In this section, you will find the answers to the Web hosting questions we most often get. You can also
use our free Web Hosting Forum and ask a question there, or view the previous ones posted by other
Sun Hosting customers. Additionally, we have created for you a
Glossary of Hosting Terms used. We also
suggest you read our FAQ on FTP related issues
or questions.
How come I cannot see my site using my IP address? When will I be able to see it?
Answer:
With our simple-to-use Plesk control panel,
there is a neat feature called the 'Site Preview' button that you can use to access and view
your website while you are waiting for the DNS to resolve
to our servers.
Once DNS propagation has completed on the Internet, you will be able to see your site by typing your domain's URL
in your browser.
If instead you've chosen a Sun Hosting server with cPanel
installed, all you need to do is to go to your Web browser and type this URL
(http://209.xx.xx.xxx/~username) into your browser. Substitute the "xx" with your correct
IP address. If you don't know your IP, simply contact us and we will give it to you. Please note that the
(~) 'tilde sign' is located at the top left of your keyboard, under the Escape Key on a standard IBM
compatible PC. Your user name is what you type into cPanel to access your account, and is the same user name we've
issued you when you first signed up for your Sun Hosting account. Please
contact us if you have any questions.
How long does it take to set up a new Sun Hosting account?
Answer:
It can be done in less than 90 minutes! If your order is placed between 7.30 AM and 6.00 PM
EST any day of the week, our tech support team is standing by ready to set up your account.
When ordering hosting services from Sun Hosting, we begin processing your account the
same business day it is received, or the next business day if it is after hours. Once
your account is activated, you will receive an email from us with your detailed account
information and the necessary technical information for your web site.
IMPORTANT NOTE: We cannot activate your account until payment is received- that is,
until we have received your PayPal or credit card payment, until your check is received at our
offices or your bank direct transfer of funds is approved and processed by our automated
accounting system.
All right! I'm sold! I want Sun Hosting to host my web site. Can I pay with
my credit card? Or, where do I mail my cheque?
Answer:
Payments by credit cards are the best and fastest way to settle your Sun Hosting
account. Through the very secure PayPal network, we accept Visa, MasterCard, American
Express and Discover credit cards. Simply click on the hosting package of your choice and it
will take you to the corresponding secure PayPal checkout page. It's as simple as that.
If you prefer to make your payment by check, that can be arranged also. Simply email
us with your request and we will take care of it. We also accept company purchase
orders (P.O.) as well.
And yes, we do accept direct transfer of funds via any Canadian charter bank or US
commercial bank. Just email us your bank
information and Sun Hosting will forward you the necessary information you need. We
also accept all Western Union payments, as well as all money orders.
For Google, Yahoo, MSN and the other search engines, what's the best way to find the right
keywords for our website? We've read that if you don't place the right keywords in your site,
potential customers won't be able to find our site in the search engines. We want to make
certain that all our keywords can be found on our site.
Answer:
You've read right. Whether your site has already been completed and has been on online for a
while or if you are in the process of building it now, it's important that you correctly
determine and identify the keywords that potential customers actually type into the search
box of today's major search engines. The only accurate and worthwhile tool we recommend for
this task is WordTracker.
In 2002, when we set out to completely redesign the Sun Hosting site, we used Wordtracker exclusively
and we've always been happy with the results it has provided us since that time. It's the only tool
that SEO experts recommend. You
might think that you know what are the keywords people type in the search engines, but Wordtracker
will provide you with a whole new set of keywords that you may have missed or that you never thought
existed.
Additional reading on Wordtracker:
Identifying accurate keywords and search terms
How to use Wordtracker creatively
How to write powerful keywords and keyphrases
How do I choose the right Web hosting plan ? There are so many to choose from.
Answer:
You may host any type of site in any of our plans from our most basic to our top of the line
plan. Once you select the hosting plan that you think is right for your needs, you can then
upgrade to a higher plan without any penalty. You will then only pay the cost differential
to the higher plan. We provide you with web hosting plans of various user levels and sizes
to choose from, and your choice should be based largely on the following three factors:
Required disk space
Data transfer requirements
Site content, including photos and graphics
Disk space refers to the overall amount of space that your site will occupy on our
servers. It is measured in MB (Megabytes) or GB (Gigabytes). Data transfer or Internet bandwidth
is also measured in MB (or GB) and is generated every time someone visits a page (or downloads a file)
on your site. Thus it is a cumulative statistic. Transfer is measured in MB per month and depends on the
number of people that visit your site and the size of the files on your Website that
are being viewed. The more viewers, the higher the transfer. The more complicated your
Website, the more transfer per viewer.
If you have more questions on selecting the right plan for your specific
needs, please contact Sun Hosting or just
send us an email and we will be happy to assist you in the fastest way possible. Since 1995, we’ve
hosted all types of Websites and we’re anxious to share our expertise with you.
I'm using Frontpage to build and publish my website. Does that mean I need to
be on Sun Hosting's Windows plan?
Answer:
No. Except for some of our lowest-cost hosting solutions, most of our plans will fully support
Microsoft's Frontpage extensions. There is no need to be on our Windows hosting plans, unless
you have ASP programs on your site, or if you are using a MS Access database or Microsoft SQL Server
database.
I have Windows XP on my computer, so do I signup for the Windows hosting then?
Answer:
No. Unless you have ASP programs on your site, or if you are using a MS Access database or Microsoft SQL Server
database, the operating system on your pc or workstation has no effect when selecting
a hosting plan for your site. All our Web servers are fully transparent to the user. Please note that
Sun Hosting does offer hosting plans running on the Linux
as well as the Windows operating system.
Does your Linux hosting plans support ASP or .NET pages?
