Blog – Sheppco https://sheppco.com Pittsburgh WordPress Development Sun, 08 Mar 2026 15:24:35 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://sheppco.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/cropped-favicon-3-32x32.png Blog – Sheppco https://sheppco.com 32 32 OsixthreeO Grid https://sheppco.com/osixthreeo-grid/ Sun, 08 Mar 2026 14:39:02 +0000 https://sheppco.com/?p=1008 OsixthreeO employs a very simple grid system to create all the layouts. In fact it is so simple that anyone can use it.

Note: this is not really all that useful considering the column blocks available with WordPress block editor. The theme uses this system in a few spots so the css code isn’t going anywhere, might as well be aware of it.

Before the WordPress editor was updated and there were no blocks, this is what we used. It requires only a rudimentary understanding of how HTML & CSS work.

First thing to know is that all things in a HTML document (webpage) are enclosed in what we call tags. For example, the entire visible part of a webpage is enclosed in a ‘body’ tag which looks like <body> . . . </body>. Everything else, the header, all the text and images, etc… is within the opening and closing body tags.

A paragraph of text is enclosed in paragraph tags, <p> … </p>. We have the image tag, a blockquote tag, bold, italics, you name it. We also have the generic <div> … </div> tag for things like layout. For example, if I wanted to make columns of text I would need containers to put the paragraphs of text in so they could be in stacks that are next to each other. These containers would be ‘div’s.

In HTML two div tags, each with some paragraphs in them would look like this…

<div>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

Divs and paragraphs are block elements though. This means that they take up the entire width of the browser pushing everything else down, just like adding a block of wood to a stack of blocks, all the others are displaced vertically.

CSS to the rescue

With CSS we can define the attributes of an element, for example we can tell a div to only be 50% of the browser width and to shift to the left making room for a 2nd 50% width div … and we have columns.

To do this we need the instructions (be only 50% and shift to the left), and a way to attach those instructions to the HTML we wrote (above).

With CSS we can write those instructions and define them as a ‘class’. Then all we have to do is assign that class to the div like so … <div class=”css-class”> … </div>

The Grid

The “instructions” to create the columns mentioned above are already written, loaded and being used in this theme. It is an 8 column grid.

To make a div a 50% width, shifted to the left column add the class ‘col-1-2‘.
col for column. 1-2 for one half.

Available column classes are:
col-1-2
col-1-3, col-2-3
col-1-4, col-3-4
col-1-5, col-2-5, col-3-5, col-4-5
col-1-6, col-5-6
col-1-7, col-2-7, col-3-7, col-4-7, col-5-7, col-6-7
col-1-8, col-3-8, col-5-8, col-7-8

Margins

Columns need a margin and these columns have one HOWEVER, it is a left margin and we do NOT want a left margin on the first column. To solve this we simply add a second class of ‘first’ on the first column.

<div class="col-1-2 first">
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-1-2">
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

Some other ways to use the grid…

<div class="col-1-3 first">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-1-3">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-1-3">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>
<div class="col-1-3 first">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-2-3">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>
<div class="col-1-4 first">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-1-2">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>

<div class="col-1-4">
   <p> ... </p>
</div>
]]> OsixthreeO Utility Classes https://sheppco.com/osixthreeo-utility-classes/ Sun, 08 Mar 2026 14:29:08 +0000 https://sheppco.com/?p=1002 Utility Classes

OsixthreeO has several CSS classes built in for use in the post/page editor. I call these “utility” classes.

Boxed Boxes

By default the column blocks inside a Columns block are not styled. With this in mind, note that each block in the WordPress editor has an “Advanced” tab and in this tab there is an input box for Additional CSS Class(es).

By adding specific css class names in this box you can activate css classes already in your stylesheet. With this in mind the OsixthreeO theme includes a few, small “utility” classes made specifically for the Columns block.

TO START:
Create a “Columns” block.
Be sure the columns container is selected and not one of the inner content blocks. Find and open the “Advanced” tab (bottom right), add the word boxed.

