entirely too much to know. I have been in this silly business for 30-odd years and there are still days where I feel like a complete idiot.

Some of those days even have to do with Web knowledge, or the lack thereof.

[Mom70x7]

Geek questions -

Okay, I understand the domain name business. But the hosting?     

It sounds like you don't like GoDaddy, so if someone needed a host (does everyone?), then what are good hosting companies, or where do you find them?

Oh - and what makes them good (or bad)? 

[kdfrawg]

A "host" is essentially a computer that is connected to the Internet and from which Web pages are served. That's simplistic, but there it is. You can "host" your own Website on a computer of your own, but most people don't; there's too much work involved in software and hardware maintenance, and the costs can get fairly high.

Instead, most of us pay a monthly or yearly fee to a Web Host, which is a company that either owns or arranges for you to use all or a part of a computer that will host your Website. Often, the company that you deal with doesn't actually own the hardware; instead, they own right to use some of a larger company's hardware and only really provide billing and customer service, which usually includes technical support.

As an example, I currently use Webmasters.com, and have for about 4-5 years. In digging around in their basement, I find that most of the hardware they use is owned by Verio, a much larger company. Although the management at Webmasters (or maybe at Verio) has caused me some headaches over the years, their support people are excellent.

Although I have never asked, I don't really think there is a physical Webmaster.com building or office. All of the hardware is somewhere else (mainly in Florida) and all of the people that I deal with are people that work from their computers at home. I know it sounds a bit obtuse, but it generally works out fairly well.

As to how you find a good Web Host, your guess is as good as mine. I have heard a lot of negative things about GoDaddy and I have had a few problems with Webmasters, but I have heard some real horror stories about some hosts. There are some high-quality, high-priced hosts, but most are lower-priced and service can be pretty spotty, or sometimes pretty good. Nadine has obviously had some problems and Kjell is happy with cihost.com. I have had mixed luck with hosts for a number of my clients over the years.

Probably everybody with a Website has a story.

[Mom70x7]

A "host" is essentially a computer that is connected to the Internet and from which Web pages are served.

Okay - I guess I'm not in grade school yet, and need the kindergarten version.

If you have a domain name, such as ElkCounty.com, what do you do with a host? Or how are the pages served?

(BTW, ElkCounty.com is available for sale, and I am NOT interested, it just makes a good example. Besides, it gives Pennsylvania examples, not Kansas  )

If you bought ElkCounty.com, and created a page with ? ? ? ? ? (Front Page?), how would you get that page to come up with someone clicked on ElkCounty.com?

[kdfrawg]

Well, it's just like a phone call or a letter. Once you know the number or the street address, you can talk to the other end. The Web is like that. Every server gets a number. The numbers are longer than most phone numbers. An example is 123.321.123.321. Lucky they don't make us remember that, huh?

Instead, they let us remember names. So when you type in "www.genuinekansas.com" (please excuse the subtle plug) while you're connected to the internet, your computer know to go to the nearest big network computer with a list of URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) and the appropriate translation. Your computer automatically asks the big Internet computer how you get ahold of the name you just typed. The big computer says, "Oh, that's easy! You need to call 111.222.222.333!" and it just forwards your request on with that number.

There are a lot of combinations of 12 numbers and three dots, though we're starting to run out anyway. But computers are better at numbers than words. So, without you even knowing it, you arrive (usually) quickly at 111.222.222.333, which is the home of GenuineKansas. Sometimes there is some extra local translation when your request arrives at that home computer, sort of like an apartment number, but that's not really important. What important is you got the number from a common Internet resource, and your request has arrived at the right place.

The site that you asked for receives your request, just like somebody would a phone call. And what it hears first is that you have just come in from the outside world and want to see the default page, which is usually named "index.htm", although it can be a number of different things. Or you can ask for a different page name, like "fred.htm." It doesn't matter as long as the Website's host computer knows about the page. And it knows your address, too, because it received it along with your request, just like caller ID. So that starts a conversation. First, it sends you the default page. The you look at that page and click on a link, which tells it to send you a different page from the site. And so it goes.

I'll admit that's the junior high version, but it at least gives you the idea. Yikes! I have to go back out to the airport and pick up my daughter!

If you have more questions, feel free.

[Wilma]

What is the middle school version?

[kdfrawg]

In Nebraska and California (forty-odd years of my life), middle school is junior high.

So, in essence, that was it.

And once you get to the high school version, you have to start speaking in acronyms, which is like speaking in tongues only much harder to understand. The computer business has more acronyms than you can shake a stick at. In fact, they probably have an acronym for "shake a stick at." SASA. And then, later, there will be SASA III.

The only people that have more acronyms that the computer business are people in government. The homeland security folks, all by themselves, have taken us into serious acronym overload. I understand that they are way over-budget on the letters S, T, R, and V. It's nothing at all like Denmark. In Denmark there is a law that they have to use every letter at least once in every word. So they don't have any letters left over for acronyms. In some ways, it's a simpler system. It does make the street signs hard to read, though.

[Mom70x7]

How do your host server and your domain name get together?

[Joanna]

In Denmark there is a law that they have to use every letter at least once in every word. So they don't have any letters left over for acronyms. In some ways, it's a simpler system. It does make the street signs hard to read, though.

I LOVE it!

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