Getting Started Guide

Thank you for purchasing your hosting account from Deerfield Hosting. Here is how to get started with your web hosting account. Please read these steps carefully before contacting us with questions:

Step One - Name Servers
If you requested domain name registration from us, we will register your domain and point it to the correct server. Only if you did not register your domain with us:

Change your domain name servers to:

  • NS1.DEERFIELDHOSTING.NET 192.99.24.121
  • NS2.DEERFIELDHOSTING.NET 208.105.242.70

Domain registrars or their resellers provide you with a place to log in and manage your domain. If you do not know how to access your account or do not have a place to log in and manage your domain, please contact the service where you registered your domain and request they change your domain name servers to those above. If you did not register your domain with us we can help you only by giving you the information already stated here. We cannot do this for you because we do not have access to your account. It must be done by you or the company who registered it.

NOTE: It will take a minimum of 24 hours before you will be able to see your domain by going to http://www.yourdomain.com. It can take 24-72 hours, or as long as 5 days. There is nothing we can do about this because it has nothing to do with our service. This is a typical DNS propagation delay and is out of our control.

Commonly, in the 24-72 hours after a change in name servers, you may find that you can call up your site only sporadicallyly. (Sometimes it's there, sometimes it's not.) This is also a DNS propagation delay and will continue to occur until your domain is fully resolved. Again, there is nothing we can do about it. If in 3-5 days you are still experiencing difficulties, contact our support desk for assistance.

Until your domain fully resolves, you will NOT be able to:
View your domain at http://www.yourdomain.com/
Check your email (POP3, SMTP and Webmail will NOT work)
Publish using FrontPage extensions.
FTP to ftp.yourdomain.com.

Step Two - FTP your files to your new server.
Now that you understand what you can't do until your domain fully resolves, here is what you can do. First, upload your files to your web hosting account and have them ready so your site will work as soon as the domain resolves. Please follow the instructions below carefully and make sure you have your setup email nearby.

To Upload Your Files:

  1. Download a graphical FTP program if you don't already have one. You can download WS_FTP from ipswitch.com). We have a tutorial on WS_FTP. There are hundreds of low cost and free FTP client programs available. A good place to search is Tucows. Do a search for "FTP client" or "free FTP client".

  2. In your FTP program set the FTP Host to the server name or IP Address in your setup email.

  3. Fill in your username and password from the setup email.
    Please NOTE: Your FTP username is "username@domain.com", not just "username". For example, if your domain was deerfieldhosting.com and your control panel username was jack, your FTP username would be "jack@deerfieldhosting.com".

  4. Click to connect.

  5. After you have connected you will see a number of folders at your new site.

  6. Open the "public_html" folder and delete the file (if present) "index.html". Note that file names are case sensitive.

  7. Upload your files. Be sure that you have created a file called "index.html", "index.htm" or, "index.php". That page is the one automatically sent on a request for your domain (http://yourdomain.com or http://www.yourdomain.com/). Be sure all letters are lowercase. "Index.html" is not the same as "index.html".

  8. Upload any cgi scripts you are going to use to the "public_html/cgi-bin" folder. It is important that cgi-bin files be uploaded in ascii mode. This will strip out extraneous white space characters put there by Windows programs. Some interpreters, such as perl, choke on these.

Step Three - Take a look around!
Login to the control panel using the server name, username and password in your setup email. You can setup email accounts, but please remember they will not work until your domain name fully resolves. Here are directions on how to setup a POP3 email account:

To create an email account in cPanel with the XController theme:

  1. Login to the cPanel control panel.
  2. Click the Email icon at the top.
  3. Locate the text input box in the center pane.
  4. Type the username you want to add as an email user. For example if you want the email address "webmaster@yourdomain.com" you would create a user called "webmaster". Create a password and click "Add".
  5. You have just created a POP3 Email account. You can check it using webmail or a POP3 Client.
  6. Be sure to remember that your username for your mail account is the full email address. Using the example above your username would be "webmaster@domain.com" not just "webmaster".
  7. POP3 email client programs, such as MS-Outlook Express, MS-Outlook and Eudora need to be set up to send and recieve email at your new site. If you use the new account wizard, you will have to modify the account properties after the account is created. For inexplicable reasons the wizard assumes that you can send mail witout first logging in. On the servers property tab, where you enter the settings for the outgoing SMTP server, be sure "My Server Requires Authorization" is selected. Otherwise the email client will attempt to send mail without giving a password and you will get seemingly mysterious errors. The name of the mail server to fill in is: mail.yourdomain.com. Again, your user login is: "you@yourdomain.com" not just your username.
     
    There is a tutorial about how to do this which explains every keystroke and mouse click. It is located in the cPanel - XController group.

Other Important Notes:

  1. Before you start using your account, be sure to read our Terms of Use. Accounts that violate our acceptable use policys will be removed without notice. We do not tolerate unsolicited email being sent from our servers.
  2. Be sure to backup your data regularly! Although we do make regular backups, we assume no responsibility for lost data. You will find links on how to do this on your control panel.
  3. Regarding the help desk and your login names and passwords: The password for your billing account is not the same as your password for server logins. This is because many of our customers use web developers who should not be able to see billing account information. To use the help desk you must first register a login there. Setting or resetting a help desk login, a billing account login, a domain account login or a server login will have no effect on other passwords. Each is independant of the others.

That's it! Your web site and email accounts are now setup and ready for use.

For additional information and help, check out our tutorials! Any questions or problems you may have can be resolved most quickly by using the tutorials or help desk rather than email. We handle an enourmous amount of email and can not always respond to it as quickly as we would like.

Again, thank you for choosing Deerfield Hosting!