This will add padding around each individual column block and give it a white background.

You may then add any of the other available class names, separated by a space.

boxed – THIS ONE is required in order to activate the others.
bdr – 1 pixel border
shade – box-shadow:
rad4 – 4 pixel border-radius
rad8 – 8 pixel border-radius
no-pad
use only one of the following
up50 – push blocks up 50px
up75 – push blocks up 75px
up100 – push blocks up 100px
up125 – etc…
up150, up160, up175, up200

utility classes in column block
SCSS

.wp-block-columns.boxed {
    position: relative;
    z-index: 2;

    .wp-block-column {
        background-color: #ffffff;
        padding: 1.5em 1.5em 1em;
    }

    &.bdr .wp-block-column {
        border: 1px solid rgba(153,153,153,0.25);
    }
    &.shade .wp-block-column {
        box-shadow: 0px 0px 10px 0px rgba(153,153,153,0.25);
    }
    .rad4 .wp-block-column {
        border-radius: 4px;
    }
    .rad8 .wp-block-column {
        border-radius: 8px;
    }

    &.no-pad .wp-block-column {
        padding: 0;
    }

    &.up50 {margin-top: -50px;}
    &.up75 {margin-top: -75px;}
    &.up100 {margin-top: -100px;}
    &.up125 {margin-top: -125px;}
    &.up150 {margin-top: -150px;}
    &.up160 {margin-top: -160px;}
    &.up175 {margin-top: -175px;}
    &.up200 {margin-top: -200px;}
    @include breakpoint(phone-h) {
        &.up50 {margin-top: -25px;}
        &.up75 {margin-top: -37px;}
        &.up100 {margin-top: -50px;}
        &.up125 {margin-top: -62px;}
        &.up150 {margin-top: -75px;}
        &.up160 {margin-top: -80px;}
        &.up175 {margin-top: -87px;}
        &.up200 {margin-top: -100px;}
    }
}
]]> OsixthreeO Custom Header https://sheppco.com/osixthreeo-custom-header/ Sun, 08 Mar 2026 14:09:09 +0000 https://sheppco.com/?p=983
Here are some examples of the custom header options in action.

Gradient color combinations

Left – #4169e1
Right – #fcd6f7

Left – #4169e1
Right – #fcd6f7

Left – #4169e1
Right – #fcd6f7

Left – #4169e1
Right – #fcd6f7

Transparent image overlay

Hero image or Video

Still image background.
Solid header background.

Movie or hero image

Text with HTML

Primary Text Box:

Your Slogan Here
<br><br>

Secondary Text Box:

<div class="col-1-2 first">
Your brief product or service write up for that 30 second attention window.
< /div >

<div class="col-1-2 ta-center">
Buy now Call to Action<br />
<a href="/osixthreeo-addons/" class="btn">Get Add Ons</a>
< /div >

]]> What is a Gacillia Nut? https://sheppco.com/what-is-a-gacillia-nut/ https://sheppco.com/what-is-a-gacillia-nut/#comments Mon, 09 Dec 2019 19:32:51 +0000 https://sheppco.com/?p=469

There is no such thing as a Gracillia Nut! Search it and you’ll only find posts like this one talking about a popular internet scam that targets web developers.

It starts as an email from a potential client, with a budget! AND content and a logo already produced! And did I say a budget? A good budget, one I could definitely work with. An import company that wants to pay a fair price for a custom website and sign on to my maintenance program. YES! The perfect client.

Being the curious type I wanted to know a little more about this import business and what products they were importing which were going to be nuts and herbs.

I have a small scale business which I want to turn into a large scale business, now it located in your country and the company is based on importing and exporting of Agriculture products such as Kola Nut, Gacillia Nut and Cocoa so I need the best layout design for it.

Kola nuts, cool. Cocoa, yum. What the heck is a Gracillia Nut though? I googled it and voila, what a let down. All I can find are posts about the scam containing word-for-word copies of the email I received. The budgets and names varied but pretty much everything else was exact.

