Web Concepts

By Tiara Rea

Customers, clients, and a faithful audience of readers and supporters have become the foundation of successful businesses in the online world. If the people who truly understand your product recommend it and your services to those around them, they will stand by your decisions and even help you grow by offering their own opinions and assistance. For example, Lunarpages customers are known for this amazing assistance - they comment, they review, and they spread the word.

Having an online presence for your business is an important part of the success of your company in the contemporary market, so here are some tips for those who have not made the leap into e-business success yet. (more…)

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Original post by Tiara

by Tiara Rea

Web Designers have a lot to consider when setting their clients up. They need to first promise a great design, then agree on how fast they can deliver that design, and finally choose a price that’s suitable for their customers but also profitable for thier business. Sometimes, customers come fully-equipped with their own web hosting accounts, but a lot of times, inexperienced webmasters seek assurance from their web designers as they search for the best website hosting company around. And if you’re a good web designer, you’ll have one company you work with, where you know the ins and outs of all their features.

But along with recommendations for their clients, every good web designer needs an affordable website hosting solution for their own business to run properly. Web designers cannot afford to pay thousands of dollars per year if they are just starting out in the business or only have several clients who need a good web host. A lot of hosting providers will try to sell web designers on the most expensive plans in order to be successful, but here at Lunarpages, we prefer an honest approach and have a variety of options for your web design hosting needs. (more…)

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Original post by Tiara

Author: Mitch Keeler

What is FTP all about? It stands for File Transfer Protocol. FTP is the TCP/IP standard way of transferring files across the Internet and between computers.

An FTP account is the quickest and easiest way for you to get content up to your hosting account and down from your hosting account. If you need to transfer many files, using an FTP client is the best way to accomplish this. From cPanel in the FTP Manager, you can create FTP accounts, which allow users to access the files of your web site with an FTP client.

Here are the steps to get your new FTP account setup.

1. To access the FTP Manager, click on the icon above the words FTP Manager on the main screen of your cPanel interface.

2. Click on FTP Accounts.

3. To add an FTP account, click on Add FTP Account.

4. Enter the user name for the new FTP account in the blank field next to where it says “login:”. Next, enter the password for the new FTP account in the blank field next to where it says “password:”.

5. You want to put in the directory which the account will have access to in the blank field next to where it says “directory:”.

6. Click on where it says “create” to create the new FTP account.

Now your FTP account is setup and ready to test out. Plug it into your favorite FTP client of choice and if you followed the steps correctly you should be up and running.

Over the month of November I have been going over some basics for all of our cPanel users here at Lunarpages. This is the last in the series, and I hope you enjoyed them all!

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Original post by Mitch

by Tiara Rea

PHP is probably the most popular server side scripting language and is also a free part of any good web hosting company’s services. With Lunarpages, the newest versions of PHP are kept up to date and are always free. This is mostly because PHP is open source and does not require any licensing fees, so Lunarpages can provide it free for every webmaster! This is great news for website owners who would like to add some incredible features to their repertoire.

But though many people have heard of PHP web hosting, what exactly can you do with PHP? Well I’m here to show you 5 awesome things! (more…)

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Original post by Tiara

Author: Mitch Keeler

There are a few confusing issues with cPanel and how to get things going, and one of the most asked about cPanel features that some people have problems with is password protected folders.

You can protect directories within your site from browsers by using a password to protect them. This allows you to restrict material to only authorized users or store sensitive material online. This has the same appearance and effect as the password protection on cPanel.

You are given a login box to access the web site after you add the password protection.

To password protect a directory:

1. Click on the Password protect directories button on the home page.

2. Navigate to the directory that you want to protect. Select a folder by clicking on the folder name link, or open a folder by clicking on the folder icon.

3. Click on the tick box next to the lock icon.

4. Enter the name that you want to appear in the Protected Resource Name field. This is optional and purely for the user’s benefit.

5. Click on the Save button. Generally, you now need to add at least one authorized user to enable access to the directory. Refer to Adding an authorized user for more information.

Now your password protected directory should be good to go.

Over the month of November I am going to be going over some basics for all of our cPanel users here at Lunarpages. Each Wednesday I’ll be coming a new topic so stay tuned, and if you have any suggestions be sure to leave a comment and let us know.

&copy Lunarpages Web Hosting - $25 off Web Hosting! Coupon Code: blog25

Original post by Mitch

by Tiara Rea

A lot of customers at Lunarpages use ecommerce features to enhance their sites. Since we offer four different shopping cart software alternatives, many people wonder which one works best and what the major differences are between each. So, I’m here to help you choose the perfect shopping cart!

