Tag Archives: tic104

Turning 10

In August 2013 (Whois.com officially says August 28, 2013), 18-year-old Meredith sat in her first college class at Mary Washington. I was introduced to a thing called a domain name. She was asked to register a domain name as part of a class and was asked to write weekly reflections on the readings. And she created her first blog on meredithfierro.com.

Little did that version of Meredith know how much the blog would be used throughout those 10 years. From class assignments to professional development, that blog has stuck around. It’s become an archive of projects, milestones, fun, and reflection.

So fast forward to 2023, and I’m still looking through Where I’ve Been (can you tell Reclaim Open is still on the brain?). I wanted to take some time to document my blog/projects documents from UMW, at Reclaim, and what I’ve been up to personally (that’s more recent).

University Blog

When I stepped into my freshman seminar, I did not really know what it would entail. Little did I know, I would start carving out her little home on the web. After using the domain name for most of my classes, I started thinking through how to use the domain name and found that WordPress was quickly becoming a solid tool in my toolkit. From subdomains for each class to categories on a single WordPress site, I realized how powerful a blog could be.

Then, I got my job as a student tutor at the Digital Knowledge Center, where WordPress, Omeka, Scalar, and Media projects, became the additional tools to work with. I began tutoring students and helping them gain the expertise to carve out their space on the web.

My website became a portfolio of sorts, where I could document my DKC projects and continue working on my class projects. I used it to work through my internship at Reclaim during my senior year at UMW, and my capstone course, to create a video about Domain of One’s Own for incoming students.

Reclaim Blog

After I graduated and joined the Reclaim Hosting team, I was encouraged to continue blogging! I do wish I really stuck to that, I have a backlog of projects I want to blog. From longer-term projects to short and sweet articles on how to complete a specific task, the blog turned into a notebook.

Within the next 10 years, I do want this blog to turn into more of a blog to continue the notetaking, to document the Flex Courses, and Workshops, among other accomplishments at Reclaim. I do have a few in the docket to start with!

Travel Blog

While this blog is a way to document my projects, it’s inadvertently becoming a place where I can document my travels as well! I used my domain name to blog about my semester abroad in London and my travels in Europe.

At Reclaim, the travels continued! I’ve been on team trips to New York City, Nashville, and San Diego– conference trips to Galway, Bristol, Atlanta and more recently New Orleans– and Reclaim specific (Domains and Reclaim Open) conferences to Oklahoma City, Durham, and while close to home, Fredericksburg. I’m so grateful for all the chances to travel!

Personal

And this blog has stuck around with me throughout the last 10 years of my early adulthood. I moved to a new city for college, and stuck around after graduating. I’ve moved around a few times in Fredericksburg, not only my home, but my office space!

I even managed to find my person and my pup– so freaking excited to get married in a couple of months!

And through all of those changes the blog shaped an archive of my life, work, works in progress, among other things and I’m so grateful to be introduced to the world of the WWW back 10 years ago. It seems like so long ago, but it’s only just begun!

Featured Image Photo by Morgan Lane on Unsplash

Reclaim Open: Where We’re Going

Whew– what a week of Reclaim Open! This was Reclaim Hosting’s 4th hosted conference and one of the best I’ve attended to date (and hopefully many more to come!). It was my first in-person conference since the pandemic and it absolutely did not disappoint!

The week overall was incredible, full of laughter, catching up with people I hadn’t seen for several years, and even a trip down memory lane to visit the campus at UMW. Even more, attending a conference in the building I’d spent most of my time in as a student, the Hurley Convergence Center.

I’ve been reflecting on where I’ve been, where I currently am, and where I’m going in the Reclaim Hosting universe!

Where I’ve been

I’ve been at Reclaim since 2017, and I’ve worn many hats and everyone at the company really has! I started out as an intern focused on building out the Support documentation and learning the ropes of the support world. That evolved into a Customer Support Specialist role, where I became the frontline agent helping customers gain experience and confidence when working with their websites and student projects. Reclaim Hosting grew throughout the years, expanding teams. We now have our Infrastructure, Account Management, and Ed Tech teams! Before I knew it, Reclaim went to a 4 person team of 11 people on the team!

Where I am currently

With the team growing, my position has changed a bit! While I’m still working on the support team as the Senior Support Specialist, where I continue to work with our end users, my role at Reclaim has changed throughout the years. Now I’ve shifted from the Support Team Manager to working between the internal teams. I coordinate internal work requests with our Infrastructure team, train our new employees on support, and diagnoses migrations, and I’ve started joining all the awesome things happening on the Ed Tech team.

And with all the fun things currently happening, this included planning Reclaim Open! The Ed Tech team had a blast planning all of the happenings for Reclaim Open!