Obviously I will terminate communication.

Reading other articles about this scam I was able to connect this to another type of scam that hit me a few years back. 3 years ago I was contacted by someone who needed a design made into a website, I said sure!! He then said he was in the hospital and could not pay the designer to release the Photoshop files. She could only accept cash and he could not go to the bank. So… his brilliant plan was he would send me a check for the cost of the website PLUS the designer’s fee. I of course would have to do the wire transfer to the designer. HA.

That was pretty easy to spot. However it now seems that they’ve been working on this!

As I was investigating the Gacillia Nut thing I became a bit curious about how this request for a website turns into thievery.

Turns out that after everything is settled, after the project is a go and you have a contact name and an address, THEN comes the “I’m in the hospital” bit. Designer can’t take credit cards or whatever, send them this and I’ll send you that etc…

Had I not been curious about what a Gacillia Nut is and searched it, I would have missed this first warning sign!

I would have seen through the scam the second they requested money however I think that would have been 2 or 3 more emails or even a phone call down the road. By then I would have made a local and a staging area, loaded up WordPress and a starter theme on each, sync up my development area with GIT, etc… HOURS of work. Busy work, setup stuff but still, it’s hours AND you’re all excited about it because we love this stuff!

Serious bummer, dude.

Ted Theodore Logan
]]> https://sheppco.com/what-is-a-gacillia-nut/feed/ 6 How Much Does a WordPress Website Cost? https://sheppco.com/how-much-does-a-wordpress-website-cost/ https://sheppco.com/how-much-does-a-wordpress-website-cost/#comments Fri, 03 Jun 2016 01:33:04 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=192 WordPress website cost

WordPress is free, right?
You can sign up for a free account at WordPress.com or you get your own copy of it from WordPress.org.

So why do web developers charge thousands of dollars to build a single website?

This infographic from Codeable does a good job showing the amount of time and cost involved in building a custom website with WordPress.

And here is a really nice web app for pricing a website here too.

According to these and a few other resources, about $5000 to start.

What about free themes?

If you can find a theme in the WordPress repository that works for you out-of-the-box, awesome. Load it up and start writing.

Maybe you need to change the coloring, resize your company logo to fit the allotted space or add a spot to your homepage for a newsletter signup. These are all easy tasks for some but for the general public not so much. You will need to invest time and for some things, lots of it.

If I got a new car and then decided I wanted it to be black instead of blue, then decided I was going to do it myself… that would be a train-wreck. Where would I do it? What type of paint do I use? How do I get the paint onto the car? How much paint fumes can I breath in without getting too much brain damage? How much brain damage is too much?

A car might not be the best analogy but the point is it would take me hours to research all that and if I value my time there is a cost associated with that research.

What about the tools necessary for the task such as HTML editors and FTP. Granted if you are happy with the theme as is there’s no need for any of the more techie stuff. Also, WordPress does in fact provide a way to edit theme and plugin files but what about the languages used to make changes on a website such as HTML and CSS?

Thing is, if you have the tools and/or know the languages for editing WordPress themes, you probably aren’t looking for a free one, you are more than likely building one… which makes this article irrelevant! ( sorry, here’s a link to learn React, let me know how it goes because I’ve been meaning to get there for a while now ).

Otherwise, you will need to either hire a developer or learn how to make the changes yourself.

Free theme that works out-of-the-box = free = awesome.
Free theme that needs customization = tools + languages + experience/know-how = cost = not free.

What about premium themes?

$59 for a really nice looking theme that seems to do everything. The best advice I have here is to make sure you are not responding to the gorgeous images being used on the demo.

There are a lot of premium themes out there. Many of these are excellent, some are not. Trouble is the only people who are in a position to judge whether or not a particular theme is right for you are future-you, after you’ve already bought it, and WordPress developers. And most WordPress developers are not buying themes, they’re building them.

Some themes tend to out-shine the others – big beautiful images, sliders, page builders, color options, and fancy animated stuff. WOW, they do everything and they look really good doing it. These are the big sellers.

