It is very expensive for a company to hire people who ensure that the website is hosted in its own company premises. To get a website online, a subscription is therefore usually taken out with another company that provides 'web hosting'. Yet it is relatively easy to set up a server for free at home on which you can run your website. All you need is this article, a working internet connection and an old laptop or PC.
Steps
Step 1. Download Apache server software
Your old computer will now be called 'web server'. Download the Apache HTTP Server public license on your old computer. This free software is the most widely used server on the internet.
Step 2. Double click on the downloaded file to install the software
Fill in the required fields in the dialog box. The requested data is quite arbitrary and you can change it later.
Step 3. Select the 'custom install' option in the next dialog box
Change Apache's default folder to the desired folder.
Step 4. Go to that folder and look for the 'conf' folder
There you then open the file 'httpd.conf'. Now you can create a root folder for your website in your 'web server', for example 'C:\Web\MyWeb'.
Step 5. In the file 'httpd.conf', change the default root folder of the server document to your root folder
- In front of
- After
Step 6. In the same file, change Apache's default web folder to your own web folder
- In front of
- After
Step 7. Create a test page with some HTML code
Write in the page "I am winner!", then save it as "C:\Web\MyWeb\index.html"
Step 8. Open port 80 for 'forwarding'
Step 9. Find your website. In your web server, open your favorite browser and type the following in the address bar: http://localhost/ Now you should see the page you created in your browser.
Step 10. Search for your own IP address
That is the unique address given to you by your internet provider. Ask someone else to type your IP address into a browser. Your website is now public.
- For example, if your IP address is 98.227.112.49, ask a friend to type this into their browser:
- Most IP addresses change from time to time, and they are difficult to remember. It must be dynamically maintained, and the address must redirect to other websites.
Tips
You need a subscription to a DNS service from a provider. They give you a mnemonic as a website name, and free software that you can install on your web server to keep using the changing IP address. People can see your website by that name. But if you want to choose a name yourself, you have to buy one, you pay a certain amount per year. You can easily forward that name to your provider's dynamic DNS
Warnings
- For the steps in this article, use a computer that you and your family have not used for anything else.
- Windows XP should not be used for this purpose for security reasons, Linux is a good alternative that is easy to install and is supported by many popular web service programs.