Re: FN-FORUM: Transferring domain names

date posted 25th June 2007 21:53

There are three things:

Domain registration - the people who take your money and set the
nameserver records
DNS hosting - the people who run your DNS servers and set the DNS records
Web hosting - the people who run your webserver

Often registration and DNS hosting are done by the same company (e.g.
123-reg) but that isn't always the case.

You need a IPS tag to change who you register the domain with (for .uk
domains), i.e. if you want to pay someone else (e.g. ukreg) to renew the
domains when needed.
To change DNS hosting, you need to modify the nameserver records using the
tools provided by your registrar.
To change website hosting, you need to modify the domain's DNS records
(the A record for www, etc.) using the tools provided by your DNS host
(which might also be the registrar).

Someone who hasn't been to your site before will first ask the root
servers for the nameservers for your domain (modifiable by the registrar).
They will then ask the nameservers for the IP address of the web server
(modifiable by the DNS host) and will then finally talk direct to the web
server. The fun happens because, to make the system work efficiently, most
of this information is cached at other nameservers (e.g. the ones
belonging to your ISP), so changes take time to have effect across the
whole internet. This can be minimised, if you have full control over the
DNS records, by having a very short TTL (perhaps a few seconds) on the
relevant records before you make the change. This stops people caching the
results, so the change takes effect much more quickly. Most of the big
players (e.g. Demon) don't allow you to do this.

Cheers!

Anthony
--
www.fonant.com - Quality web sites