I’ve seen it many times.
A premium theme is purchased based on how good the demo looks. The theme gets loaded and WTF, it’s blank. Or perhaps the theme has demo content that you can install and it looks great, just like the demo except the demo is for a dental practice and your site is for selling your new book. Nice images but they don’t work.

So you begin to look for images, and you need a ton of them for this theme. 4 for the slider and one for every post. That is, if you want the site to look like the demo. Finding a suitable image can be difficult, you have something in mind that relates to the content you just created so you begin your search by typing in some keywords in a search engine or at a photo site like Getty.

Many of the suitable images you find don’t work because they’re not the right size. They’e square or tall and you needed short and wide for the slider and featured images. Others don’t work or look ugly because they clash with the site coloring.

Then you realize the ones you really liked, the images that could actually work for the site cost $400 each. Youch.

So now you’re only looking for free images. After significant effort you come up with two or three, certainly not enough to get the theme looking like the demo but, you have to start somewhere I suppose …

Why do I need all these images? I can’t go through this every time I make a post.

So you decide to go with no images, or maybe use the best one for the homepage instead of a slider, sliders are passé now anyways right?

The site doesn’t look like the demo anymore but hey, you made it, you paid for the theme, it is what it is.

That’s the images, same thing goes for the content!

The theme demo has content blocks, they look great, some are in columns, or in a “Call Out” box, maybe some quotes with a parallax background image, “our team” photos, a map and a contact form, etc… It was exciting to imagine your content filling up these areas. Now comes the time to actually come up with that content. You write, or you pull out that which you have written for your future website. You are happy with this content, you spent a lot of time fussing over it and feel satisfied that you have captured what you think needs to be said.

Now it’s time to fit that content into the blocks available on your premium theme. You soon realize that the amount of text in each of these areas is pretty important. Too much text in the some areas pushes everything too far down or it makes the section too tall or lop-sided. The original balance is lost. So now you have to choose between re-writing your content to accommodate the layout or living with the unbalance.

Despite the beautiful demos, even a premium theme can end up looking like crap.

So, What Does a WordPress Website Cost?

Depends.
When do you want it?
What do you want to end up with?
How much of your own time are you willing to put in and what is your time worth?
and finally…

How much value should the website bring to the table?

An e-commerce site, a brochure site that represents your business and/or your brand, a portfolio site that demonstrates your craft and enables prospective clients to contact you, are all examples of how a website can be valuable.

If your website’s purpose is inconsequential, a wedding announcement for your friends, a family photo album, meaningless rantings, then value isn’t really an issue. Load up TwentySixteen and go.

If your website serves a business purpose your needs will be different. The site now represents something of value; you, your business or service or a product so having a professional looking website can be pretty important. The compromises necessary for the free and premium themes mentioned above may not fly here.

Granted, some studies have shown that ugly sites can perform very well but I don’t think you would have read this far if that was your plan 🙂

Consider a website that is customized to display your original content in a balanced layout, has a customized backend tailored to be easy for you to edit, has a color scheme that matches your logo and looks great on desktops and handheld devices.

The value a website brings to you or your business should be represented by the amount you are willing to pay for it.

If the site is simple and you don’t need anything fancy or custom, then yeah, a website could be free. There are a LOT of great looking free themes and you can get hosting for free at wordpress.com. You’ll still need to put in a few hours to figure out contact forms or any other plugin type functionality, so, not totally free I guess but close.

If you are a D.I.Y. type you can get hosting for under $100 a yr., install WordPress using the host’s installer and get a nice free theme from the repository. With a little bit of research into plugins and how they work, you can even add some serious functionality to your site. A bit more of an investment if you consider your time.

On the other hand if your website needs go beyond what an out-of-the-box theme is capable of, if you do not want to spend the time necessary learning HTML and CSS and WordPress functions and hooks, if you need your site customized to your content needs, if you want your website to accommodate the amount of time your willing to spend searching for and resizing images, if you want your website to be easy to edit regardless of how customized the layouts are… That is a valuable business tool and will probably be priced as such.

