I am new to the web hosting biz because I am a student and have had my website hosted on my university's server. I recently registered for a .name domain. Can this new domain, being a second level domain, be hosted just like a .com or .org domain? I am particularly concerned about the e-mail issue. I understand that .name e-mail works differently than other e-mail. I don't want to buy a standard web hosting package only to find out that they can't handle my .name domain.

Thanks

Daniel.

ps. avoid Doster like the plauge!

Hello there,

.name domains can be hosted just like any other domain, and this includes email. So for instance if you you have john.doe.name, this can be hosted by any host, and your email addresses would be something@john.doe.name.

In addition to this, you can buy an email address like for example john@doe.name, though you will have to buy this directly and your hosting company won't be able to host it.

I hope this has helped you.

It has helped in one sense and confused me in another. I thought that when I bought john.smith.name my e-mail address automatically became john@smith.name. If this is not true, please explain how I go about buying john@smith.name.

Thanks

Daniel

There are two ways to purchase .name domains - with and without Registry forwarding.

It depends on which flavor you purchased whether or not you have the Registry forwarding.

Check back with your registrar.

As for the domain itself functioning, as has been stated - it will function just like any other domain - it just has more dots in it - that's all :).

-t

Contact my registar?!! ROTFL. They haven't responded to any of my e-mails for the past three weeks. Before that, it took them a month. Dotster is their name and customer no service is their game!

I did purchase the package with e-mail forwarding. However, the information on their website says that this e-mail fowarding won't work unless their nameserves are used. But if I want someone else besides Dotster to host me website I have to change my nameservers. So what you are telling me is that I have a choice of either a website with Dotster (heck no!) and e-mail forwarding or a web-site with someone else and no e-mail?!! Crazy.

Daniel

If you purchased the Registry forwarding, this is completely independant of whose nameservers you use. In your example, smith.name is NOT a domain that is hosted anywhere, so mail sent to john@smith.name goes to the Registry, and they forward it to you.

The domain john.smith.name will need to have nameservers - and again these can be anywhere - and mail sent to anyname@john.smith.name will be handled by the MX servers in your nameserver records.

Your website would be at www.john.smith.name, or with the appropriate DNS entries, you can leave off the www.

Does this make sense?

-t

Originally posted by worlddan
...So what you are telling me is that I have a choice of either a website with Dotster (heck no!) and e-mail forwarding or a web-site with someone else and no e-mail?!! Crazy.

Are there really than many web hosts that don't offer email?

Originally posted by bitserve
Are there really than many web hosts that don't offer email?
I think there is still some confusion here - or perhaps I'm reading more into this than I should be.

The .name Registry offers something that no other Registry does - and that it Registry level email forwarding.

Forwarding is not rocket science, and it's trivial to set up on a regular domain at any number of places, but it's something that the .name Registry offers.

You can purchase a .name domain with email forwarding and never set up a nameserver or a hosting account with it, and still get mail forward to another account from first@last.name.

For some reason, this appears to be a very popular option for .name domain holders. More than 80% of our .name registrants are buying the Registry email forwarding option.

It is completely separate from standard email forwarding at your hosting company however, which in this case would be to addresses in the form username@first.last.name.

-t

Thank you for you responses. They make sense to me. 80% of your customers may be buying the product because they don't understand it...like me! Your explaination is not found anywhere on Dotster or on the Global Name Registery, for that matter. It makes me even more angry at them than I already am, and anger is not healthy.

Since you have been so helpful, let me ask one more question. Since the domain forwarding takes place at the registrary level, how do I get an e-mail account that lets me *send* mail from john@smith.name. Is this even possible? Is my only option to send mail from anyuser@john.smith.name?

Thanks once again.

Daniel

Sending email to it comes from john@smith.name will rely on your mail client and the SMTP server that you use for outgoing mail.

If I use Outlook on Windows as an example, you would go to:

Tools
Email Accounts
and select "Add New Account"

In the next section, select your account type, and then when you fill out the identifying information for your account, the email address field would contain john@smith.name. The username, password and incoming mail server sections would point to the actual account that you are receiving mail from.

When you send mail, it will come from john@smith.name. When you receive mail, it will be read from the mail server you specify for incoming mail, using the account and password you defined in your mail client.

The two addresses do not have to have anything in common.

Does that make sense?

-t

Yes. It makes sense. I learned something new today! Thank you for that. I always assumed that the in-coming and outgoing address were linked in some way. Interesting that they are not. I will have to process that for a bit.

Daniel