Setting Up Own Hosting ?

Hey... can some one answer me in some details what are the requirements to start own hosting ? (for instance , a good computer (server) , linux ( is suse 10 okay ? ) and what else ?
how to set up name serves and other things ?

PS. I know it is hard but after all it shouldnt be impossible , so kindly discuss briefly.Im not going to start it but just want to know everything).

It depends what you mean by "your own hosting." If you mean for hosting a personal site on your own computer just installing a webserver. Apache etc would be good enough. Your would also need to install things like PHP and MySQL depending on how good you want your website to be

If you are wanting to setup a hosting company/server for public use I would suggest a long study into web mastering skills and other things similar.

Apache is the basic software you will need to install to start everything going along to become a web server. After installing Apache, your computer will basically be a HTTP web server, meaning it can then host HTML files live on the internet. If you want server-side scripts, you will need to install an add-on to your Apache web server. PHP will be a good server side scripting which you will need to install. Be sure to read through the documents before installing as you will need to configure the Apache and PHP configuration files for them to work together successfully. Likewise if you need a database to store all your information, you will need MySQL or similar database software. Again, careful installation is also required and SQL database skills are also needed to manage your database well.

Many people find it tough to install every thing that makes a perfect web server. Hence there are also ready made scripts that installs all needed software together in a single setup. XAMPP is one of them. It installs everything you will need to become a web server without much manual configuration. It's also a better alternative for newbies instead of installing part by part manually. Again, be sure to read it's documents to make an easy task installing and administrating your webserver.
http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html

Thanks Inspiron for your reply..I just want to learn things.thats why Im too keen to discuss about it and some other topics otherwise i think trap17 is very good option , after all , its providing free hosting.and i think even if there wasnt trap17 , its more easy and secure to get paying hosting from any good hosting company instead of starting own hosting.but again , as i said im keen to learn how things work.so i have more questions..
For instance, i have laptop.. 1.7 Ghz Intel Centrino and ram is 512 mb ram.. i have windows xp home edition.. (is this configuration okay ? of course just for test purpose )
as you mentioned..I have successfully installed APACHE server...PHP 5 , MySQL , Phpmyadmin, and they all work fine..for example , i put a website files.. on htdocs and i can see the website on ,
http://localhost/index.html

Now please tell me next steps..suppose i have a website and i want to host it on my computer.what are the things i have to do.Most important, how i will create Name servers etc...How i will redirect any domain to my hosting.(I mean creating my own , like NS1.domain.com etc , NOT no-ip.com etc )Please im very concious about it .. i Will be very thankful to you if you just tell everything.

don't forget to buy a name domain, and a broadband connection, an isp, the http server, the application server, the ftp server, the mail server, the database server, a control panel, and something to display.

a cheap way could be:
http apache
app php
ftp FileCOPA FTP Server
mail eudora internet mail server
db mysql

all are free software, and very reliable, good luck!

Your computer configuration is perfectly alright. You will, most importantly, need Windows Services to run everything successfully because they depend on it. I've recently tried to install a web server on a Windows 98SE computer and encountered alot of problems. It's because Windows 98SE doesn't have the Windows Service feature. Almost every part of the server don't run well in this old Windows operating system. This feature, as far as I know, comes in Windows XP both Home and Professional editions. I'm sure the future Windows Vista family will be also fully support Apache web server. Hence you need not worry about compatibility.

For me, I use similar services like no-ip.com provide. Basically someone on the internet just have to type your computer's IP address as the URL on their browser and it will point to your computer's host directory, which is your document root, or htdocs. You can try that out yourself too. What these services, no-ip.com etc., does is that they take your IP address and change it into a domain name which is easiler to remember and recognise than an IP address. Let's take no-ip.com for example, you sign up an account and register a domain name from them. After that you will be prompt to enter an IP address for redirect. The database at no-ip will be updated about 5 minutes before someone can enter the domain which you've registered. The domain will first point to no-ip.com and no-ip.com will search its database for your IP address and forward the visitor to your computer, which then the visitor will see your web pages in your document root.

I'm not very familar about NS nameservers working with Apache server as it can be very complicated and require quite an amount of coordination between the servers. Basically the nameservers are elsewhere in the internet which you will register your own domain name, that is not done on your computer locally. The procedures of working around should be much alike to how no-ip.com does. I suggest you use no-ip.com or other DNS services that provide their services for free. Choose among the different services for the domain which you desire as they provide different domain names.

You may like to refer to these websites regarding nameservers for Apache web server. Take these as reference only. You don't need to change your configurations to suit what these documents require you to do because you already have a working server that is ready to run. I'm sure you won't want to accidently corrupt your own server without knowing what you are doing.
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/vhosts/name-based.html
http://www.granitecanyon.com/

Here are afew free DNS services to get you started.
https://www.dyndns.com/services/dns/dyndns/
http://www.xname.org/
http://www.everydns.net/
http://freedns.afraid.org/

Also visit this thread for more free domain services
http://www.trap17.com/forums/page-»-t9320-s100.html

To have your own hosting you basically need a really good T1 line and around 5 or 6 static ip's unless you are planning on having few visitors and in that case you do not need dedicated hosting anyways. You also need to have a webserver on your machine as well as other things you might use like PHP and SQL (I recommend Whitebox Linux its a free enterprise server that has a lot of that stuff). After you have all that stuff you MUST read your ISP's TOS, service agreement, ect. Some internet service providers do not allow you to be a webhost and will shut down your connection (Comcast is a good example I read their TOS when I got it to see if I could host my own site) it is not that hard for them to detect it they just need to see that you have connections to the port used for webhosting.

If you want to set up a web host of your own, with multiple sites, like here at Trap17, I suggest you buy a cPanel license (http://www.cpanel.com). Sure it is expensive, but it will allow you to set up and maintain shared hosting accounts much more easily. If you want to see cPanel in action, it's in use right here. If you are hosted here, log in to your cPanel, and explore all of it's wonderful features. When you install cPanel on your server, it will automatically set up Apache, some FTP, POP and SMTP servers, as well as Bind DNS server. Basically, it transforms a machine into a powerful web server.

for your own basic webserver...just get apache, or some sort of package that has apache (Lotsa free ones on the internet). Also try taking look at abyss webserver.

Also, for those who are new out there to Web Hosting, then its a good suggestion to use something like XAMPP on the main source computer, and if you can source another computer from someone, and learn ow it works, try and build the system from the ground up so that 1) You learn how to build XYZ Server 2) You can learn how to manage the XYZ Server and 3) Learn about the security of it, get someone to see how deep they can get into your server, of course there will be nothing on it but the server and 'dummy' files but... If your wanting to learn, then its the best way to go about it. Otherwise get a job that has 'On the job Training'.