]]> https://sheppco.com/how-much-does-a-wordpress-website-cost/feed/ 1 WordPress Updates https://sheppco.com/wordpress-updates/ Thu, 02 Jun 2016 16:03:34 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=188 maintenance
Like any great product or service, WordPress undergoes constant upgrades and improvements. It is Open Source software which translates into hundreds of developers world-wide working on it, making it faster, more secure, easier to use, prettier, etc…

The fact that WordPress keeps getting improved and updated doesn’t necessarily mean that your site is reaping the benefits of these improvements.

WordPress requires maintenance as do its Themes and Plugins. Good news is WordPress updates are easy.

Updates don’t necessarily mean that the previous version was bad — The core team behind WordPress is constantly improving the software. Also keep in mind that software is complex, technologies are constantly evolving and WordPress’ huge market share makes it a high yield target for hacking.

Updates are an integral part of using any great piece of software or hardware. They are necessary in order to keep the software secure and to roll in improvements to the interface.

Bottom line – you have to keep WordPress, Themes and Plugins up to date.

Thing is, it’s a 2 minute second process. WordPress updates are not hard to do, remembering to actually do them might be a problem for some though.

Red Dot With White Number – Time for WordPress Updates

In the main admin menu, under Dashboard (the top link), you will see the link for Updates.

The big give-away is the red dot with the white number in it. That means there is an update available. If the white number is 3, then three updates are available. The red dots will show up in other spots of the menu as well. It will appear next to themes or next to plugins if there is an update.

Click on Updates to go to the updates page. Here we have three sections. The top section is for WordPress. Next section is for plugins and the next for themes. There will be plenty of messaging to let you know exactly what needs to be updated.

If there are multiple updates I usually do them in the order that they appear on the page, WP Core, Plugins the Themes.

Be sure to backup your database before doing updates, it’s just a good idea.

WordPress Updates

]]> How to Manage Email in cPanel https://sheppco.com/how-to-manage-email-in-cpanel/ Tue, 29 Mar 2016 17:25:56 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=69 a dog managing some mail

Setting up email accounts is one of those tasks that tends to wait in the shadows until the final stages of website development, or worse, a week after launch. You read how having an email account for your new site is really important and using a Gmail account just doesn’t look professional. So now its time to figure out how to manage email in cPanel.

Despite the hype, designing and developing a website is hard. Even if you are using WordPress with a pre-made theme with no modifications, there is still writing all the content, finding images, loading product shots and descriptions, etc… it takes time.

Even after your site is ready and everything is perfect, little details creep up on you. Site security, SEO and Analytics are a few of the extras that can be easy to forget while focusing on the bigger picture of your business and your website.

Email tends to have a few gotcha’s of its own. Setting up your local email program to send and receive using a newly created email account or getting the account to work with Gmail can be troublesome. Sometimes these steps go smoothly, other times not so much. If you know how to manage email in cPanel then you can probably move along. On the other hand, if you have no clue how to set up emails or configure your email client, read on.

manage email in cPanel 01

Log in to manage email in cPanel

Using Hostgator’s shared hosting cPanel for our example, here are the very simple steps to manage email in cPanel.

The first step is to go to your cPanel login page. cPanel is Control Panel of your hosting account. The URL for this page was in the purchase confirmation email you received right after signing up and paying for the hosting account. It will be something like… https://gator987.hostgator.com:2345

At Hostgator you only have one main username. Choosing it was the first thing you did when signing up for your hosting account. Other hosting companies may require a different username for your control panel.

Once you are logged into your cPanel account you will see all the options available in an intuitive, simple interface. The obligatory up-sells and affiliate offers are… somewhat modest.

Access your Email Accounts

manage email in cPanel 02

The forth section down on the main column is Mail. The first button, top/left, is Email Accounts. This is the icon to click for creating and editing emails. Click it.

