In this issue

All about domains
This month we talk about domains. 
Business Intelligence
Google gears - gear up your browser.
A movie website from Lexus - Uh!.
News from the web 
This month in the internet world 

All about domains

Every so often I have clients who need to change their email provider, or broadband supplier or move their website. At some point I need to explain to them how domains work so they can get things changed by their service provider. Every time, people get confused. There are up to seven different organisations you may need to deal with, so no wonder.

I thought that maybe if I tried to explain this in simple terms in a newsletter it might help. The downside is that this is not the sexiest subject on earth. However if this comes up you may be grateful for something you can refer to. It will be in the newsletter archive on www.textor.com/archive.html.

Why domain names?

The first thing to understand is that if I attach a computer to the Internet it has to have an address so that other computers can talk to it. This is a set of numbers like this 89.234.1.165 - and you probably have seen something like this before. However computers move and change their address, so something was needed that is never going to change and is a bit more human-friendly.  These numbers have an alias like this: www.google.com. 

The domain I own is textor.com. If I put www. in front it becomes www.textor.com which is the address of my website. I can create a whole bunch of them; abc.textor.com; def.textor.com; and so on. The world is my oyster in this regard. By convention the www in front of the domain means a web site, ftp would be the ftp (file transfer) site, mail would be a mail server and so on.

Each sub-domain can be a different physical address, although often they are all the same. 

Relating the names to the numbers

So now we have to translate from the human-friendly address to the computer-friendly address. If you type http://www.textor.com  in your browser, what happens?

1. Your computer communicates with another computer called a domain name server (DNS) and asks for the real physical address that corresponds to www.textor.com.
2. The DNS server looks to see if it has that address already and if not goes away to another domain name server to see if it has it. 
3. Eventually if all else fails the DNS server goes to a computer that holds details of all the .com domains and asks where it can find details of textor.com. These are stored in a computer called the authoritative server for textor.com.
4. The authoritative server sends over the real address of www.textor.com and so the website can be loaded up.

Add on email

Email works the same way. The authoritative server contains the address that emails should be sent to for anything@textor.com.  What happens after that varies: 

1. Mails may be stored on that computer in a compute file called a mailbox. Then you would probably have the option of viewing mail with a web browser or downloading from your mailbox to your PC or Mac.
2. That computer may simply forward them on to your real mailbox on another computer somewhere, for example your broadband supplier.  In this case you have the web or download options as before.  This is called mail forwarding.
3. Alternatively it may be forwarded to a web-based service such as hotmail in which case you can only use a web browser to view your mail.

Registering domain names

I own textor.com because I purchased it from 123-reg. We use them because they are cheap and their systems work. They send me a bill every so often to renew it. You probably used someone similar and the people that you purchased your domain from probably run the authoritative server for your domain, but not necessarily. 

Companies like 123-reg are resellers for the people that actually control and manage the domain names within one super-domain (like .co.uk).  All domain names that end in .uk are controlled by Nominet who are the Internet registry for the UK.  If you end up in a dispute about a domain name then this is where it will all get resolved.   Some people who have had their domain for a long time have registered directly with them rather than an intermediary. 

The cast of characters

So we have the following seven people to deal with (plus the internet registry who we all hope you never have to deal with).

1. Your broadband supplier
2. The people who run the DNS server you are using
3. The people who get the domain renewed
4. The people who host and manage the authoritative server - you might find them referred to as the people who host your DNS.  This is different from hosting your website.
5. The people who run the computer that forwards your mail to your mailbox
6. The people that run the computer that stores your mail in your mailbox ready to be downloaded to your Mac or PC.
7. The people who run the computer that stores your website.

These can be seven different organisations. Or they may all be the same. The more you can keep everything in one place the better, however some companies that have been doing this for a while do not have this well organised.  Then if they want to change something - for example they want to move the website to a new server, confusion reigns.

Here are some combinations that work. I have used 123-reg as an example of a domain registration company and I have nominated BT as your broadband supplier, but just as an example.

Do you know what your setup is?

Or did some spotty youth set it all up for you in 1998 and it all seems to work?

The spotty youth method works fine until you need to change something. Then things can fall apart in a big way.  

Business Intelligence

Lexus the movie website

Lexus marketing has taken off in a terrific new direction with a website containing a library of original  short films. This includes a series with Lisa Kudrow (Web Therapy) which is a hoot.   Check out Puppy Love when you have 7 minutes to spare, it is incredibly well made. If you are a Doors fan (some of us are that old) check out the piece with Ray Manzarek.

Everything about this site is high quality.  The scripts, the acting, the production and the flash player. 

The only thing is - does it sell cars?  There is not a car in sight.

Maybe it sells something.  One of the shorts is about the Lexus Hybrid - Hotel suite.  This is an enviroment-friendly hotel room sponsored by Lexus. It is in a luxury hotel in San Fancisco.  You couldn't make it up. 

What is Google Gears?

Google Gears is a plug-in you have to download and install.  When you have done so it allows websites to set up a database of information on your computer and access it. It also allows websites to store web pages and images locally and use them instead of ones on the Internet.  

Which all sounds dangerous and a bit strange, but Google Gears only allows websites to access information stored by the website - not others, so it is private information. Gears also asks your permission first, so it is OK.  

Basically this is a cookie facility on steroids.

You can download the plugin at http://gears.google.com  for IE or Firefox. If you are running Chrome, you seem to have it anyway.   There is not much point in downloading the plugin unless you want to use special features on a website that uses Google Gears.  

As an example of what can be done, zoho email (www.zoho.com) now has an offline feature.  This means that although it is a web-based mail system like Google, you can also set up an offline version which syncs with the mailbox regularly.  So if you don't have access to the Internet you can still look at your old mails, even if you are not getting new ones.  This is very smart.   

News

Apparently 20% of US families are watching Internet TV.  This is regular broadcast TV being accessed in a different way - or YouTube.   HBO are moving the concept forward with their show Hooking UP.  The show is backed up by a website (www.hookingupshow.com) which features a lot of video.  Comcast (a big US cable company) identifies TV as the main reason people are leaving telephone-based ADSL for faster cable internet.

Meantime, startup VideoSurf claims to be able to search videos online for particular people by recognising them in the video - even if the video is not tagged with their name.  I have no idea if it works, but if you want to find some video to watch it looks like a great place to start.  Pretty cool.

If you search on YouTube you might notice Google ads popping up.  They appear as 'sponsored videos' much like sponsored links on Google.  Something of a no-brainer for Google as they own the site.

Here is a great idea - a Porn website that doesn't have nudity or sex.  OK - it is a spoof.

Joost have completely relaunched their Internet TV service.  It is looking and working a lot more like YouTube now.  There are a lot of shows but still not really  well organised.  It needs to be organised by show, and ideally remember which episode you watched last.  They have set up each show as a 'channel' which looks like a last-minute kludge.  This should be the easy stuff.  Apart from that the videos now show in a very upmarket flash player.  No more software to download and no more (presumably) bandwidth-eating peer to peer.

Searching the Internet may help middle-aged and older adults keep their memories sharp.  That is why I am so brilliant then.