For the first time, this site has a new host.

New Host For This Site

Frequent visitors will notice that the previous web hosting banner disappeared and was recently replaced by the HostGator banner. To be honest, the old banner should have been taken down long ago. The only reason it was not, was due to laziness on my part and the difficulties I was having with the site over the past few months of having them host it.

I had a few problems with the previous host before.

Just after starting this site, the entire host went down for an entire day. The reason given was a power failure to the server floor. Although the building had backup power, it would not work as the problem was only on the one floor. They promised to make sure that it would not happen again. Ok, I can see things like that happening (I am generally a forgiving person).

Sometime last year, the same thing happened.

The exact same excuse was given. The exact same promise was made. This time, I was not happy but I did not act fast enough to move. They renewed my account for the next year before I was able to move. So, I figured I would take my time for the move – after all, usually there were no real problems. I had a full year to make the move.

Last summer (2009) things really fell apart here.

I tried an update. I have been very busy with outherFor once, I tried the shortcut and tried and auto-update and failed to do my usual. I did not shut off extra plugins. I did not do a backup. Saying the update did not go smoothly would be an understatement. There were problems with the file transfer and things came back scrambled.

Additionally, I could not get a good FTP connection.

My FTP connection kept failing while I tried to upload the files manually. It is hard to repair something when the connection to the host keeps failing. My opinion is that this connection failure may have been part of the cause for the bad update but I could be wrong.

Denis de Bernardy, the creator of Semiologic Pro, the theme I use did all he could to help.

He spent several hours trying to straighten things out. He did finally get it working. Well, as good as he could.

I soon got an alert that my site was using too many resourced from the host.

This is where things got really bad. I replied to the alert to ask what was the problem. The site was moved to a backup server long before I received any reply. Not that the reply did any good. The only thing I could do was shut down any added features the site was running and hope that would fix it. Apparently, it did as they stopped telling me there was a problem.

I thought the site was Ok again.

I added back a few plugins. Trying to get the site close to where it was. Still trying to avoid anything that I thought would be a problem.

Again the alert from the host.

Again, before I received a reply from my own reply as to what might be the problem, I was told the site was moved to a backup server. Just a note, when this was done, I was unable to make any corrections as all my links to the site would no longer work and the domain would turn up the host’s “this page has been suspended” type of notice. All before I would receive any reply from them. If your going to suspend an account, shouldn’t you answer the trouble ticket first?

Talk about terrible service.

How can you fix something that you cannot connect to? What kind of service suspends the account before replying?

Anyways, lack of time to do much forced me to deactivate nearly everything behind the scenes on this site.

That is why this site has been neglected for the past few months. I had no time to try a move (this was a first time moving a blog to a new host for me). I had not idea what could be causing the problem. Semiologic Pro runs fine on other hosts. I could not think of anything that would be using extra resources. All I could do was deactivate everything I could think of. Afraid any excess changes would get it suspended again, I was afraid to make posts.

I also had some additional minor problems with the previous host.

I mentioned the FTP connection problem. This was always a problem with them. Since they were the first host I had, I had gotten used to it. Only now I realize that I do not have the same problem with FTP on other hosts. There were occasional outages. These were always attributed to them as some type of DNS problem with my ISP or a routing problem between here and there. I am not entirely sure that is the truth. I cannot think why the DNS or routing would fail. The internet is designed to be redundant in this regard. I have had some schooling in regard to routers.

So, this site is now hosted by HostGator.

I have not had any problems that I know of with any sites I run on them. I expect few problems now. HostGator will now be one of the ads featured on this site and I am comfortable recommending them to anyone. Service has been great from them when I needed it. In fact, they were quicker to reply to questions when I was getting alerts threats from the old host than the old host was about my request for information about the problem.

I am looking forward to a long, happy hosting relationship with HostGator.

They will be one of the few companies that I directly feature in ads here. If you are looking for  a host, I hope you’ll consider them.

How to manually create a Database for WordPress in cPanel

If you want to install WordPress on your host manually, it is not very difficult.

All you need is access to the administration panel (cPanel) on your host, the latest WordPress download, and an FTP program to upload.

In this video, I show how to create the MySQL database in cPanel.

I assume you can already access cPanel on your Web host. Usually your domain name followed by /cpanel will get you to it. You will need your user name and password.

There are three step to creating the database for WordPress.

1. Creating the database
2. Creating the user with a password
3. Adding the user to the database

It is very important to write down the database name, user, and password.

You will need these later when you add them to the wp_config file before you upload the WordPress files to your server. Make sure you take note of them. You will find that cPanel will add a prefix to your database and user name.

Here is the video:

Online Videos by Veoh.com

Let me know if you find this useful and please mark it in your favorite social network.

The next video will cover adding the information to the wp_config file.

Video on how to edit the wp-config.php file for WordPress

Choosing a domain name may be the most important step in starting a new website

I said maybe in the title of this post because there is the also the question of the subject the website is about. Most likely, a domain name related  to subject will be preferred.

I think that the domain name may even be more important than the subject

There is a market for used domain names. There appears to be a “sandbox” for new sites with new domain names at Google. This means that any new domain name is put on hold for really great search engine ratings till it has aged for a few months. This is supposed to help keep spam sites (sites just made to get high ratings to get advertising clicks) from going straight to the top. Much of this is theory, since Google does not share its methods with anyone. Still, there is a market for older domain names that have been hosting some kind if content.

