Hey Guys I'm migrating an existing site to a new server. The domain, DNS servers, and hosting are all with the same company. Do I create the exact same DNS on my new server? Or do I have to create an entirely different nameserver for the new server? Or can I leave it where it is? I'm not exactly sure where the DNS fits into the process. It's my understanding that it responds to requests for my domain if someone types it in to a browser, then directs them to my IP where my website is at. So if I keep my domain and DNS with the same company, all I would need to do would be to point the DNS to my new IP and that's that? My web guy said this: "Once the new server is up and running, we can create the namservers on the new sever, and then you can point the nameservers over to the new server's ips. Your sites will then propagate to the new server, and once everything is tested and working fine, the old server and be shut off." So it sounds like he's going to create the same DNS on the new server, then we're just going to update the IP, then shut down the DNS on the old server? Any help would be appreciated... Thanks!
The nameservers have been set up on the new server yet.... I'm trying to figure out how I should set that up...
Setting dns/nameservers on your webservers is so your webserver can resolve domain names nothing more. The important part here is when you change your ip/move to the new server you will have to change the IP of your domain on the primairy nameserver. (usually done by your ISP or on some admin site) (if your domain is the same and your provider as well the nameserver used will not change) Also take into account that changing the IP of your domain on your nameserver can take up to 24 hours for it to be propangated worldwide (to all other nameservers) if you want to speed things up a little ask for a lower TTL (time to live) Example: assemblergames.com's primairy nameserver is: NS1.PEER1.NET If you would switch to another server with a different IP adres, then this IP should be set in and known by NS1.PEER1.NET DNS zonefile which needs to be edited with the new IP will look something like: www A 64.34.180.17 Simply said: Then when somebody browses to www.assemblergames.com their pc (which has a dns set to his isp) will ask his isp's nameserver where to find www.assemblergames.com, your isp's nameserver will then ask the root servers which nameserver assembler.com uses and get back ns1.peer1.net, then it will ask ns1.peer1.net what the IP address is for www and get back 64.34.180.17 and thus the request will end up on your webserver.
I generally understand the purpose of the nameserver and how it works, I'm just a bit confused about if it needs to be transferred and how it's stored. I know that it translates IP address and web addresses and tells computers where to go when they get a request for a domain. I also understand that my IP is linked with the nameserver and when I change servers I need to update the IP so the nameserver can tell other computers to go to my new site. Right now I have my domain and server with the same hosting company. My site has been migrated to a new server and we're doing testing. So very soon I will have my domain registered with one company and my server registered with another. After we're done testing I'll go to my old hosting company and ask them to update the IP for my nameservers. And....is that it? I get confused because I don't know what a nameserver physically is. Is it just a registration? Once you register it then you're done? Or is it something that needs to be created again or migrated every time you create a new server? My new hosting company is asking me what I want the nameservers to be but I'm thinking we don't need to do anything since the site was originally established on another server and the nameservers were already created at that time. Correct or bathsiat crazy?
Correct, that is it basically. You could choose to also migrate your domain/nameserver to your new ISP but this can be a pain, I would keep it as is and just have your old ISP update your zonefile with the new IP for www (or any other subname you use) pointing to your new IP address. But note that keeping your nameserver with your old ISP does create extra work as you have to deal with 2 company's now. What you can also do is ask your old ISP to add a test www record for now, like: wwwtest.yoursite.com pointing to your new IP so you can test your content before renaming wwwtest to www.
I went ahead and changed the IP at my domain host. Hopefully the transfer will happen soon. The odd thing is that my website on the old server went offline....? I'm still waiting for the domain to point to the new server so my site is down right now.... I figured it would point to the old server which is still up until it pointed to the new server which is up....
