Today I registered a domain name for a family member. He had several questions, having never been the “owner” of a domain name. I realized that some of his questions were ones we commonly see in on-line help forums, even from people who have registered many names and should know the answers. I’m not going to explain how the domain name system works, but highlight a few points that are often not understood.<\/p>\n

Domain names are case insensitive. MilDeW.org is the same as mildEw.OrG. You may choose to capitalize some letters on your web site or in printed materials to make a domain name more attractive and readable.<\/p>\n

A domain name may contain a combination of letters, numerical digits, and hyphens.<\/p>\n

A domain name contains at least two parts, separated by a period or dot. These parts are called “labels”. For example, in mugwhump.com there are two labels: “mugwhump”; and “com”. Each label may contain up to 63 characters. A label may not begin or end with a hyphen.<\/p>\n

The “com” in the previous example is known as the top-level domain (TLD). While .com is the best known, there are many other domains including over 250 country code top-level domains (ccTLD) such as .de (Germany) and .uk. Anyone may register one of the “generic” domains such as com, net, org and Some country code top-level domains have additional requirements such as having a personal or business presence in the country.<\/p>\n

Once a domain name has been registered, it must be hosted in order to make use of it. If all you want is e-mail, then you may need only domain name system (DNS) hosting. Some domain registrars offer this for free. If you also want a web site, then you will need web hosting. Web hosting allows your domain name to lead to your web pages, and will include e-mail hosting.<\/p>\n

With your own domain name, you may create whatever e-mail addresses you like. You may have virtually anything as the user name portion, the part that comes before the “@” sign. For example, if you register saltednuts.com, you may create jim@saltednuts.com<\/a>, cashew123@saltednuts.com<\/a>, etc.<\/p>\n

The domain name system allows for third-level domains, also known as sub-domains. While CityMusic.ca would be your domain name, www.CityMusic.ca<\/a> would be a sub-domains. Sub-domains are useful for splitting up various subordinate sites, e.g. sales.CityMusic.ca, forum.CityMusic.ca. while DNS allows the creation of unlimited sub-domains, your web host must support this. Here at WebHostingBuzz, their cPanel control panel allows you to create unlimited sub-domains.<\/p>\n

While there is far more to talk about domain names, I hope I’ve clarified some of the common points of confusion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today I registered a domain name for a family member. He had several questions, having never been the “owner” of a domain name. I realized that some of his questions were ones we commonly see in on-line help forums, even from people who have registered many names and should know the answers. I’m not going […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":134,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[134,74],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n