DA beginner questions (license, nameserver, ...)

[lightningbit]

Hi

I have some questions, on which I hope, to get answers

first off, I'm a DA user, as a reseller (I like the quality/price balance), so not a DA admin (yet)
But I soon have the opportunity to land a server in a DC myself. and move my clients from my reseller accounts to that new server.
Before I do so, I want to "learn" and test DA of course (I want to know and try out, before going in production), not just DA, but the whole setup:
- CentOS,
- DA setup, (including items like spamassassin, installatron, ...)
- DA admin,
- DNS setup, nameserver, ...
- security, CFS,
- migrations, backup, restore...)
- a webhosting management package (like WHMCS, AWBS or so)
obviously, starting with a sever in a datacenter, just to try it out, is an expensive trial, no?

so here is question no 1 (I guess DA Sales can answer this one?)
- I've not a fixed IP at home, but I retain my IP for a week easy, sometimes even longer... as I understand from the forums here, we would not be able to make changes to the IP in our DA license if we would logon to our account to manage our license. I also understood, that there is no option for a demo license. I've no issue to pay for a monthly lease while I do my trials..
But would it be a problem if I ask Sales at DA to make a change to my license of my IP address a few times in the coming months? Is the license also domian dependent? or just IP ? (so later on, I can move it under my primary domain)

question no 2:
the nameservers... as I understand, the common practice is to have the primary nameserver on the "web" server on which DA runs, as well as the customers or clients or...
as secundary, I saw quite a few people making use of one of the free services (like afraid.org, opendns...)
I would make use of the nameserver(s) of the provider in the datacenter
Is are there special requirements for the nameserver which is not the local machine (like authorization to get updates, etc...)?
does anyone have e.g. a how-to for DA and DNS ?

thanks for your feedback

L.

P.S. I assumed this was kind of a general question, so I posted in General Discussions, sorry if this is the wrong place for these questions

 

[scsi]

You need to get a static ip address. If you dont have one then dont waste your time getting da.

 

[nobaloney]

- I've not a fixed IP at home, but I retain my IP for a week easy, sometimes even longer... as I understand from the forums here, we would not be able to make changes to the IP in our DA license if we would logon to our account to manage our license.

There are other issues involved, including how to get all ports you need forwarded through your router to your testbed webserver. I presume you understand those and no how to resolve them, because no one is going to be able to help you.

As far as actually doing it, ask the question of the DirectAdmin Sales office.

I also understood, that there is no option for a demo license. I've no issue to pay for a monthly lease while I do my trials

Generally DirectAdmin will give you a test license for a month if you ask nicely.

But would it be a problem if I ask Sales at DA to make a change to my license of my IP address a few times in the coming months?

Ask them in advance.

Is the license also domian dependent? or just IP ? (so later on, I can move it under my primary domain)

You'll need a hostname for the server and that will require you own a domain name.

as I understand, the common practice is to have the primary nameserver on the "web" server on which DA runs, as well as the customers or clients or...
as secundary, I saw quite a few people making use of one of the free services (like afraid.org, opendns...)
I would make use of the nameserver(s) of the provider in the datacenter
Is are there special requirements for the nameserver which is not the local machine (like authorization to get updates, etc...)?

That all depends on how your provider manages slave DNS. Some require you log in to their system and add domains manually, while others actually log into your system and get the zone files. I don't know of any besides us (and we don't have dedicated servers in the EU) who automate it with Master2Slave DNS Replicator and BIND doesn't include anything built in to transfer the list of zone files. You may need a setting in your named.conf file to allow zone transfers only to your slave if you don't want the entire world to be able to see them (but that makes it harder for us to help you if you have problems), and of course you'll need to be sure you can transfer port 53 TCP/IP traffic between the seves. (Ordinary DNS generally requires only UDP traffic).

does anyone have e.g. a how-to for DA and DNS ?

Have you looked at Site-Helper?

Jeff