- What the heck is a “CPanel” and why do I need one? Why do I need a username and password for it?
The “CPanel” is just the control panel for your website. You need an username and password to log into your control panel. Once inside, you can do any number of things: check your email, back up your site, create add-on and subdomains, create databases, check your site stats, you can even view and edit all your website files. Everything you need to control your website is in there.
Your CPanel username is also the default email account for your website, for example: username@yourdomain.com. You might want to think of that when deciding on your username. However, just because it’s the default email address, doesn’t mean you have to use it. You can create unlimited email addresses and they can be whatever you want. It’s something to consider if you want an automatically created email address, though.
- What’s the difference between a Subdomain, an Add-on domain, and a Parked domain?
A Subdomain is a folder installed in your main domain. So if your main domain is www.yourdomain.com, then a subdomain of it would be www.yourdomain.com/subdomain. The subdomain could also be viewed as subdomain.yourdomain.com.
An Add-on domain is a separate domain that points to a folder within a website. So in effect, a Add-on domain points to a Subdomain. So if your main domain is www.yourdomain.com, you could set up an add-on domain such as www.addondomain.com to point to www.maindomain.com/subdomain/. Users visiting www.addondomain.com/file.html would actually be seeing www.maindomain.com/subdirectory/file.html, even though ‘www.addondomain.com/file.html’ would appear as the address in their browser.
A Parked domain just allows you to redirect people to your main domain. So if your main domain is www.yourdomain.com, but you also bought www.yourdomain.net, you can set www.yourdomain.net as a parked domain and anyone who goes to www.yourdomain.net will automatically be redirected to www.yourdomain.com.
- How do I back up my site? Do I need to do this often?
Backing up your site is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU CAN DO. While none of our clients have EVER lost any of their data due to server malfunction (knock on wood) bad things happen everyday, so it’s best to be prepared for the worst. We recommend that you backup your site and databases at least once a month and keep a copy in a safe place on your hard drive or on a CD. If something were to happen to your site, all your files can be restored with your backup.
To backup your site, log into your cPanel and click on the Backup icon. Click on ‘Download a home directory Backup’ and your back up will automatically start downloading onto your computer. Additionally, you can download a Full Backup which will be stored in the home directory on the server.
- What’s a database? Is that important to back up as well?
A MySQL database is what many applications powered by PHP use to store important information. In the case of a Wordpress blog, all your posts, comments and options are saved in your Wordpress database, therefore it is of the utmost importance to backup this database. If you were to restore your blog without this database you would essentially be starting from scratch. (The only thing of importance not stored in the WP database are your themes.)
To backup any of your databases, just click on the database backup link listed on the Backup page in your cPanel. The database backup will automatically start downloading to your computer, where you can store it in a safe place.
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