Newbie here with a question re: web servers

[dokiroku]

Hello, guys. How's it going? I just downloaded Uniform Server and am about to install on my PC (I'm running windoze XP). I'd like to create a website and practice my skills only on my PC, for now.

 

I read the very informative "30 second WAMP" Wiki tutorial. However, I still have some questions. Step 2 advises that "As it stands now, your web server is running and serving web pages, but it is not visible to the outside world." So, how can it be that the server is "running" but not outwardly visible? Seems to me that the MySQL or Apache server would at least be aware of my IP address if I have there server(s) running on my machine. There's no internet contact whatsoever at this point??

 

Finally, the tutorial concludes with "Your web server will not be able to support high levels of external traffic and should not be used for commercial use." I plan to use Drupal to create this website. Will the completed website be transferable to an outside host so that I can receive large amounts of traffic? And, if it is transferable, what becomes of MySQL and Apache?!

 

Thanks for helping out a newbie, guys.

[oconkero]

well you could give your hosting ip address a domain name but the thing is no body will be able to see youer site with meta search engines like google. af for your other question clueless bu im sure the administrator will help u further.

[olajideolaolorun]

As to the part where he says that you site is not visible to the outside world, what he meant is that you have to edit the setting to allow them in cause the default settiing is to block outside connections.

 

To do this, edit the .htacess in W:/www/

 

For the other part, it really depends on the PC and the ISP. If your PC has a high memory capacity and the connection to your PC to you ISP is something like DSL+, then you should be good. Make sure you PC also has a very fast processor to serve everything needed. 1.2+ GHz.

 

About you transferring, you can do that. Copy all the files and make a export of youur database to be imported into the live server. You may have to change some variables in some files/database regarding file paths and database setting.

[dokiroku]

Olajideolaolorun & oconkero, thanks for your posts! Much appreciated.

 

However, Olajideolaolorun, I'm still a bit unclear on what actually happens when I click on Server_Start.bat. I'm running Zone Alarm and when I click on this batch file, my DOS window pops up with "the server is working on the disk w:\[http:127.0.0.1/apanel/]"

 

Then, when I select Firefox to open up "redirect.html", Zone Alarm notifies me that "serv.exe is trying to act as a server (source IP: 0.0.0.0:HTTP) & "this program has previously asked for internet access". I allow serve.exe to act as a server and, in my browser window, it shows the address of "http://localhost/apanel/".

 

I think my confusion lies in exactly what a "server" does. When the server kicks in, am I on the internet or still only working off my computer? And, if I go in and start editing webpages and saving my work, will those files save on my computer, Apache/PHP or both??!!

 

Again, thanks for your assistance.

[olajideolaolorun]

I think you need to do a search on Web Server Articles on Google. When the server starts on your PC, you are serving pages, either to you or to the outside world if open. When you save it in W:/www/ it will show up in http://localhost, meaning that its savd on your PC. Apache is just a program serving the site.

 

You need to go to Google to find more articles that will teach you about servers and their functions.

[dokiroku]

Olajideolaolorun, thanks for the last post. I think I understand things a bit better now. I also took a look at some articles regarding web servers. LoL...wish I would've studied this stuff in school!

 

Take it easy.

[olajideolaolorun]

That would be better, but i also learnt the way you did, learnt it all by myself and working with the server and messing with it.