The Wild West of the Internet

Or ..why I now have the same site on two domains!

Or … if you like convoluted you'll love this !

A little background

When I first decided to enter the world of the Internet with a site on my favorite topic I was excited and apprehensive at the same time. I knew absolutely no one who had a site. I had to rely on books and magazines for information.

So with the encouragement (not permission, I'm a macho guy…right dear?) of my first and only first mate I started my quest to build a web site where boaters could gather and have some fun. I did all the pragmatic business things e.g. register for a Trademark for the All Volunteer Yacht Club and bought the domain name "volunteer-yachtclub.com". Of course, that was before I found out that most people do not like really long domain names. Hey, I never said I found this stuff out in the proper order! That kind of thing happened and still happens a lot!

So six months and more fun than I ever thought I would have a very primitive Web site began to develop. I'm very serious when I say it was fun! Any hobby I ever ventured into, was more fun to me during development and the learning stage, than when I became proficient at whatever it was. Don't worry this project is holding my interest just fine. The need to learn is neverending. And, don't get the idea that I'm a type "A" personality either. I'm really an easygoing fellow who simply needs a challenge and goals in front of him at all times. So don't get in my way or I'll… anyway its been a lot of fun!

This is where it starts to get wild

So the site, such as it was, was ready to venture into the Wild West equivalent on the Internet. There is no real easy way to select an Internet Service Provider (ISP). There are thousands of providers (it seemed like millions) who are willing to "provide" anyone space for a fee. The question is, how reliable is their service? It's really a shot in the dark for the first time Webmaster. I made the wrong choice but it was not evident for almost one year. As you will see, the ramifications of making such a wrong decision sent me off jumping trough more hoops than a trained seal at Sea World.

We (my ISP) had just upgraded to new servers (updated computers) and within a month the site crashed several times. Once for over eighteen hours! That's a lifetime on the Internet. Why is that a lifetime? Well, just about every search engine I was listed with, like Lycos, Excite, Hotbot and many others, send "spiders" or "robots" out to check to see if the sites they have indexed have changed. If they find no site, many will drop the site from their list immediately. That has happened several times and as many of you know (because that's how many of you found my site) search engines are important and it is very time consuming to get re-listed.

If you love irony you'll enjoy the fact that I had just previously agreed to make a statement for my ISP. I said something about how pleased I was with their service. They placed my comment on their "What Our Customer's Say" page.

Anyway, what concerned me most was that all my emails to my provider's support desk were going unanswered. I even wrote the person who asked me to write that testimonial and she ignored that email! Gee, I did what she asked! Talk about fare weather friends!

I contacted a couple of other site owners I knew, who used the same provider. They were all having the same problem! There we all were, floundering around trying to figure out what the heck was going on! My biggest fear was that my ISP would close down and we all would be left scrambling for another provider. Talk about down time; that would mean days if not weeks. It was time to get pro-active. It was time to move! Easier said than done!

So, I started looking around for a service provider. " There are thousands of providers (it seemed like millions) who are willing to "provide" anyone space for a fee. The question is, how reliable is their service?" Where have I heard that before? But this time I was not a new Webmaster and I had become aware of some host provider rating sites. I simply went to one and visited, the then, top rated site. What I found was a well-documented provider that seemed to have it all together. I visited a few others but ultimately decided to use the well-rated provider.

Now it gets a little involved! Question…how does one move a site without any down time? It is not possible for a domain name to point to two providers at the same time. It was also not possible to simply move the site for some very good technical reasons. To state it so I don't bore you to death with Web babble, here is the short version.

Any Dynamic site (one you interact with such as fill out forms for membership) require what is called a CGI script. That is usually kept and placed on the site by the provider. It is what is used when the page developer writes the code that make the forms work and determines what is ultimately done with the information. In my case it went into a database and also emailed me whenever someone joined the club. Well, I could move the pages but the CGI programs belonged to the host provider. I would have to re-write the HTML code on my dynamic pages to point to my new host provider's CGI script. I just could not figure out how to do it without shutting down the site. Would that have been the end of the world if I did shut the site down and moved it? No, not at all. After all I'm an easy going fellow and the idea of hundreds if not thousands (I wish) of potential visitors all over the world, clicking on my web site at search engine sites (that are about to drop me, again!) and getting nothing wouldn't bother me much. Right dear? (Sorry about the squished dog, the limp will go away soon). JUST KIDDING dog lovers.

The dilemma and why I now have the same site on two domains!

My course was clear! Driven buy my natural calm nature and some events outside my control, I decided to start another site, rebuild my Web pages, get them working properly then move the domain name "volunteer-yachtclub.com" to that space. If all went well it would work seamlessly. And, it actually did, but for one small hitch; I picked a really nice temporary domain name! But I'm getting ahead of myself.

My first stop for my temporary name was Network Solutions. They are the Dot Com People and pass out, or rather lease names for a specified length of time. The domain name is yours as long as you pay for it. Anyway, after playing around with some silly names I typed in boatclub.com…. "Taken". Not a surprise. Casually I typed in myboatclub.com expecting the same result. "Available"! Sold! Today it is rare to find any combination of single syllable words that are still available as a Dot Com. That was a surprise. In about a week I had the new version of the All Volunteer Yacht Club site up and running at the "myboatclub.com" domain with the script working properly. Hurray!

I paid good money for myboatclub.com. I have it tied up for two years and it's a great name. So I hit upon one of my better ideas. From this point on it will be "myboatclub.com" home of the All Volunteer Yacht Club! Super, great, absolut……but wait! What about all those search engines, all the directories? Yikes! What about all my members and their bookmarks? OK, OK so we need a transition period! So off I go back to my new provider and I purchase a second spot but within my current directory. (It's cheaper that way…did I mention this is getting a little expensive?) Keep in mind that all this has happened and my original site is still with my old provider, you know; the one not talking to me? I still have to cancel with those folks and point all my visitors to the new location.

OK, now it's back to Network solutions, one more time to direct them to point "volunteer-yachtclub.com" away from my old provider and towards my new provider.

It took about a week but slowly the traffic moved to the new site. Few knew the difference except…. Remember the CGI script I told you about? Well apparently a few of the search engines during their travels spidering my site picked up the address of the script on some pages and indexed them. So when some people had a specific search result and clicked on it, they got the famous "Page Not Found" page. I fixed that by building what is called a friendly "Page Not Found" page and it automatically re-directs the visitor to my main page. Whew!

So here I sit with two domain names (myboatclub.com and volunteer-yachtclub.com) and the same site on both! I just have to remember that every time I make a change to one I have to upload the same changes to the other. It's really not a problem. How long will it stay this way? Maybe a year. I'll slowly migrate all the search engines to "myboatclub.com". Another modest hurdle will be notifying all the sites that are linked to my site. But a simple letter will do the trick for most of them.

So there you have it. A fine kettle of fish I have gotten myself into this time Ollie! If my temporary site name had turned out to be just that, I would only have one site and one domain. But, "myboatclub.com was just too good to pass up! One thing I know for sure. It's never dull and I'm having more fun than I have on any of my other projects! I really am! This is not pandering but a big part of that fun is the interaction I have with the members of the All Volunteer Yacht Club! It's been a blast and I look forward to many more good times in the future. Bring on the wild Internet and its challenges I can take it! Remember, I'm a macho guy…. right dear? Why is the dog looking at me that way?

Keep Safety First and Have Fun!

Jim Kearney