Serving Global Customers for Over a Decade
Contact Us

Getting Started

What page is loaded when I go to http://www.my-company.com?

Our web servers are configured to read index.html as the default homepage, so people browsing your site can simply type "http://www.my-company.com" rather than having to specify a filename, such as "http://www.my-company.com/homepage.html"

It is strongly advised that you have an index.html file in each directory of your web site. Directories without it allow browsing through your files, possibly exposing to public view files not intended for that purpose.

The default pages that can be loaded when someone visits your web site are:

index.html; index.htm; index.shtml; index.php3; index.phtml; index.jsp; index.asis

Note that you only need one type of index files in your web site directory, and index.html will always supersede others if multiple index files exist in the same directory.
 

Where should I place my index file?

When you FTP to your web site, you will see a directory called "public_html". Simply FTP or copy the index file to "public_html" directory, and you should be able to view your web site in Netscape Communicator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. Be sure to name everything in lowercase, NOT "INDEX.HTML".
 

Is index.html same as INDEX.HTML?

Unlike Windows or DOS, UNIX is case sensitive. This includes your User ID, password, all directories and filenames. This means that index.html is different from Index.html, INDEX.HTML and all its various case combinations. If you place INDEX.HTML in the "public_html" directory, the web server will return an error message. You can change the filename by renaming it using File Manager in Panelbox.
 

How do I update my web pages?

You can create and maintain your web pages, images, and scripts locally and upload them to the web server at your leisure via FTP. You can overwrite existing files or transfer a new file.

If you have installed Content Management System, you can update your web pages from the CMS Administration console.

 

How do I write HTML/create a website?

There are a large number of documents and programs on the web to help you write HTML.* * We can not help you write HTML * *. Try searching for these keywords on Google for places to get started:
  • Beginner's HTML
  • HTML Editors

We also recommend the following books which may assist you in creating your web site:

WebMonkey also has excellent resources for Web developers:

To demonstrate what HTML looks like, here is a "Hello World!" sample HTML:

 

<html>
<head>
 <title>Hello World! Sample</title>
</head>
<body>
 Hello World!
</body>
</html>
 

Can I create my entire web site in .htm extension?

Sure. Windows and DOS filenames can only be saved with a three-letter .htm extension. As long as you have appropriate case for the filenames and directories, there shouldn't be any problem. Of course, you can always rename these files to the .html extension after FTPing.
 

My web site looks good on my hard drive, but after uploading it the images are missing and the links are broken?

Unlike Windows or DOS, UNIX is case sensitive. This means that index.html is different from Index.html, INDEX.HTML and all its various case combinations.

This creates a problem when transferring your site from your hard drive (Windows or DOS) to one of our UNIX servers. It can often result in pages having broken links and missing images.

If you encounter this problem, check to make sure that your hyperlinks in your web pages correspond to the exact filenames on your website. If they do not match, you can either modify your hyperlinks in your web pages or rename your files with an FTP program so they match your hyperlinks. Please note that if you are referring to your pages with a .htm extension in your hyperlinks, make sure the filename actually ends with a .htm extension. If you are referring to your pages with .html extension in your hyperlinks, make sure the filename actually ends with a .html extension.

Another problem encountered is that you are referring to web pages and images on your hard disk. For example,

<a href="c:\webpage\welcome.htm">My Web Site</a>

The above hyperlink should be replaced with the one below it:

<a href="/welcome.htm">My Web Site</a>
 

The HTML page is garbled. What's wrong?

It is important to remember to send HTML (text) in ACCII mode and all image-format files in Binary. Many Windows FTP client programs can automatically set the appropriate file type during transmission. In addition, if you are using Word or some other text-editor locally for writing HTML, be sure to save the file as plain-text only , not a .doc file, for example. All of this is basic, but results in a majority of the FTP errors!
 

How do I edit my files while they are on the server?

You can edit web page files using the online editor in File Manager when you are logged on to the Panelbox.
 

What is an appropriate file size for HTML files?

When people browse your home page, it's important to remember that they might be on a slower 14.4kbs modem. Hence, to download 100K of file and graphics, it takes a little over 60 seconds at that speed.

Here's some suggestions to alleviate this problem:

 

  1. Split your home page to a few separate pages.
  2. Reduce the graphic size by shrinking the image size.
  3. Save photographs as .jpg files with about 85% compression ratio.
  4. Save images with mostly solid colors using .gif compression.
  5. Experiment with reducing the number of colours in your GIF files.
 

What file types does my Virtual Web Server support?

We have configured the HTTP servers to support all MIME types. If a Web browser or plug-in can read it, you can serve it.
 

What are MIME types?

MIME is an acronym for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions, an Internet Standard for representing multipart and multimedia data in email. The Web server informs the Web browser which file type is being sent using a similar MIME configuration file.

When new software is released for World Wide Web, the MIME configuration file has to be updated before the server will handle that software's file. If the server does not recognise a particular file you are using, please contact Service Centre with the message "MIME configuration" plus the location (URL) of that software's home page. Our system administrator will add it in the configuration after evaluation.

 

What is Telnet or SSH?

Telnet or SSH is a tool that lets you log in to other computers over the Internet. Telnet is text-based; there's no pointing or clicking. All your navigation is done via the keyboard.

When you Telnet or SSH into your Virtual Web Server, you will be connected remotely to the UNIX operating system. Thus, you can type in UNIX commands and manipulate your web site.

However, since our Panelbox includes all the functions you need to manage your website, shell access is no longer needed. Thus it is disabled on our server.

 

There are bunch of /_vti_xxx/ directories and files in my public_html directory. Can I delete them?

If you log in to your site with FTP and find some directories (for example, _vti* ) and files (for example, .htaccess ) that you did not upload, DO NOT delete them. These are FrontPage Server Extensions components. You will damage the FrontPage support for your web site if you remove them.

If you accidentally delete them, please submit a service ticket at Service Centre and we will re-install the FrontPage Server Extensions for you.