Thoughts from Reclaim Open

I knew this conference would be different since we were in person in Fredericksburg. There’s something about having the “home base” of Fredericksburg. The other Reclaim conferences were fun, as we could travel to other cities in the States, and even conquered the internet with an online conference. Still, it was so nice to be in a familiar place in Fredericksburg.

I always enjoy hosting so I was excited to host everyone in town! There are a ton of fun things to do in Downtown Fredericksburg, and of course, Reclaim Arcade! Seeing everyone in one space after the pandemic was refreshing and uplifting. With all the ideas coming through every session from the Unconference to the scheduled sessions was great!

What was super cool too– getting to see our Infrastructure team take on the registration table! Noah and Goutam rocked it!

90s Living Room

We’re moving through the decades! Since we held the conference at the Hurley Convergence Center, we wanted to create a throwback and recreate a living room for the Art Fair! This time we went 10 years in the future to create a living room from the 90s.

We found a desk from a second-hand store and sifted through Goodwill for decorations. Tim lent some video game consoles from the Arcade. Taylor grabbed a monitor and computer tower on eBay to use a Mister to emulate Windows 95 too. I had the monitor and computer tower in my dining room for a solid couple of weeks before the conference started.

Projects While on the Ground

Outside of the pre-conference prep, we decided to film a documentary! This was such an amazing feat in itself, Taylor, Amanda, Pilot, and I created. This was an idea Jim wanted to create live during the conference, showcasing the themes, Where the Web Was, Is, and Will Be.

I was in charge of asking the questions during each interview, where we’d ask questions like:

  1. How did you get into the open web?
  2. What did you miss the most about the Web That Was?
  3. What is something the Past Web did not have, that you’re grateful the present Web currently has?
  4. What work are you currently seeing that you’d like to see grow in the future?
  5. Where is the web going?
  6. What is your Pie in the Sky Dream? Could be about anything (This one was my favorite!)

Then Pilot took very thorough notes on what each participant described and noted the timestamp for each question. After each interview, we’d upload the files to Google Drive to send off to Amanda in New York to clip/edit! Finally, Amanda would upload the edited clips for Taylor to edit the full video together. It turned out so well! Stay tuned for the full release and directors’ cut in July!

Thoughts on Interviews

I was so grateful to interview all of the participants! Everyone had so many thoughtful and interesting perspectives. Their experience with the web, what they’re working on now, what work they want to see in the community continue to grow, and where the web is going!

Everyone was super hopeful and optimistic. They’re excited about the new opportunities the web is bringing into our field, even if they seem bleak (cough cough AI tools)– but they’ve chosen to look at the awesome projects and work that’s coming out of these tools.

In the interview with Lee, she started talking about her optimism for learning and she’s seeing this through her daughter’s experience. Lee was so excited to see how they created online projects and utilized them in storytelling. It’s very reminiscent of the ds106 days.

I am always impressed by Pilot’s thorough note-taking. They were typing away the entire time I was asking questions, and it made things super easy to track through editing!

Thoughts on the Event

What’s more, everyone who presented was amazing! I caught a few presentations and every keynote was thought-provoking and inspiring. Thank goodness we were able to pull off the hybrid element to the conference as I still have a lot fo catching up to do.

Where I’m going

So now the question is, where are we going? The future is always interesting to talk about. Where do you see yourself in 5-10 years? I always like to say the future is optimistic.

I’d love to see more younger voices in our community, sharing their work and awesome perspectives. I’d love to explore how our work can be sustainable too. Working online has its perks, but finding small ways to help the environment a bit, will help keep it around far longer.

Will our lives turn out to be Solar Punk (one of my key takeaways throughout Bryan Alexander’s keynote)? What will that look like?

Loved the vibe from this photo in Bryan’s slide deck

As for me personally, I’d love to continue working with Reclaim! My time at Reclaim has been awesome so far and I can’t wait to see where it goes! I’d also love to pick up the blog a bit more. I keep telling myself to but I always forget. So whether it’s a short post or a long post covering events I’m going to post more! So here’s to Reclaim Open, a revitalizing event that brings out new ideas to refresh us for the summer and to keep brainstorming new ideas!

Some of the Reclaim Team celebrating a successful event!

Projects Lately

I think it’s about time that I dust this blog off!

via GIPHY

It’s been almost a year since I last blogged about one of Reclaim’s first Flex Courses in Reclaim Ed Tech, and now we’ve completed the first year! Throughout that year we’ve put on several flex courses, workshops, and even planning for a Conference! (P.S. You should go register for all the awesome stuff planned!)

