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What is a domain name? |
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It is your address on the world wide web. It is the first step to personalized email (say ram@yourbusiness.com) and to your own website. Family, friends and customers can type your website name into their web browser (Internet Explorer) and visit your website. |
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Why do you need a domain name? |
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Registering a domain name is the first and foremost step to start setting up an online identity. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is responsible for controlling domain names. Domains are allotted on a first cum first serve basis. Once a domain is registered, it is no longer available to anyone else unless it expires and is not renewed. It is hence essential to book a domain name as soon as possible. Domain name can end with various extensions - .com, .biz, .info, .net, .org, .in. |
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What are the tips for selecting a domain name? |
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- Avoid using very long domain names
- Avoid using special characters in your domain name
- Keep your domain name close to the name of your company or yourself
- Your domain could also talk about the nature of your business
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How is a website hosted? |
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Organizations classified as “web hosts” allow space on their server along with internet connectivity for hosting of the website on the “world wide web”. The provision of space can either be through servers owned by web hosts or through collocation. |
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What type of web hosting solutions is provided? |
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Shared web hosting: Shared web hosting is basically on a shared space where various websites will be hosted simultaneously on a single server itself. This would also mean sharing of a common RAM and a CPU (i.e. several websites share the resources of a single machine). |
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How payment gateways work?
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When a customer orders a product from a payment gateway enabled merchant, the payment gateway performs a variety of tasks to process the transaction:
- A customer places order on website by pressing the 'Submit Order' or equivalent button.
- The customer's web browser encrypts the information to be sent between the browser and the merchant's webserver. This is done via SSL (Secure Socket Layer) encryption.
- The merchant then forwards the transaction details to their payment gateway. This is another SSL encrypted connection to the payment server hosted by the payment gateway.
- The payment gateway forwards the transaction information to the processor used by the merchant's acquiring bank.
- The processor forwards the transaction information to the card association (i.e., Visa/MasterCard)
- The card association routes the transaction to the correct card issuing bank.
- The credit card issuing bank receives the authorization request and sends a response back to the processor (via the same process as the request for authorization) with a response code. In addition to determining the fate of the payment, (i.e. approved or declined) the response code is used to define the reason why the transaction failed (such as insufficient funds, or bank link not available)
- The processor forwards the response to the payment gateway.
- The payment gateway receives the response, and forwards it on to the website (or whatever interface was used to process the payment) where it is interpreted and a relevant response then relayed back to the cardholder and the merchant.
- The entire process typically takes 2–3 seconds
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