General IP Questions..

Hello I have a few questions:

-I tried to ping my website which is a shared hosting account, took the IP and entered it into internet explorer. It did not work. Is it because that IP is used by all the people that are sharing that server with me?

-Yahoo.com on the other hand does have its own IP, so.. If I was to purchase a server would I automatically be getting a static IP? Or would I have to buy it? If I bought a server and did not buy a static IP what IP would I be using?

-When you use a proxy to go to certain websites does that block your router given (network IP) or the IP given by my DSL provider?

-Pros/Cons of having a static IP vs shared or whatever IP is used (still not sure what IP a server would use if it doesn't have a static IP)

-Whats all this about IPv6?

-Where can I read up about this stuff?

Edited by danone on 02/28/06 10:14 PM (server time).

In reply to:
I tried to ping my website which is a shared hosting account, took the IP and entered it into internet explorer. It did not work. Is it because that IP is used by all the people that are sharing that server with me?

Correct, there most likely is many websites on a given ip address.

In reply to:
Yahoo.com on the other hand does have its own IP, so.. If I was to purchase a server would I automatically be getting a static IP? Or would I have to buy it? If I bought a server and did not buy a static IP what IP would I be using?

You wouldn't automatically get your own static IP, you normally have to pay for a static IP address when using shared hosting. If you didn't pay for a static IP address, you will get whatever IP address the web hosting provider assigns you.

In reply to:
When you use a proxy to go to certain websites does that block your router given (network IP) or the IP given by my DSL provider?

It blocks the IP given by your DSL provider which is assigned to your internet connection when you connect to your ISP.

In reply to:
Whats all this about IPv6?

I can't help with this.

In reply to:
Where can I read up about this stuff?

Google is your friend.

Ipv6 is a solution to the currently enormus need for IP adresses. They are running out, so they add some more numbers to the adresses :) (dummy explanation)

Thanks for the explanations.

-So would it be possible to access my website using http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/mywebsite or that sort of thing? Because before your website is assigned to a domain thats where you are hosted, right?

-When a website is assigned to a domain.. The domain is basically a mask for the IP correct? so instead of the IP Address you see the bhlahlah.com?

Thanks

>So would it be possible to access my website using http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/mywebsite or that sort of thing?

Some hosts work this way, and allow you to connect to your site with the IP address of the box. Dreamhost isn't one of those hosts.

>When a website is assigned to a domain.. The domain is basically a mask for the IP correct? so instead of the IP Address you see the bhlahlah.com?

Not really. This is where DNS servers come into play. Becuase dreamhost, and just about anybody else, doesn't want to have to promise that the yoda server wiill have the same IP address for ever. So, when you say I want to go to example.com you computer says, "hello? hello Mr. DNS? I want to connect to example.com - where is it?" The DNS server replies with the current ip address. Then you computer is able to send the request to that ip address for the domain.

It's easy for dreamhost to update their dns server to show a new ip address for a box. This can be really helpful - for instance becuase dreamhost was/is a little tight on IPs aviable to them, they went through all of the machines re-arranged IP addresses, and updated the dns server. So while the IP address of the box change, it's accessability wasn't ever comprimised.

You might find this Wikipedia article helpful.

-Matttail