- What is a Domain name?
Every
machine connected to the Internet has it's own individual number,
much like your telephone number, and these numbers are in the
form 194.143.190.10
As
you can well imagine, having to remember a number like that
for every machine or web site you wish to visit, would be a
very annoying task, so to simplify the job, you can obtain a
Domain name which will point to your web site's address.
This
means if your company is Smith Electronics, you could register
smith-electronics.co.uk and your customers could visit your
web site at www.smith-electronics.co.uk, instead of typing in
194.143.190.10 for example. Likewise, you can use that address
to receive e-mail.
A
domain name gives your company it's own unique individual name
on the Internet, which makes you that much easier to find, obviously
a good thing!
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- How much does it cost?
For a .co.uk a .com,
.net or .org domain just £48.00 for two years including NIC fees plus
VAT.
From
the third year onwards your domain will cost approximately £49.00
for a further two years to maintain (subject to variation and exchange
rate fluctuation). This annual fee covers the management and
continued propagation of it's location details around the worldwide
Domain Name Databases.
-
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- What suffix to my
name should I use?
Generally, for UK based companies
who's primary business is in the UK or Europe the best is .co.uk.
If you trade internationally then the option of using .com
may be better. In both cases hard and fast rules do not exist
and either could be used.
Unlike
.co.uk and .com registrations, comparatively strict
rules apply to .ltd.uk, .plc.uk, .net.uk and .org.uk.
The name prefix to a .ltd.uk or a .plc.uk must
be EXACTLY the registered company name, E.g.. W H Smith Limited
could register "whsmith.ltd.uk" but not "whs.ltd.uk".
.net.uk
and .org.uk are reserved for UK based network providers
and UK based non profit making organisations (charities). Both
these domain types are currently strictly controlled.
Although
similar rules theoretically apply to .com, .net and .org
registrations, in practice the enforcement is currently less
strictly upheld
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- How long can a Domain
name be?
For a domain ending in .uk
you may use up to 63 characters (before any full stop characters).
For
any other domain (.com, .net, .org) you
may use 22 characters.
You
may use any alphabetic character (a-Z, A-Z) and any numeric
character (0-9), and you may also use hyphens (-) in your domain
name, but the domain name must start and end with an alphabetic
character.
It
is best to keep your domain name as short and simple as possible,
so your customers can find you with the minimum effort.
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- So what's Domain Hosting?
Once you have your Domain name registered,
machines on the Internet still need to be able to find your
web sites numeric address!
The
Internet has several "directories" of domains, and
other machines on the Internet look in these directories to
find your machine. The master directories have entries
which will point to your domain host, which in turn holds your
machines details.
Several
companies charge for this service, but Net-Address.co.uk will
host your domain name for you free of charge!
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- Someone has my domain
name, what do I do?
If someone has already registered
your domain name, there is normally very little you can do,
unless you have a legal trade name claim to that domain
name.
For
more information on Domain name disputes in the UK domain, click
here.
It
should be pointed out that Net-Address will not become
involved in Domain name disputes.
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- What about e-mail forwarding?
Your company may already have an
e-mail address with a different Internet Service provider, and
your e-mail address could be yourcompany@yourisp.co.uk
Once
you have a domain name registered, we can forward all mail to
your domain name back to your existing e-mail address. None
of your customers will know any different, except that they
will be e-mailing you at anything@yourdomain.co.uk which is
much more individual and looks more professional.
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- And web forwarding?
As with e-mail, you may already have a web site,
and we can point all visitors to your domain to your existing pages. So
instead of typing something like http://users.your-isp.co.uk/~yourcompany
all they will type is www.yourdomain.co.uk, much easier to remember,
a much more professional appearance, overall much better!
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- Can I
move my domain to another service provider?
Yes of
course you can. Although we offer full web hosting and design services
starting from just £500.00, if you need to move your domain just let us
know and we will help you achieve a smooth transfer. Each domain
transfer carries a £25.00 plus VAT administration charge.
- How do
i upload to my web space?
When you
ordered your web space you are assigned an FTP user name and password
for Unix hosted sites which is what you must use to authenticate you to
the web server when uploading your web pages. The ftp host that you
upload to is www.your-domain-name.com where
"your-domain-name" is the domain to which the web space is assigned. If
you have ordered Frontpage web space then you must use Frontpage to
publish your site. The publishing location you use is http://www.your-domain-name.com
where "your-domain-name" is the domain to which the web space is
assigned.
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top.
