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Welcome to
Loft Productions
We are glad that you have chosen Loft Productions to be your web
hosting provider. We are dedicated to your success online and
value your business. In order to make your transition to
Loft Productions as smooth as possible, we've created a number of
information resources that will give you the answers to any
questions that may arise as you are setting up, developing,
and promoting your website. This Getting Started Guide, as
well as the rest of this Online Manual will help
you get oriented with our services through step by step
instructions on how to set up and configure your account to
meet your needs. We have a Site Essentials area that
provides tips on HTML, Online Marketing and more. If at any time you are not able to find the answers
to your questions quickly from any of these resources, please
Contact
Us, as we are available to help.
Changing Your DNS to
Loft Productions
If you registered your domain name through Loft Productions, your
DNS will automatically be configured correctly to work with
our servers. If you have registered your domain name with
another company, you will need to update your DNS settings by
contacting the company that you used to register your domain
name. Have them change your name server settings (DNS) to the
following:
Primary
Nameserver
NS1.WEST-DATACENTER.NET
69.36.161.11
Secondary
Nameserver
NS2.WEST-DATACENTER.NET
69.36.161.12
If your domain name is registered with Network Solutions
specifically, you will need to contact them to change the DNS
settings for your domain name. You will need to have them
change your nameserver settings (DNS) to the information found
above. Network Solutions also requires that you specify a
technical contact. You may set this to Loft Productions's Technical
Contact Handle for Network Solutions:
Technical Contact Handle: WE2632-ORG
You can make these changes via web at https://www.netsol.com/en_US/manage-it/
or by calling Network Solutions at 1-888-642-9675.
Once you have changed your DNS settings, it will take
approximately 24-48 hours for your domain to point to
Loft Productions's servers.
Logging In to Your Site
Manager
You can administer your site(s) with Loft Productions by logging in
to your Site Manager. This can be done at http://yourdomain.com/manager/ (making sure to
replace yourdomain.com with your
domain name). Enter the Username and Password that you
received in your Setup Instructions e-mail. Once you are in
Site Manager you will be able to:
- Setup e-mail accounts
- Setup FTP user accounts
- View statistics for disk space and bandwidth
- Backup and restore files
- Install/modify applications
- Manage your web server, e-mail server and FTP
- View traffic statistics
- Manage your DNS
- Make changes to your site with File Manager
Setting Up Your
E-mail
Your account has been set up with the default e-mail
address, yourdomain@yourdomain.com. You can set up as many
additional e-mail addresses as you like in your Site Manager.
To do this, log into your Site Manager at http://yourdomain.com/manager/ (making sure to
replace yourdomain.com with your
domain name). Enter your Username and Password to log in. Once
you are in Site Manager, click on "E-mail/FTP Management" in
the top menu and then "Users" in the left menu.
To create a new user, click the "New E-mail/FTP" button
below the existing user list. Choose a Username, from 1 to 32
characters in length, starting with a letter or a number, and
containing only lower-case letters, numbers, periods, hyphens
or underscores. Then enter a description of the account such
as "Bob's Account" or "FTP Account for Ann". Next select a
password, from 6 to 8 characters, containing only characters
printable in English (only the characters you see on a
standard English keyboard). After clicking "Next", you can
choose whether or not you would like to enable this account,
the default setting is "Enabled". You can also choose to limit
the e-mail box size of the account or leave at "0" for
unlimited. Lastly you can automatically install the Auto
Responder for this account, assuming it has already been
installed for at least one other account.
Please note that the e-mail quota is part of your total
disk space. If you have a lot of e-mail accounts set up for
your domain, you could potentially run out of disk space on
your account because of your e-mail user occupying all of it.
It is recommended that you set this to a maximum of 10MB/user.
For additional information on setting up e-mail accounts,
please click
here.
Once you have your e-mail accounts created, you can access
those accounts either by your preferred e-mail client or
through one of the two webmail clients that Loft Productions provides
with each account (both Imp and NeoMail).
We have provided step by step instructions on how to configure
many of todays most popular e-mail clients, please click here to
view this information.
Uploading Your Website
(FTP)
The process by which files are transferred to the web
server is called FTP (File Transfer Protocol). You have
unlimited access to your web server via FTP 24 hours a day. As
such, you can create and maintain your web pages on your own
computer and upload files to your web site at your
leisure.
Online services which offer an Internet gateway, such as
AOL may have a built-in FTP interface. If you have a normal
Internet account, you will need an FTP program such as
WS-FTP.
We have instructions available for the most popular FTP
client software both PC and Macintosh users and special
instructions for those who use FrontPage for site development.
For detailed instructions on these different options, please
click on the appropriate link below:
NOTE: If you are using FrontPage, you should NEVER
use regular FTP to upload your files. This will damage the
extensions. Stick with one format or the other at all times.
For instructions on how to upload with FrontPage click
here.
Changing Your
Password(s)
If you decide to change any of your passwords, changing it
in one program will not change it for your other tools, you
will need to change it in every manager for your passwords to
all be the same.
Account Manager:
You can change your password for
the Account Manager after you log in by going to the "Change
My Password" section located under the "My Account" section of
Account Manager. To change your password, simply type in your
new password twice where indicated, and then verify your
authority to change your password by typing in the old
password where indicated.
Site Manager/FTP/SSH:
You can change your
password at any time by logging into your Site Manager
(www.yourdomain.com/manager/). Once in your Site Manager,
click on "Site Management" along the top menu, then "Site
Parameters" in the left menu. Here you can enter your new
password two times, to verify you are typing it the same both
times, then click "update". The password for the site manager
will be immediately changed to the new password assuming it
follows the requirement of being at least 6-8 characters long.
For more detailed instructions on how to change your password,
click
here.
E-Mail:
E-mail passwords can be changed within
the "E-mail/FTP Management" section of your Site Manager
(http://yourdomain.com/manager/
making sure to replace yourdomain.com with your domain name).
These passwords will also need to be 6-8 characters long.
Updating Your Contact
Information
It is important to keep your contact information updated
with us so that we can reach you with billing information and
important updates that may affect your account. You can keep
your contact information current by Contacting Us.
NOTE: In the future, you will be able to manage and
edit your contact information directly from your Account
Manager.
We are very excited to be working with you and your
website. Your success is very important to us. We are
dedicated to providing top quality support . Our preferred
support medium is e-mail, since it provides a documented
communication log, and the opportunity to send and receive
links and files. This has proven to be most effective for
providing fast and helpful technical assistance. Our average
response time for a support ticket is less than 2 hours!
However, if you need immediate assistance we have Live Chat
and a toll free number that are covered by our reliable staff
around the clock. Contact
Us today!