Towards the latter half of the year, I started participating in a lot of the Flex Courses and even the WordPress Multisite and Domain of One’s Own Workshops. We’ve got most of these in our Reclaim Hosting EdTech Discord so I would highly recommend checking it out! We’ve got a ton of goodness going on in that Discord that anyone from the Reclaim Hosting community can join in!

So to talk more about the Flex Courses, I joined in during the OBS sessions back in January starting with OBS, Open Broadcaster Software.

OBS is such great software if you’re looking to start streaming to Youtube or Twitch. I really enjoyed working with this software in an educational light, and it’s been vital to the Flex Course filming. I’ve only used it a handful of times until then and I’ve seen a bunch of people I follow use it for their gaming streams.

Next, was a Discord course! This was taking a dive into how you can set up a Discord server for your class, club or any large group in general. The session I worked through was with Pilot looking at setting up the server and using templates, and what you can do with your server– and throughout the month we looked at how Reclaim uses Discord to host virtual events.

This month; We’re wrapping up our Flex Course around Installatron applications. Most folks know you can install WordPress easily through Installatron, so we wanted to highlight some of the lesser-known applications like Omeka Classic and Omeka S as well as YOURLs, Matomo and Scalar. I was working on the Omkea Classic and Omeka S Sessions with Amanda and joined Taylor for the YOURLs session. These are some really awesome tools to use for any projects/classes/archives.

It’s been really fun to work on the Ed Tech team on the side. While I’m still incredibly involved with the Support Team, I’m loving the crossover we have between all the teams lately, keeping support at the core of Reclaim’s values. And it’s been so fun to work with my coworkers on some fun courses!

There are many more Flex Courses to come and I’m excited to see where year 2 of Ed Tech takes us! Check out the Youtube channel and discord when you get a chance too, to stay up to date on all things Ed Tech.

Form of Awesome: Week 1

This month, I’m participating in some professional development offered through Reclaim Hosting’s EdTech Subscription, where we’re diving into all the Gravity Forms offers. Last week, we met for the first time so I wanted to jot down some notes and set up some gorals for the next 3 weeks! First, I did have some experience with Gravity Forms prior to this workshop, Reclaim already utilizes the plugin in a couple of forms within our internal work flows, and even on some Domain of One’s Own schools! You may have seen some of these forms in action, like our Migration Assistance form.

I built out this version of the Migration form to use conditional settings as a way to gather as much information from the requester upfront before we start the migration.

So with my background, I wanted to learn more about supporting Gravity Forms. I’ve always loved supporting our Domain of One’s Own community, so any chance I get to support a new feature, I would love to learn!

On more of a personal level, I wanted to learn how to recreate a form to collect recipes. I created a social media site back in college where folks could communicate and submit their own recipes. I think I used Gravity forms for this, but I accidentally deleted the site a couple of years ago without realizing it. So I would love to rebuild the form for this site and get it back up to its final phase for archiving-sake. (This is what the site looked like back in 2015).

With those goals in mind, I was ready to get started with the sessions. I immediately got inspired to how Reclaim can use Gravity Forms within some internal workflows! Pilot and I have been working to set up a workflow between the Support and Sales teams once we onboard a new High-Value Client to Reclaim Hosting. We found that filling out a quick Google Form for each client was super helpful to get the base information on the particular DoOO server or Managed Hosting setup. And it’s been working well so far! The only issue is, that it’s another place to go when we need to fill out the form.

We use an internal website within some more internal workflows, that uses WordPress, so I thought why not turn the hand-off into a Gravity Form! Gravity Forms has a Slack integration with its premium subscription so we could pull the responses into Slack easily.

It was really fun to see the other Recalimer ideas and we were immediately talking through our ideas after the first session and the basics of Gravity Forms.

 

Now on to what I’ve done this week– I haven’t really done much but I’m hoping to get a draft of the Google Form I have into my Form of Awesome site, then I can add this to the Internal Reclaim Hosting site. Then I want to mess around with the conditional fields and finally work with the Slack integration.

So here’s to Week 2 and the rest of Form of Awesome! Really excited to keep learning about Gravity Forms.

 

New Tool Find: Scribe

I wanted to highlight a very cool tool I found (thanks to TikTok!). I am always running folks through processes, like renewing domains or transferring accounts, where the process would be the same each time you go through the scenario. I write documentation for these processes or writing within tickets. Any time I can Use visuals is always helpful.

Introducing Scribe: The chrome extension that allows you to create a step-by-step process in a matter of seconds. And it was the easiest set up ever. I signed into my account using their Google SSO integration and installed the extension. Then I was off and running!

Scribe captures your movement on the screen. clicks, and keyboard inputs. While recording, any click will produce a screenshot with an annotation as to where to click. Then it adds text as to where to click.