Even if you don’t plan to sell your domain name, it may be just as important as the subject of your site

I was originally thinking of using subdomains for extra web sites ( I sill might ). A subdomain is a separate part of another domain. It looks like this www.subdomain.maindomain.com. This would save a bit in creating additional websites. It saves from purchasing the additional domain. It also saves on hosting. Many hosts allow you to add subdomains at no extra cost while they often charge for additional full domains.
Using subdomains, you could save a lot of money on testing ideas for niche sites by making each site a subdomain. Even if this does not give a penalty on the search engines (I have not been able to determine a real yes or no on this question), not having a separate domain name for a site could really cause problems later if you need to change hosts.

Three reasons you may need to switch Web hosts

• One or both domains you have sharing a host are beginning to require large amounts of bandwidth or disk space. You simply may not be able to get enough from your host with one account.
• If a site is generating a lot of income, you may need a more robust host. No matter what the claims a discount host provides, you will experience downtime at some amount point. Really tough backup systems will cost more than you will receive at any discount host. I have a site on one host that experienced a 1/2 hour connectivity outage. This has happened once in over two years. This was a major breakdown by their standards and generated an emergency email even though I did not have content up. They also provide constant and regular backup (and restores when you need it). Another host, recently lost power to all their servers for nearly a day. This was a major breakdown by their standards. They never notified me directly and I would not have known had I not been trying to update the site at the time. They also charge if you need them to restore from a backup. You get what you pay for and should not really expect everything from a discount host. If your site make $10 a day if it is down one day you don’t lose much. If your site makes $100 a day it would definitely be worth the extra monthly charge to make sure it is up and has better backup and redundancy in place.
• May need more CPU time for a site than you get with a shared server. If your site uses databases heavily, even if your host provides high bandwidth, if you share that server with too many other sites that use the same CPU, your site may seem slow.  Also, even if you have a high monthly allotment of bandwidth, your host may not be able to provide a wide enough pipe during a peak period (the fabled site that crashes from volume during a Super Bowl commercial).

Of course, maybe you chose a bad host to begin with

You can read a bunch of horror stories one blogger has had with web hosts here.
www.jimwestergren.com
Sticking to better known Web hosts will help you avoid problems like he has had. Yet, even well known hosters will experience some outages like I said above. At least with a well known host you can expect that there is actually someone there to fix problems (not off to university).

Just Switching domain names later on can cost you

If you decide that a different domain name for your site would be more effective, you may pay a penalty with the search engines when you change. Even if you provide the proper redirects and try to notify the search engines and keep all your content the same.
You can read how one blog has had some problems after changing domain names here.
www.paulallen.net

A domain name will make you independent of the host you choose

This is one reason you should purchase your domain name from a separate registrar like GoDaddy. Your domain name will be completely independent of your host. If you need to switch to a new host for any reason, it can be very quick and painless. Just sign up with the new host. Then transfer a downloaded backup of all your data over or recreate it at the new host. Finally, just change the namservers at GoDaddy to point to your new host. Your all done. You could be up on the new host in just a couple days or even hours (depending how long it takes for the domain to go propagate and point to the new nameservers. There should not be any penalty with the search engines this way either.

I suggest choosing your domain name carefully

You will not want to change it later. Make sure you use an independent registrar like GoDaddy. Use a separate domain name whenever possible for additional sites.

Honestly I was not real scientific about choosing a Web Host

***This was an early post on this site. Problems with the host chosen have forced me to leave. Sad, but things change. I recommend HostGator now. ***

I felt I had several options.

First, I had one web site at ProHosters.com. I could also go with GoDaddy, a popular Domain registar.iPowerWeb is one that has been around a few years and has been recommended by Chris Carpenter of Google Cash. I also looked at xxxx which has also been around for a while.

ProHosters was a bit on the expensive side.

I might recommend them if you are running the type of buisness that would advertise during the Super Bowl. They offer great service, fantastic bandwidth and back-up but their starting package is 3x more than anyone elses here.

GoDaddy is probably the first choice for domain names.

I have bought several from them and keeping them organized with GoDaddy is very easy. They are not well know for their Web hosting though. While they have very low prices, it looked to me that many sevices free with other hosters would add a bit to the initial cost. No real savings and I have heard poeple who were not happy there. Again, if I were telling my mother how to start her own website, maybe I would recommmend to her.

That left me with iPowerWeb and XXXXXX.

Both of these continually show up in most of the top 10 web host sites (of which there are probably more than there are web hosts). I have actually kind of been keeping an eye on these types of pages on and off for a couple of years. Both iPowerWeb and XXXXX have been on them long enough for me to be familiar with the names. Odd how the first place host on many of the pages never makes it on to some of the others.

Anyway, I was leaning towards iPowerWeb until I looked at the help files for both hosts. Being a little new to blogs and not very experienced setting up a website, I found that Lunar Pages seemed to have more information on doing things than iPowerWeb. XXXXX just seemed like it would give me a few more places to go to find out how to do stuff before I would have to resort to the help desk (I find that embarrasing).

The cost between the two are very close.

The disk space and bandwidth are huge for both. While I went with XXXXXX this time, I plan to give iPowerWeb a try next time I look for a Web host.

So far, I have been happy with XXXXX.

One thing I learned after starting my account was, that many of the applications the host supplies you with will need their own MySql database. When I first opened my account you only got one and had to pay for any additional databases. Within a week they had already changed it to unlimited MySql databases.

Maybe I’m just lucky.