Configuring DNS with your new IP address

Configuring DNS with your new IP address

Before starting to work on the server itself, there is one item that you need to take care of. You need to do some preliminary configuration at your domain registrar using the IP address that your VPS has just been assigned. I use Godaddy.com as my registrar, so I can’t promise that these instructions will work at any registrar. We will be using the same IP address for both nameservers, since that’s all you’ve got. Some registrars require unique IP addresses, and some even require them to be in different subnets.

If you have not registered a domain name, do so now. This will be the primary domain name that you will run your hosting business as.

Login to your godaddy.com account and navigate to Manage Domains. You should see your primary hosting business domain in the list. Click on the domain name to go to the setup panel. You will find a box called “Host Summary” in the bottom left, which looks like this.

Click the “add” link to enter a new host name. You will enter “ns1” as the host name prefix for your domain name (I’m using entomy.com in this example, but you will substitute your primary business domain name throughout this tutorial), and associate that name with the IP address that your VPS assigned to you by entering that IP address in the “Host IP 1” box. That entry should look like this.
Click OK. Now click “add” again. This time enter “ns2” in the host name box, and enter the same IP address in the “Host IP 1” box. Click OK. You should now see both entries in the Host Summary box, and it should look like this.

You will give those name server addresses to your hosting customers for nameserver settings, and you will also enter those same nameserver addresses for your own domain. You can do that now by scrolling up the configuration panel about halfway to where is says Nameservers.

Click the “Set Nameservers” link. Select the “I have specific nameservers for my domains” radio button. Now enter the ns1 nameserver you just created (including your primary business domain name, like ns1.yourdomain.com) into the “Nameserver 1” box. Also enter ns2.yourdomain.com into the “Nameserver 2” box.

With the nameservers set to your new IP address you are done at godaddy.com. It will take a day or two for those new DNS entries to propagate throughout the Internet, so be patient.