Domain Pointing Problems

[jnagyjr]

One of my domains, http://www.joseph-a-nagy-jr.us, is accessible by everyone else but myself. After logging in twice to my webmail, it appears that bluehost thinks my computer is joseph-a-nagy-jr.us, at least whenever I try to access it. I'm on a private, WEP secured WiFi-enabled DSL connection several hundred miles away from BlueHost (if not further).

I know that my domain points to the correct place because I gave the link to a buddy after uploading a file he needed hosted and he and everyone he has given the link to has been able to get the file no problem.

My question, what is going on here? This is really one of the only problems I've ever had and I'm fairly certain it's not a BH issue.

Anyone have any ideas?

Oh yeah, before you ask, I'm not running a webserver.

[Early Out]

A few questions... What happens when you try to go to your domain? What kind of error do you get? Can you ping it? How about a tracert?

Finally, did you, by any chance, go through a stretch where you tried to login, but were using the wrong password? If so, you might be blocked at the BH firewall - BH support can fix that (use Live Chat).

[TheWebHostingHero]

Try issuing this from a command shell (DOS):


nslookup joseph-a-nagy-jr.us

[jnagyjr]

To the first responder, I get the following error:

The connection has timed out

The server at www.joseph-a-nagy-jr.us is taking too long to respond.

* The site could be temporarily unavailable or too busy. Try again in a few
moments.

* If you are unable to load any pages, check your computer's network
connection.

* If your computer or network is protected by a firewall or proxy, make sure
that Firefox is permitted to access the Web.

To the other guy, this is what nslookup returns:

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

nslookup joseph-a-nagy-jr.us
Server: dns4.InfoAve.Net
Address: 206.74.254.2

Name: joseph-a-nagy-jr.us
Address: 207.144.230.112

Which is completely not how it should be I'm sure, considering my buddy was able to download and link to a file I uploaded to bluehost. I'll go back to my registrar and make sure all the dns info is proper, but aside from that I'm not sure what else to do.

Also, as I said I earlier, I can access my other domains on this hosted account

[Early Out]

Your domain isn't resolving to the proper address - it should resolve to 69.81.31.64 (not 207.144.230.112). Two things to try:

Flush your dns cache. Start, Run, type cmd, Enter, type ipconfig /flushdns, Enter, close the window.

Failing that, switch to the OpenDNS servers. There are instructions on their website (http://www.opendns.com/start).

[jnagyjr]

Your domain isn't resolving to the proper address - it should resolve to 69.81.31.64 (not 207.144.230.112). Two things to try:

Flush your dns cache. Start, Run, type cmd, Enter, type ipconfig /flushdns, Enter, close the window.

Failing that, switch to the OpenDNS servers. There are instructions on their website (http://www.opendns.com/start).

That would be all well and fine if I was hosting on my own computer, but I'm not. All the files and DNS settings from my registrar point that url to my Bluehost account. I only started to have this problem recently and it's fairly annoying.

[Early Out]

This has nothing to do with whether you're hosting on your own computer or not. Everything on your registrar's site appears to be correct. The problem is with IP resolution on your PC, which is controlled by whatever DNS server your browser is pointing to. I've given you two things to try to fix it. Have you tried them?

[Early Out]

For those of you in the cheap seats, a quick explanation of what a DNS server does may be in order. When you type www.bluehost.com into your browser, how does it know how to connect you to that website? The Internet doesn't operate on names - it operates on numbers, specifically, IP addresses. So, your PC has to translate www.bluehost.com into a numeric address.

A DNS server can be thought of like a phone book. It translates John Jones into 860-555-1212, so your call can be completed. It doesn't handle the routing of your call, any more than your white pages dictate how your call to John Jones will be routed. It just provides the correct (you hope) numeric address for the site you're trying to connect to.

Some ISPs steer you to DNS servers that are full of errors. I used to be on Comcast, and their DNS servers were notorious for this - for an extended period, their DNS servers couldn't resolve an IP address for a number of heavily-used Microsoft download sites! Using OpenDNS to provide your DNS is one solution to this problem. They maintain public DNS servers, and that's all they do. Their servers, in my experience, are fast and reliable. When I got my domain on BH, the OpenDNS servers were resolving it correctly literally within minutes.

A DNS server should not be confused with a nameserver (i.e., ns1.bluehost.com and ns2.bluehost.com). These are not the same thing.

[jnagyjr]

This has nothing to do with whether you're hosting on your own computer or not. Everything on your registrar's site appears to be correct. The problem is with IP resolution on your PC, which is controlled by whatever DNS server your browser is pointing to. I've given you two things to try to fix it. Have you tried them?

I did the flushdns and it didn't help, but I haven't changed to OpenDNS, yet. I'll give that a try now then. The thing is, I sit behind a router (wi-fi connection) I don't have control over (I don't pay the bill but the connection is legit), but I will give it a try now.

I'll post with results.

[jnagyjr]

I set up OpenDNS on my system and it worked just fine. Sorry that I was stubborn about changing it, I just don't like changing my network setup (unexpected consequences and all). Thanks for the help.