Getting started

We have designed this getting started tutorial to teach you about the basics of site administration/development, and to motivate you to create a site that will be functional and successful. Simply follow these steps and you will be publishing and your site in no time.

Step 1: Choose a domain name

If you have already chosen a domain name, or already own a domain name, proceed to step 2.

I don't have a domain name, how do I choose one?
Choose a name that reflects the content and purpose of your web site or business. Try to keep it short and descriptive. . Keep in mind the image that your domain conveys. When seeing your web site in search engines, your domain name is one of the ways a surfer may decide whether or not to visit your web site.

Step 2: Sign up for your account

Now that you have chosen a domain name, you will need a web hosting service to store all your web pages and graphics. That is why you need us. Our simple step-by-step sign up process will have you online in no time. If you have any questions about this process, please feel free to browse our sales FAQ or contact our sales team.

Step 3: Change Your DNS

If we registered a new domain name for you when you signed up us, we have already setup your DNS correctly, and you can proceed to step 4.

If you already own a domain name, or are moving from another web host, you will have to change your DNS so your domain name will point to our servers. You will not be able to use any of our services, unless your DNS servers are correct.

What is DNS?
DNS stands for Domain Name System. This system is used to associate a domain name (e.g. www.lankawebhosting.com) with one or multiple IP addresses. Now, an IP (Internet Protocol) address is like a phone number to a computer. Every computer has one but just like a phone number, sometimes an IP address can be hard to remember. This is why there is DNS. Instead of having to remember the IP we only have to remember www.lankawebhosting.com.

The domain registrar you purchased your domain name from will assign two IP addresses to your domain name. These IP addresses are also called nameservers. So, with your domain name, you will have to manage a Primary and a Secondary Nameserver. These nameservers determine what server, on the Internet, your domain name will propagate to. In order to upload your web content to the lankawebhosting.com server, or receive/send email, or type your domain name into a browser and have your website be displayed, you will need to update your Primary and Secondary Nameservers to:

Primary:
ns1.lankawebhosting.com

Secondary:
ns2.lankawebhosting.com

How do I change nameservers?
The only way to manage or update your nameservers and other information regarding your domain name is through your domain registrar. Remember, your domain registrar is where you purchased your domain name. All domain registrars will provide their customers with information and a manage area where you can login to update your nameservers. Simply, go to your domain registrars website and login to your domain manage area to update your namerservers. See the documentation of your domain registrar for instructions on how to do this.

When will my domain begin working?
New domains begin working 24-72 hours after initial registration. DNS changes to existing registered domains can take 24-72 hours after the DNS change has taken place. Therefore it may take up to 3 days before your domain is pointing to your site at our servers.

Within 2-12 hours of signing up, we will send you a welcome mail. This mail contains your account information and login details. you willl recieve a temporary URL where you can access your website, so you can upload/preview the content before the DNS information gets propogated.

Step 4: Setup Email Accounts

The first step in setting up your email accounts, is to setup/define your email addresses on our mail server. Our simple to use Control Panel allows you to login and setup/manage your email accounts 24 hours a day. Once you have setup your email accounts on our mail server, it is now time to configure your email client software. We will add a new tutorial with details on setting up email accounts very soon.

Step 5: Build Your Web Site

You are ready to get started building your web site. First, you will need to decide if you are going to design your web site by yourself, or hire a professional web site designer. Building a web site yourself may be a challenging task, yet very enjoyable and satisfying.

Step 6: Upload Your Web Site

As you create your web site, you can begin uploading and making changes at anytime. We have made the entire process of uploading very simple.

The recommended way of uploading is using FTP (file transfer protocol). Any FTP software suite will work, and a search on download.com will result in many possibilities. The most popular FTP clients are probably CuteFTP or WSFTP, and Fetch for Macintosh. However, our favorite is the excellent piece of software called SmartFTP, which is free for personal and non-commercial purposes.

After you have downloaded and installed your choice of FTP software, upload your site to the directory "public_html".

FrontPage Users: If you are using Microsoft FrontPage, the FrontPage extensions must first be installed on your account. This can be completed through our control panel software. Please refer to the cPanel tutorial for more info.

We support the following welcome pages. (Welcome page is the page that your visitor would be greeted with, when he enters your site)

index.htm

index.html

index.php

Congratulations! now your site is live and running. Now it's time to market your site and let people know that it exists.