On this page you will see a form to create a new email address. Below the form is a list of all your email accounts.

 

Create a New Email Account

manage email in cPanel 03

Just fill in whatever you want your email to be. If the email address is taken or if you entered a character that is not allowed cPanel will let you know.

Definitely use the password generator. Write it down on a piece of paper and tape it to the bottom of the desk drawer. Or put it in a file with a filename that has nothing to do with passwords or websites or the internet. Encrypt it then store it somewhere secure, preferably a computer that is not connected to the internet, no WiFi.

Click the Create Account button and your done.

manage email in cPanel 04

Configure Your Local Email Client

The next step is to configure your email program to communicate with this account. This step can be a P.I.T.A. for sure, however your hosting account will always provide instructions and help is available in several different ways.

manage email in cPanel 05

If you click the More button you will see a couple options one of which is Configure Email Client. Here you will find all the information necessary to hook up your new email account. They even provide automated apps that will configure your email program for you.

manage email in cPanel 06

By now you’ve noticed the “Walk Me Through” tab at the bottom of your browser screen. Clicking this tag, making a few selections and following the step by step prompts will get you through any task you’d need to manage your hosting account including how to manage email in cPanel.

]]> How to Clear Your Browser Cache https://sheppco.com/how-to-clear-your-browser-cache/ Sun, 27 Mar 2016 17:15:01 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=66

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

You just had some changes made to your website. Developer says he/she is done so you view your site but none of the changes are there. (!) You call your developer/designer and say “where are the changes?”.

In most cases this can be resolved when you clear your browser cache!.

The browser cache is a storage area in your browser that holds all the files of web pages you’ve visited. This conserves bandwidth because the next time you visit that page the trip to the web server is not necessary, files are already right there in your browser cache and the page loads that much quicker.

When you change an image by replacing the old with a new that has the same filename as the old one, the old one can get stuck in the browser cache.

Stylesheets will stick in a browser cache too.

If you are having work done on your website, it is a good idea to learn how to clear your browser cache. There are ways to prevent stylesheets from sticking in the cache but these techniques can be tedious and many developers do not use them.

browser-refresh-button

The easy way is to hold the shift key and hit the Refresh button on your Browser’s toolbar.

Sometimes that just doesn’t cut it though so…

Chrome

In the browser bar go to Chrome / Clear Browsing Data…
In the browser window that appears
select the time period from the dropdown,
be sure that the “Empty the cache” select box is checked
Click “Clear browsing data”

Firefox

In the browser bar go to History / Clear Recent History…
In the popup box that appears
select the time range from the dropdown,
under details (Click the down arrow next to “Details”), be sure that the “Cache” select box is checked
Click “Clear Now”

Safari

In the browser bar go to Safari / Empty Cache…
In the popup box that appears click “Empty”

Internet Explorer 9 and 8

Click Tools, and select Delete Browsing History… .
Deselect Preserve Favorites website data, and select Temporary Internet files, Cookies, and History.
Click “Delete.”

]]> Intro to Domains and Hosting https://sheppco.com/intro-to-domains-and-hosting/ Sun, 27 Mar 2016 17:11:30 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=62 web server panel

Photo by Jordan Harrison on Unsplash

New website?

You need a domain name and a hosting account. If you are not familiar with the process of setting up a new website, domains and hosting can be quit confusing. I will attempt to help but, actually going through the process is the best way to grasp how these two things relate.

A Domain Name

is the word you type into your browser to get to a website.
It has two parts, the top level and the lower levels.

A typical website URL (Universal Resource Locator) or website address looks something like this

http://www.sitename.com

The last part, the .com is the top-level of the domain name. The other parts to the left, separated by dots, are the lower levels of the domain name.

Examples of different top level domains:
.com – Commercial
.net – Network
.gov – Government agencies
.edu – Educational institutions
.org – Organizations (nonprofit)
.mil – Military
.ca – Canada

Dot com and dot net are generally the most popular.

