The Planet Blog

Technology permeates our lives. We rely on GPS to take us to Grandma’s house; we stay up-to-date on friends we haven’t seen since high school via Facebook; and we are far more connected to the world around us than we ever thought possible. The fact that you are reading this blog, in one form or another, means you’re a part of this technology revolution. But it begs the question: Do you know how you are interacting with the world through the Internet?

I’m utterly unqualified to discuss an answer to that question metaphysically or philosophically, but I can take a crack at a crash course in hosting that will begin to answer the question literally. It’s the elephant in the room: In the simplest terms, how does the Internet work?

I’ve seen that there is steep learning curve for people outside the hosting industry when it comes to a general understanding of the technical answer to that question. The answer is not overly complicated or obscure … The sentiment is that by the time someone needs hosting, they’ll know how hosting works. The fact that you are reading this entry on The Planet’s blog would suggest you already know a fair amount about what hosting is and how the Internet works. So please bookmark this blog post as a resource to reference when your less-technically-savvy friends ask you to explain what you mean when you say you work online and host your own website.

I’m suggesting all of my friends read this post, so when anyone happens to mention Web sites, e-mail or computers, they can amaze their associates with their stellar understanding of the infrastructure and the behind-the-scenes goings-on of the Internet. Trust me: When you pass along this explanation as your own in the “real world,” everyone in earshot will be in awe.

If, as a rule, you don’t associate with non-technically-savvy people, please feel free to stop reading this post here.

The Internet: Under the Hood

1. You access a device connected in some way to the Internet. This device can be a cell phone, a computer or even a refrigerator. You are connected to the Internet through an Internet Service Provider (ISP) which recognizes that you will be accessing various sites and services hosted remotely. Your ISP is a network connected to the other networks on the planet (which is where we get the term “Internet” or “inter” “network”: Activity travels across multiple networks).
2. You enter a domain name or click a URL (for this example, we’ll use http://www.google.com).

3. Your ISP will see that you want to access “www.google.com” and will immediately try to find someone/something that knows what “www.google.com” means … this search is known as an NS (name server) lookup. In this case, it will find that “www.google.com” is associated with several name servers.

4. The first of these four name servers to respond with additional information about “google.com” will be used. Domains are typically required to be associated with two or three name servers to ensure if one is unreachable, requests for that domain name can be processed by another.
5. The name server has Domain Name System (DNS) information that essentially maps “www.google.com” to an Internet Protocol (IP) address. When a domain name is purchased and provisioned, the owner will associate that domain name with a specific IP address by creating DNS records. Think of DNS as a phone book that translates a name into a phone number for you.

6. When the IP address you reach sees that you requested “www.google.com,” it will find the files/content associated with that request. Multiple domains can be hosted on the same IP address, just as multiple people can live at the same street address and answer the phone. Each IP address only exists in a single place. (There are some complex network tricks that can negate that statement, but in the interest of simplicity, we’ll ignore them.)
7. Depending on what content you are accessing, the response from the server can be very simple or very complex. In some cases, the request will return a single HTML document. In other cases, the content you access may require additional information from other servers (database servers, storage servers, etc.) before the request can be completely fulfilled. This process is typically transparent to you as the end user, but it’s important to note when you are trying to understand the complexity of what seems like such a simple request.
8. When the requested content is located (and generated by other servers if necessary), it is returned to your browser in HTML code.

9. Your browser takes that code and translates the formatting and content to be displayed on your screen. Often, formatting and styling of pages will be generated from a Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) referenced in the HTML code. The purpose of the style sheet is to streamline a given page’s code and consolidate the formatting to be used and referenced by multiple pages of a given website.

10. The HTML code will reference sources for media that may be hosted on other servers, so the browser will perform the necessary additional requests to get all of the media the website is trying to show. In this case, it needs to pull in the Google logo from this location: http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif

When the HTML is rendered and the media is loaded, your browser will probably note that it is “Done,” and you will have successfully navigated to “www.google.com” in 10 easy steps! I know it seems like a daunting and complex process, but it happens in a matter of milliseconds each time you use the Internet.

Pretty crazy, huh?

-Kevin

Howdy. I’m Lyndell, a technical support specialist at The Planet. I work with customers regularly, so I thought a server setup guide could help new customers get started with ease. This documentation is based on my personal server setup experience and on the experience I’ve had helping customers with their new servers.

1. Password

Be sure to change your password. Use a combination of letters, numbers, even symbols. You can even mix capitalization. Don’t use names, birthdays and other trivia that can be dug up out of public records. Conventional wisdom says you shouldn’t write down your passwords, but Microsoft’s senior program manager for security policy Jesper Johansson suggests otherwise: “If I write them down and then protect the piece of paper — or whatever it is I wrote them down on — there is nothing wrong with that. That allows us to remember more passwords and better passwords.”

Bruce Schneier — a notable security technologist and writer — agrees and explains, “We’re all good at securing small pieces of paper. I recommend that people write their passwords down on a small piece of paper, and keep it with their other valuable small pieces of paper: in their wallet.”