The Agora Shopping Cart features design integration for cascading style sheets/CSS, templates and HTML, PERL, and even JavaScript. You can also take charge of merchandising and inventory management by generating unique product pages, adding unlimited options for each product to vary by size, color, weight, etc, adding unlimited categories and sub-categories, and even classifying taxes, best selling items, and discount codes. This makes order processing and order management incredibly easy, since you can generate creative order confirmation emails, HTML order forms, and handle multiple payment processing gateways. With the ability to view order logs by date, year, status, etc, and support for various shipping arrangements, many customers prefer Agora to the competition. Of course, you also get it as a one-click installation through the Lunarpages cPanel.

Since they’ve been in business for over 6 years, OsCommerce is one of the leading E-Commerce shopping systems in the world and probably the best known as well, serving over 12,000 storefronts and 150,000 webmasters. Their software runs on any operating system or machine, so it’s Windows and Linux-friendly and compatable with Macs too. There is a one-click installation for OsCommerce via Fantastico through the Lunarpages cPanel, and since it works on a template-based structure, integration into your website and everyday updating is simple. Like Agora, osCommerce supports unlimited categories, subcategories, products, and invoices, and also allows webmasters to add, remove, or edit any of the features easily. Their administration area is secured with sensitive login and from there you can create newsletters, backup your information, and send out packaging lists or invoices directly from the interface. OsCommerce also supports an address book, product reviews, shipping, and payment through multiple payment gateways like Authorize.Net and PayPal.

CubeCart is a professionally audited shopping cart system, which offers a variety of extras along with the most common shopping cart features. It is 100% template driven, where the HTML code you create can be completely separated from the PHP code that runs the application on the server. This makes CubeCart a favorite for webmasters who want ease of use and simple maintanence. There are various layouts to choose from, XHTML and CSS are fully-functional, it supports unlimited product images, has an HTML image gallery pop-up, enables currency support for a various countries, and includes email marketing tools, multiple tax classes, and various languages, such as German, Chinese, and Slovakian. Plus a one-click installation, because Lunarpages likes to make things that easy.

ZenCart’s motto of “the art of ecommerce” aptly suits them, as the software speaks for itself. Acclaimed for being newbie-friendly, many customers choose ZenCart as their option for its customization, XHTML and template systems, and of course its ease of use. Again, we offer a one-click installation through cPanel, so that makes it quicker than ever to get this fully-functional shopping cart up and running. Considered one of the most helpful systems around, ZenCart’s FAQs are one of the other many reasons customers flock to Zen. Among the other outstanding reasons to give them a try are no HTML knowledge necessary to add, delete, or edit product catalogues, security guarantee, the inclusion of an advanced template system for CSS, HTML, and image functionality, multiple pricing and payment options, product quantity limitations, one-time fee additions, sorting by any method, store layout is easily customizable, customer authorization keys, WYSIWYG page editor, and even advertising banners, which is one of their neatest features.

So Which Shopping Cart Works Best?

As always, the best way to find out which one will best suit your site and personal tates is to give each of them a shot! You can visit their websites and read up on their support, ease of use, and creative elements, because what works for one person doesn’t necessarily fit another. It’s ultimately up to you to do your homework to find out which works best for your customers and website.

© Lunarpages Web Hosting - $25 off Web Hosting! Coupon Code: blog25

Original post by Tiara

Author: Mitch Keeler

Getting going with your very own e-mail account is the first thing that many people do when they finally get that welcome e-mail in their inbox. From cPanel you have the ability to add extra e-mail accounts to your main account. You can setup as many as you have room and bandwidth to support - but let us not get ahead of ourselves.

How about we just start with creating one fresh e-mail account from cPanel?

1. To access the mail menu, click on the icon above the word mail on the main screen of your cPanel interface.

2. Click on the words “Add/Remove Accounts” to enter the Mail Account Maintenance screen.

3. Click on the words add account and then enter the name of the account, the account’s password, and the account’s quota (amount of disk space the account can use) in their respective blank fields.

4. Almost done! To finish up the job just click on the button labeled “create” to create the account.

Now you can get going with your very own you at yourowndomain.com e-mail address. Pass it to friends, family, business contacts. The options are totally left up to you.

Over the month of November I am going to be going over some basics for all of our cPanel users here at Lunarpages. Each Wednesday I’ll be coming a new topic so stay tuned, and if you have any suggestions be sure to leave a comment and let us know.

&copy Lunarpages Web Hosting - $25 off Web Hosting! Coupon Code: blog25

Original post by Mitch