This one’s for the real techies! If you have an extra computer laying around the office, you won’t after reading this post. Aprelium Technologies has released The Abyss Web Server X1. It is an application that hosts websites from the computer it is installed on. You do have to have a working knowledge of IP addressing and port calling. In a nutshell, it’s very simple though. The installation is user-friendly. It will ask you which port you wish to run your server on. Select something that is easy to remember such as the last four digits of your telephone number. This will allow you access to configure the web server Basically a port looks like this when called from a web browser: http://localhost:5201/ . (localhost is the computer you are running - others would access it by typing http://billscomputer:5201/) This works just like a regular website works. You can post your local INTRAnet website on your server (putting it in your hosting folder on your computer) with information such as tech solutions, leadership files, etc.. This is a great way to centralize your frequently used files and forms. Normally, a user would only have to type in http://billscomputer/ and it would automatically forward to your website.
You can even configure your router to allow traffic to access your web server. No one will ever know you are running your own server. There are several hoops you have to jump through. Start by configuring your computer/web server with a static IP address. Secondly, forward port 80 (web access port) on your router to be directed to the IP address of your web server.
To get a more recongizable domain, you can use the free service www.dyndns.org and get a free dynamic dns account. Then, you can point your www.whatever.com to your dyndns.org account. It gets a bit complicated, so if you have questions, you can e-mail me and I will try to walk you through the basics. I wanted to put this out there for the more advanced users of this site. If you can’t understand this, give it to your IT guy…chances are, you will just make his day.