2. Firewall

Firewalls block network connections. Configuring a firewall manually can get very complicated, especially when involving protocols like FTP which opens random ports on either the client or the server. A quick way to deal with this is to use the system-config-securitylevel-tui tool. Of course, ssh, web server, ftp, mail and all the ports the control panel uses need to be open.

Mail Ports

• 25 – SMTP
• 110 – POP3
• 143 – IMAP
• 465 – SMTPS
• 993 – IMAPS
• 995 – POP3S

Web Server Ports

• 80 – HTTP
• 443 – HTTPS

cPanel Ports

• 2077 – webDisk (unsecured)
• 2078 – webDisk
• 2082 – cPanel control panel (unsecured)
• 2083 – cPanel control panel
• 2086 – WHM control panel (unsecured)
• 2087 – WHM control panel
• 2095 – webmail (unsecured)
• 2096 – webmail

Personally, I closed the unsecured control panel ports 2077, 2082, 2086 and 2095. Using SSL protected ports better protects passwords and data. To access secure control panel pages without browser popups warning about invalid certificates, buy proper SSL certificates (explained below).

Other

• 22 – SSH (secure shell – Linux)
• 53 – DNS name servers
• 3389 – RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol – Windows)
• 8443 – Plesk control panel
• 19638 – Ensim control panel

3. DNS

DNS is a naming system for computers and services on the Internet. Domain names like “theplanet.com” and “orbit.theplanet.com” are easier to remember than IP address like 70.87.6.117 and 70.87.6.16.
DNS looks up a domain’s A record to retrieve its IP address. PTR records are used to look up the domain name associated to an IP address.

Hostname

Pick a hostname for your server. It can be anything DNS allows, but some names are better than others. Hostnames such as “accounting” or “hackme” may draw unwanted attention. The hostname must be resolvable by DNS, so “example.theplanet.host” will never resolve since “.host” is not a top level domain. “host.example.com” and “server.example.com” are examples of the proper form of a hostname. You’ll want to avoid using “www” at the beginning of your hostname because it may conflict with a website on your server.

In cPanel, the hostname can be easily set in “Networking Setup”. In Plesk, the hostname is set in “Server Preferences”.

A Records

If you buy your domain name from The Planet, it is automatically added to our nameservers, but if your domain was registered externally, you’ll need to go through a few additional steps to ensure your domain resolves correctly on our servers.

To include your externally-registered domain on our DNS, you should first point it at our nameservers (ns1.theplanet.com, ns2.theplanet.com). Once The Planet’s nameservers are correctly reflected on your domain, open a “DNS Change Request” in Orbit. You’ll enter both the domain name and the IP address in the form, and we will create the DNS zone file for that domain. We automatically add A records for default subdomains like “www”, “ftp”, “mail,” and if you’d like to add any other hostnames, log into Orbit and use “DNS Administration” to add an A record for your server’s hostname. If your server’s hostname is “host.example.com”, add an A record for “host”.

PTR Records

Many ISPs configure their servers that receive email to lookup the IP address of the domain in a sender’s email address (a reverse DNS check) to see that the domain name matches the email server’s host name.

You can look up the PTR record for your IP address. In Linux and Mac use the “host” command on the console or in Terminal.app. In Windows use “nslookup” in your Command Prompt. If the results of the PTR record lookup don’t match your server’s hostname, open a DNS change request asking that the PTR or reverse DNS be configured. Please include both the IP address and the server’s hostname.

4. SSL Certificates

Getting an SSL certificate is optional, but it has many benefits. SSL encrypts passwords and data sent on the network. The certificates will assure your customers that they are looking at your site securely. Browsers won’t trust SSL certificates created by the server, so you should purchase certificates externally to keep your content safe and avoid invalid SSL certificate popup warnings.

If you’re interested in learning about The Planet’s offerings in this area, visit our SSL Certificates page. Remember, any website using SSL Certificates should be assigned its own IP address. More information can be found on our support portal.

5. Protect Your Data

An old adage says, “It’s better to have and not need it, than to need it and not have it.”

Data loss can happen to anyone. I recently experienced a hard disk drive failure at home, and I can attest that recovering data without a current backup is certainly disruptive.

Control panels include backup functionality and can be configured to automatically backup regularly to the home server or an external site. For example, cPanel and Plesk can be easily set up to backup to an FTP site. The Planet offers several options for data protection and backup to fit any of your needs.

Imagine what would happen to your business if you lost just some of your data. There’s no excuse for neglecting backup when configuring your new server.

6. Know the Mail Guidelines

Some Internet Service Providers are very particular about email sent to them. As a mail server administrator, you may experience frustration when your server’s emails are not accepted by ISPs that aggressively combat spam. To better prepare for your server’s operations, you may want to verify with the larger email providers that your messages will meet their criteria for valid traffic. Read what a few of the larger postmasters have to say:

• Hotmail
• Yahoo
• AOL
• Comcast

7. Move In!

Now that the server has been prepared and the data protected, you are ready to migrate your content. Never underestimate the usefulness of control panel documentation. Here are the links for our popular control panels:

• Plesk
• cPanel
• Ensim
• Helm

Remember, The Planet’s technical support department is only a phone call away.

-Lyndell