Answer:
No. Running ASP pages or sites developed using Microsoft's .Net on Linux is
very limited in its use and we don't recommend it. Therefore, we will only support
ASP applications and .NET on our Windows plans only.
What is the difference between Linux (or Unix) and a Windows hosting plan?
Answer:
Linux (or Unix) supports CGI, Perl, PHP and MySQL natively. Windows will allow you to
publish in ASP and .NET pages, and has support for MS SQL Server and MS Access databases.
Both our Linux hosting plans, as well as our Windows hosting plans run on
Plesk™ and is the industry leader in server remote control software.
Unless you have a special need or specific request for running Microsoft applications
like ASP or .Net, any of our standard Linux hosting plans are best for your website, and
they even cost less than a comparable Windows plan since there isn't any licensing fees
to pay to Microsoft.
We've especially created this detailed page for you that fully explains all the differences
between the two platforms.
I have never used Linux before so I don't know if I can manage my website
with your Linux plans. Does this mean I have to pay an extra for a Windows plan?
Answer:
No. Any of our hosting plans, Linux included, do not require you to have any
knowledge of that specific operating system. For the most part, our Web servers are
fully transparent to the user.
Our Plesk™ control panel will help you manage things like email creation, password
modifications, creation of new users, FTP parameter modifications, and a whole variety
of additional functions and commands. If you know how to use a mouse and keyboard, you will be able to easily
manage your website with our easy-to-use Plesk control panel.
Important note: However, this does not mean that our control panel will
create your website. You will still need to have knowledge of how to create and
design your site, write it in HTML, upload it to our servers, using FTP, etc. If you don't
have that knowledge or don't have the time to learn it, you can still
build your own Web site with the Online Site Builder application.
What are MIME types?
Answer:
MIME Types allows you to set certain programs to be used for specific extensions.
In easier-to-understand terms, MIME Types help your web server to identify what
type of file is being requested by your browsers. For instance, when the web server
gets a request from a browser such as Internet Explorer or Netscape, for a file
that ends in .html, the web server knows that it is an html document because that
extension is stored in the MIME Types.
If the web server gets a request from a browser for a file that ends in .gif,
the web server knows that it is an image because that too is stored in the MIME
Types. This applies to every file, image, application, etc. that may be requested
by a web browser. If the extension is not stored within the MIME Types, the web
server will not recognize it and will not be able to assist the browser and that
particular file type will not be viewable by the user.
MIME types are identified by the server by the following format:
subtype/type extension
For example, adding the following two MIME Types will allow users to view ipx
images on your web pages:
application/x-ipscript .ips
application/x-ipix .ipx
Where "application" identifies the subtype, "x-ipscript" identifies the application,
and .ips identifies the extension used for that application.
Can I use the MIME types feature if I'm using FrontPage?
No. This feature is not available for FrontPage users. If any MIME types are
needed, FrontPage users will have to add them using FrontPage or else your web files
may not be accessible online.
How will people and prospective customers find my web site ?
Answer:
Excellent question. You can submit your web site to several search engines such as
Global Business Listing,
Google, Yahoo, MSN etc. and on sites such as the
Open Directory Project (DMOZ) to help new and existing customers find your
site. You can also help prospective customers find your site if you have your site
optimized by a professional SEO (Search Engine Optimization) firm.
Depending on the exact model you choose, what it will do for you is place your web site at the
top of search engine results pages (SERP), over and above your competitors. Marketing
your online business through these and other tools will help you reach new customers
and increase your business by a large factor. An SEO optimization firm we have used
in the past and that we've always had good results with is
Rank for $ales. It is
them that have also successfully optimized the Sun Hosting site, and we are happy
with the results in Google, Yahoo and MSN.
What kind of Tech Support do you offer?
Answer:
Technical support is available by email at
[email protected]. Our tech
support service is also open for phone support from 7.30 am to 10.30 pm (Eastern time),
7 days a week.
As a rule, we always encourage all our customers in need of assistance to send us an
email with questions or concerns about their Web sites and various hosting plans, as
email is still the fastest method to receive an answer to your inquiries, and it
provides us and yourself a good record of communication, wich can be extremely helpful
in resolving your problem. At all times, email support is around-the-clock. Technical
emergencies will be addressed first, and support issues are handled in the order they
are received.
When can I begin viewing my new web site?
Answer:
Our tech support department begins setting up your site upon receipt of confirmation
order and payment is received by our accounting department. This process takes about
5 minutes to 10 minutes if your order is received during normal business hours. It is
that fast.
In order for you to see your web site, the following items have to be completed by
our tech dept:
1 - Your Internet domain name (www.yourcompany.com) either has to be newly registered
or transfered if it already exists. If you are getting a new domain name this will
take a couple hours to secure itself on your behalf and to insure its well into the
Internet's DNS (Domain Name System). If you are transfering your domain to us, this
process may take 24 to 48 hours (sometimes 72 hours) to process the paperwork. See
our FAQ referring to transfering a domain name for details.
2 - DNS has to assign a IP address to your Domain. This is the process of converting a
domain name into a series of numbers that only computers understand.
3 - Web server space in allocated to your account - This is where we assign disk space
and setup your domain on our web servers.
All the above steps take place within minutes of placing your order with us. You
can start uploading your web pages, pictures, graphics and files as soon as you receive
your welcome letter with all the necessary FTP information. Your site is active
as soon as you upload any index.htm or index.html file on our server. It's really
just as simple as that !
Copyright © Sun Hosting.
The Sun Hosting logo is a registered trademark of Sun Hosting. All content, all
photos and the Sun Hosting logo on this Web site are the property of Sun Hosting and are
protected by Canadian, U.S. and international copyright laws. The Windows logo is a registered
trademark of Microsoft Corp. The Linux Logo is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. Any other logos,
trademarks or service marks on this site belong to their respective owners or their companies.