The part of the domain name next to the top level section (.com) is the part you will choose to represent your website. It can be representative of you, your business or nothing at all. yourname.com is a good choice if you intend to blog or if you are the sole contributor. If you intend to sell red widgets on your website then redwidgets.com (or .net) is probably a good choice. This can be anything you want as long as the word is available. It can be a word or not. It can represent your site’s content, or not. Amazon, Google and Zappos are all examples of a word that doesn’t necessarily represent the content of the website. Anything goes here.

You can purchase a domain name from a domain name registry. There are a bazillion different places to do this, GoDaddy.com and NameCheap.com are two of the most popular.

A Hosting Account

is what you need to have a website that can be found at the domain name you just purchased. A hosting account is basically renting space on a web server. A web server is a computer running the software necessary to serve website files to computers anywhere in the world. Like domain name registries, there are a bazillion hosting companies to choose from.

DNS

DNS is short for Domain Name System. Web servers are accessed by their IP address. You may have seen an IP address, they are just a bunch of numbers and dots such as 123.45.67.89. Once you purchase a domain name it has to be mapped to the correct web server. This is where the Domain Name Server comes in (yup, same first letters but no, not the same). A Domain Name Server can be thought of as a big 2 column spreadsheet, domain names in one column, IP addresses in the other. When you click a link to view a webpage or type in a domain name such as copypastedeveloper.com the first stop is a Domain Name Server which directs your query to the correct IP address by looking it up in the 2 column spreadsheet.

Keep in mind that a single web server may house many different websites so there is some internal trafficking going on there as well.

Domain Mapping

This is the last step you’ll need to take and usually the most confusing. If you purchase your domain name and hosting account from the same company you may be lucky enough to be able to skip this last step. On the other hand if you purchase your domain name from namecheap.com and purchase hosting from another company like Hostgator (<- affiliate link), this step is unavoidable. The hosting company will provide you with 2 DNS addresses. These addresses then have to be entered somewhere at the domain name registry. This is how the domain name gets mapped to the IP address. All in all it is very easy, however finding where to enter these addresses at your registry can be frustrating depending on the interface the registry provides.

Conclusion

Domains and hosting are integral parts of the website creation process. Thinking up a domain name can be fun, until you have to start compromising because your first choices are already taken. DNS and hosting is just plain confusing to those who don’t have to deal with them on a regular basis.

To have a website you need a domain name and a hosting account. A domain name is purchased from a domain name registry, a hosting account is space on a web server purchased from a hosting provider. The domain name is a word, the web server’s address is a number (IP address). To map the name to the number you have to enter the DNS addresses provided by the hosting company into the provided space at the registry.

]]> Hello world! https://sheppco.com/hello-world/ Sat, 26 Mar 2016 06:06:57 +0000 http://sheppco.com/?p=1 hello world

Photo by Philipp Litvin on Unsplash

That’s right, this is the default post that comes with WordPress and I’m not going to change the title.

This site has been around for 15 years and has gone through a few iterations. Unfortunately I am usually busy building sites for other folks so this one is always the last to get any love and I really want to change that. So I’m starting over. $post_id = 1.

I saw Chris Lema speak at a WordCamp a couple years ago and one of the (many) tidbits of wisdom he issued was “share everything you know with everyone”. His reasons for doing this made a LOT of sense and really struck a chord (G major I think) for me. So, despite my enormous affliction of “Impostor Syndrome”, my intent is to get over myself and try to do just that.

In fact if it were not for Chris and a myriad of other bloggers who share their knowledge on a daily/weekly basis I would not be nearly the developer I am today. I mean, holy crap, how many times have I been stuck, plugged in my question at Google and found exactly what I needed. Sites like Bill Erickson, WP Beginner, Tom McFarlin, Chris Coyier, CodePen and many others that just give it away truly emulate the essence of open source. Very cool.

So while I am no Lema or Erickson, there may be someone out there who could benefit from one of the zillions of problems I’ve had to solve over the years. One way to find out…

]]>