Monthly Archives: November 2010

To upload files to your hosting account, you will need to install an FTP client on your home computer. Note, this step is no longer necessary when installing WordPress.

What is FTP?

FTP, or “File Transfer Protocol”, is a set of instructions for transferring files between your home computer and your web host. It allows you to “upload” (send) and “download” (receive) files so you can make additions and modifications to your website. Each web hosting account is secured with a username and password, so only the owner of the site is able to make changes to it.

FTP is the standard used when transferring files online. Every web host will provide access to your account using FTP, allowing you to upload and update your website.

Why do I need an FTP client?

An FTP client was once a crucial part of building and maintaining a website. With recent advances in the CMS software, we now won’t need to be using FTP as we once would have.

However, it is useful to understand what it does and how it works. I still use it to upload attachments to my websites, and manually backup the files on my web host.

How do I get an FTP client?

There are many FTP clients to choose from, but they all pretty much do the same thing. I personally use CuteFTP, but it does involve purchasing a license. There are several free options to choose from as well. In this example, we will deal with a free FTP client called FileZilla.

Head to the FileZilla website and click on “Download FileZilla Client”. Click on the version of FileZilla that is appropriate for your computer; most people will use Windows, but there are Mac and Linux options available

Once the file has been downloaded, you simple double click on the file to begin the installation. There is no need to modify any of the options – just stick with the standard installation.

Step By Step Instructions

Once you have installed your FTP client, launch the program. Whether you are using FileZilla, or another FTP client, these instructions will allow you to create a connection with your hosting account:

After you have installed FileZilla, run the program. You will notice that the body of the client is divided into a left and right side. The left side indicates the local files and directories; that is, the files and directories located on your computer. The right side will show you the files and directories in your hosting account, once we connect to it. So let’s make a connection!

Open Site Manager (File -> Site Manager). Click “New Site” then give the connection a name; you can call it anything you like. I would call it the same as your domain name or your hosting company; after all, that’s what you’ll be connecting to.

Now we need to fill in some details about the connection. These details will generally be found in your confirmation email from your web host. We need:

Host – this will be either your domain name or the IP address.

Port – unless otherwise stated by your web host, you can leave this blank (which means the default will be used).

Servertype – select “FTP – File Transfer Protocol” unless otherwise stated by your web host.

Logontype – choose “Normal”

User – this is the Username provided by your web host

Password – this is the Password provided by your web host

Once you’ve entered this information, click on “Connect”

You’ll see some dialog scrolling through the top section of your FTP client text box, and then a directory listing of files appear on the right side of the page.

Congratulations! You’ve just connected to your web host.

By now, you would have done most of the preparation needed to start building your new website. We are finally getting to the exciting part! Your website is about to start taking shape.

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A domain may only point to a web host’s name servers, which may be responsible for thousands of different websites. In order for your website to appear when someone types it into their web browser, you will need to map your domain to the folder on the web host where you will be hosting the website files.

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By now, you should have registered a domain name and purchased a hosting account. The next step is to connect the two.

In this lesson, you will learn how to point your domain at your hosting account.

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To build any website on the Internet, you need two things: a domain name and a hosting account.

In the previous post, you learned what a domain name is and how it acts as the address of a website. Unlike the real world however, a domain name is not a static address, like a street address; a domain name is a dynamic address. For example, the website www.incomepassport.com might be moved from a web host in the USA to a web host in the UK, and the domain name would not change.

A domain name is effectively just a sign post pointing to the location of your web hosting account, which is where your website is located.

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If you’ve never built a website before, you may be feeling somewhat intimidated at the moment. As one client told me, “Before I started, I thought I’d have a better chance building a rocket to the moon than building a website!” But rest assured, as this client found out, the gulf in your knowledge is not so great.

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If you allow someone else to purchase your domain name for you, especially a valuable “dot com” domain, things can go wrong very easily. This article explains what can go wrong and how to protect yourself.

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The very first step in building your website is to register a domain name. A domain name is simply the technical term for the address of a particular website on the Internet; the domain name tells your browser where to access the web page you want to see.

For example, google.com and incomepassport.com are both “dot com” domains.

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You might think that domain names are the addresses you type into your browser to visit particular websites. But what is a domain name, really?

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Whether you love Google or hate it, there’s no denying it’s changed the world. The word Google is no longer just the name of a company, but it has become a common-use verb, as in “I’m just going to Google it!”

Google has become synonymous with search – more than 80% of global search engine searches are made through Google!

No matter how you feel about Google, as a website owner you need to know how this search engine works in order to ensure your website gets maximum exposure.

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