User Guide

Userguide V5

Using Other Nameservers or Internet Services

If you use other nameservers you will need to get them to point the "www.yourdomain.com" and "yourdomain.com" addresses to the server with your site. Once there, we do the rest provided that you have done "Step 1, Telling HotDoodle".

Why Use Other Nameservers?

The most common reason for using other nameservers is that if other internet services such as email reside outside of HotDoodle. Moving email from one server to another is always a challenge and may be disruptive and it is often sensible to leave email where it is.

Warning - Sites might be moved

A single machine cannot serve all HotDoodle sites and we may from time to time move your site from one server to another if a server has problems. While we use redundant hardware, the reality is that even with this machines do sometimes fail and the new machine must have a different address for various unavoidable reasons.

We will inform you should this ever happen, and we will inform you in advance if the outage is planned. It will be your responsibility to adjust your nameserver accordingly.

We also reserve the right to relocate sites if needed for performance or operational efficiency.

Getting to the Config Domains Screen

Domains are managed from the "Config Domains" screen.

If you are in the HotDoodle main site:

Go to the "My Stuff" page, find your site and
click Get Domain.

If you are within your site:

From the "Administration" tab on the toolbar, chose Configure Site.
then choose

Once in the Site Options screen,
click Config Domains

Getting Your Site's IP Address

Look at the bottom for a message such as

"This site is hosted on 198.66.245.229, (s3.hotdoodle.com) — you may need to know this to manage domains purchased elsewhere."

Editing External Nameservers

If you are using external nameservers you have to wade through their interface until you get to where you can set the ANAME, CNAME, and MX records. See the "Doing it the hard way" in the vendor specific pages for ideas on where you might find this functionality.

Using HotDoodle Nameservers with External Services

You can use HotDoodle nameservers with external services such as email. This is recommended mainly if you started with a 100% HotDoodle solution and added other services later.

To take control of your namesrver records, click "Edit Domain" on the affected domain and then look for a link such as "Manage HotDoodle's Domain Name Server (DNS) records for yourdomain.com"

The yellow area to the side shows a typical configuration where email is hosted elsewhere.

The ANAME record
* 198.66.245.229
points all traffic by default to the HotDoodle server. This takes care of 'yourdomain.com" (without the www)

The ANAME record
www 198.66.245.229
points all www.yourdomain.com traffic to the HotDoodle server.

The ANAME record
mail 72.64.26.114
points all mail.yourdomain.com traffic to the some external server. Sometimes you will also see "smtp" "imap" or "pop" also done this way.

The MX record
10 mail.yourdomain.com
says that any email traffic sent to this domain is to be handled by wherever mail.yourdomain.com refers.

So, to point just the website, go after the www record and possibly the * record. Just take care that if you change the * record you may have to add or change other records that were ok before with the prior value for *.

friendsonshore.com Main IP: 198.66.245.229


A RECORDS

*	198.66.245.229
mail	72.64.26.114
www	198.66.245.229

MX RECORDS

10	mail.friendsonshore.com.

Technical Details

The true DNS/Bind record for this example would be as follows:

$TTL 2H
@       IN      SOA     n1.hotdoodle.com. hostmaster.hrnoc.net. (
                        1262672613                      ; serial
                        8H                              ; refresh
                        2H                              ; retry
                        4W                             ; expire
                        2H )                            ; minimum TTL

                NS      n1.hotdoodle.com.                 ; name server
                NS      n2.hotdoodle.com.                 ; name server
                MX      10 mail.friendsonshore.com.  ; mail exchanger
            	A       198.66.245.229
*        	A       198.66.245.229
mail        	A       198.66.245.100
www        	A       198.66.245.229