First, let me explain what DNS is. DNS stands for Domain Name Service. DNS translates IP addresses into domain names. Each domain name must list nameservers. With your own custom nameservers (DNS) it would look something like, dns1.mycustomnameserver.com and dns2.mycustomnameserver.com. Your name server would then translate the IP address of the server for that particular domain name.  

So can I use my own nameserver on Certified Hosting’s reseller plan? Yes! Custom nameservers (DNS) are an essential part of our reseller plan as it takes owning your own hosting company to the next level. With your own custom DNS, you are able to brand and market your hosting company and your customers are not confused by who they are actually hosting with. 

Other than our reseller plan, you must have a dedicated server to use your own custom nameservers. Custom DNS is not available on our shared hosting plans.

Permalinks…What are permalinks? A permalink is a permanent link/url, assigned to a blog or forum entry. It is useful for linking to and or locating an entry once it has moved from the front page to the archives.

Ok, but how can a permalink help with search engine placement? Well, I found myself asking the same questions a couple of weeks ago when I stumbled upon a plugin for WordPress called Dean’s Permalinks Migration and began researching permalinks, their purpose and how they can benefit in getting traffic to my blog.

Here is what I found:

WordPress typically defaults permalinks to a post ID. If you look in options – permalinks you will find a custom option for you to change the way your permalinks are created. It is recommended that you change the permalink custom option to, /%category%/%postname%/.  But WAIT, before you go changing things you will want to download, install and configure the plug-in mentioned above, Dean’s Permalinks Migration. With this plug-in, you can safely change your permalink structure without breaking the old links to your website, without hurting your google pagerank.

Once you have the plug-in installed you will want to configure the plug-in with your current permalink structure. This was a bit hard for me to figure out, so I will include it here. Go to Options – PermalinksMigrations and input your old permalink structure. If your current structure is post id, then you will want to use /%post_id%/. Once you have done that you will want to change your permalink structure to /%category%/%postname%/. You can do that by going to Options – Permalinks and inserting the change into the Custom, specify field.

Now I bet you are asking yourself, ok but what does this do for my blog? How will this help with my search engine rankings? Well, search engines are keyword based and having a link to a blog entry that looks like this: http://blog.certifiedhosting.com/?p=123 doesn’t really do much for you in regards to keywords. BUT…if you have a link that looks like this: http://blog.certifiedhosting.com/funny-stuff/25-easy-steps-to-building-a-web-page/ not only are you including keywords that are relevant to your post, but you are describing to potential readers what your post is about.

So enough talking about permalinks, get out there and take control of your permalinks. In just a few short weeks you too can increase your search engine rankings!

Microsoft has forged deals with LinkedIn, MySpace and Facebook to connect their networks through its popular email and personal information manager, Outlook. The company introduced Outlook Social Connector when it rolled out a beta of Microsoft Office 2010 last November. The OSC connects emails, contact information and networking sites within the Outlook application.

The rest of the article is available here: http://www.technewsworld.com/story/Outlook-Takes-Timid-Step-Into-Social-Networking-69359.html

Article courtesy of TechNewsWorld.com