Mac OSX Web Hosting Question?

Question

Im running OSX Leopard ive heard talk about how i can host my website on my computer, how would i go about doing this? I would like to use my own domain(already have one), and dreamweaver if possible. Im sorta of a newbie

Thanks

Answer 1

Its always better to get a commercial web hosting service. Since hosting your own website means running your computer 24/7 and doing lots of maintenance and programming. I am using bluehost webhosting for my website



http://www.bluehost.com/track/bluehostwebhosting/

Answer 2

Do you really intend to pass such an expensive and complicated process? You should know your site would be unavailable whenever your PC is turned off, and you're leaving yourself open to attacks. So I recommend get a reliable company to do that in return for a few dollars.



You need just a web host compatible with dreamweaver to fullfil all your requirements.



Take a look at:

http://bluehost-features.atspace.com



Good Luck!

Answer 3

In order to "host" a local website you have to install a web server on your machine. I am pretty sure Leopard comes with Apache already installed. Apache is perhaps the most commonly used server in the world so you can rest assured that there is a lot of help out there. Getting a localhost instance up and running on a local machine isn't hard, but it would be more than I could really cover here. Here are a couple of links to get you started:



http://www.onlamp.com/pub/ct/49



http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=+site:www.onlamp.com+Apache+Mac+OS+X



http://www.devarticles.com/c/a/Apache/Using-Apache-and-PHP-on-Mac-OS-X/



http://www.apple.com/server/macosx/features/webhosting.html



A good option for a complete local development environment is XAMPP which installs Apache (web server), MySQL (a rational database), PHP or hypertext preprocessor (a scripting language) and Perl (a scripting language).



http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp-macosx.html



As far as your domain is concerned, you might not want to point your URL to your local box unless you are intending it to be a server. That would pose a security issue and I am not sure your ISP would appreciate your bandwidth usage.



Once you have apache set up, you can open your trusty web browsers up and point it to http://localhost or http://127.0.0.1 to see your locally hosted web pages.



You are on your own for Dreamweaver, that's commercial software and I am sure there is a Mac version. As far as I know, Dreamweaver has native support for HTML (hypertext markup language) and PHP (hypertext preprocessor) both of which are installed by default on OS X. Good luck and I hope you have fun!



You might want to consider checking out Ruby on Rails for web development. It's fast, easy, powerful, well supported, and the wave of the future!

Answer 4

Mac OS X has Apache (web hosting software) pre-installed in the system.



This site gives fairly good directions on how to set it up:

http://www.macinstruct.com/node/112



Some things you might want to consider are discussed here:

http://lifehacker.com/software/top/ask-lifehacker--host-my-web-site-at-home-160945.php



In particular, read up on how to access a home web server behind a router if you happen to use a router at home.

Answer 5

well if you're just gonna need apache, you're set. Just go into System preferences->sharing and turn on website sharing.



If you need php or mysql, try out MAMP (just look it up). Incredibly easy and works for most purposes.

Answer 6

Did you try local host providers softwares fopr mac. This can help.