Hosting a website with DNS

Learning this has been anything but straightforward, partly because of the wide range of vendor specific processes, and partly because it is the type of information that everyone seems to just already know.

In order to host a website, you need the following things:

• a server with a static IP
• you must own a domain name (see www.activedomain.com)

From top to bottom, here is my procedure for directing a domain at my server.

* purchase a domain name 
    * see www.activedomain.com

* find the DNS provider of your domain
    * cmd: whois willpittman.com
      # you are looking for 'Name Server:' field
      # generally it will be something like:  ns2.server.com

* point DNS provider at your web server's ip (creating DNS records)
      * active-domain.com/login
      * home
          * jump to domain: willpittman.net
          * Domain Registration: name servers
              * point name servers to digital-ocean
                # these will start out as:
                # ns1.active-dns.com
                # ns2.active-dns.com
                # ...

                # you want to redirect them to digital ocean:
                # ns1.digitalocean.com
                # ns2.digitalocean.com
                # ns3.digitalocean.com


* digitalocean.com/login
    * Networking (tab) > Domains:  willpittman.net
        * Create 'A' record pointing to watson
            # A     @     Tor1/watson
        * Create 'CNAME' record polinting towards watson
           # CNAME   www   @