 

You can add or delete steps as needed and publish/embed the post wherever you need it! Literally could not be simpler, I was up and running within 5 minutes. Here’s what the final product looks like:

 

I’m still playing around with the Free version, trying to see if I can justify the paid subscription but I really like it so far!! Fun little tool to work with to streamline workflows!

2022 Desk Setup

As promised in my last post, I am writing a post about the tech specs as to how everything comes together on my desk. Working from home again meant I needed to come up with a dedicated space to work, and moving into a new space allowed Brandon and I to think through the perfect space for the both of us. And it’s like I have two built-in coworkers now!

Right now, I’m running two machines, a 2019 Macbook Pro and a hand-me-down gaming PC (that still runs like a champ). Current specs on the PC: an Intel i5 8600k, GeForce RTX 3070, with 16GB RAM, with about 500GB of storage. Perfect for a starter PC and a chance for me to explore gaming outside of my PS4 and Nintendo Switch.

I needed a space that allowed me to seamlessly switch between my PC for fun and my MacBook Pro for work. There was no way I was switching to use my PC for work, as I’d only really worked on macOS before so I knew the learning curve was steep.

I scoured YouTube for ideas, where I could combine a minimalist setup, with some Scandinavian vibes (looking at you IKEA), while also working with the previous setup Brandon built. I wanted to keep dual setups in mind as I was envisioning the final form for the desk.

I took major inspiration from Maisyleigh and Wayne Banga for their clean cozy setups. (Spoiler alert, Wayne has a ton of cool stuff in his space and bonus points for the baby Yoda squishmallow)

Once we were settled in the new house, hours of YouTube consumed, and a road trip to IKEA of course, it was time to build. First the Alex drawers, then the Langkapten tabletops (2 55inch and 1 76inch top), PC builds, monitor mounts, and of course the RGB lights.

My side is on the left, and I needed a second monitor and desk mount. I was quickly finding that I needed one after using two screens at Reclaim HQ. Then it was time for shelves. We had plenty of wall space above the monitor mounts so it was a perfect space for wall art and decorations!

When we first started, I had most of the peripherals in place, like my mouse, keyboard, webcam, mic, and speakers. I needed to be able to use those with both setups so I wasn’t constantly switching cords around.

I picked Taylor’s brain on desk setups as well, and I discovered USB/KVM switches. You plug in up to 4 USB inputs into one end, then you have two outputs on the other end to route to each device. This was perfect! I found one on Amazon and it’s been working well so far! I ended up mounting it under my desk to hide all the cords. I ended up adding my keyboard, mouse, mic, and speaker (with a 3.5mm to USB converter) to the switch, my webcam stays connected to my MacBook as I don’t see myself using it on the PC.

 

 

Now I can click one button under the desk, and I’m able to switch between inputs quickly. My monitors also pick up inputs automatically so it’s even easier!

Now the next step, my MacBook only has 2 USB-C ports… I thought that was going to be a bigger hurdle than it ended up being. Jim mentioned using the OWC Digital dock, and I found the Thunderbolt Mini 3 as a good middle ground for my budget. It allowed me to hardwire my laptop to the Internet through Ethernet and utilize multiple USB ports, and 2 HDMI inputs for my monitors. This worked perfectly because my PC uses DisplayPorts to connect, so I wasn’t competing for inputs.

The only downside to this setup currently is that I can’t get my Macbook to wake on the keyboard or mouse through the dock or the KVM switch (I haven’t found out which one yet), so I have to open up my laptop to wake. Only a real “inconvenience” when checking in to work in the morning, or coming back from break. I also grabbed a vertical laptop stand (similar linked on Amazon), to keep the laptop in tiptop display shape and off my desk.

And holy cable management, that was a feat in itself to get organized, but we ended up using a couple of trays from IKEA and hoped for the best. I had about 3 times as many cords as Brandon does, the dedicated PC man he is! But I think I did a fairly decent job hiding them all!

Finally, on our shelves and scattered around, we wanted to showcase some of our favorite things, mine being Spiderman, Animal Crossing, the Uncharted series, Star Wars, and Legos– Brandon’s being The Thing, Bloodbourne, Dark Souls, Elden Ring, Deadspace, and Doom (in the desktop background). These both add a touch of personality to our setups, where things can be bland.

Here’s a final look!

 

We’re really happy with how it turned out, we each have our own space, but are shared in the middle– and after moving around so much in college/post-grad/pandemic life, it feels good to have a permanent space to work from.

This is now officially dubbed the Mega Desk.

 


Check out our post on Reddit r/battlestations too, we had to include Dexter in the photo of course.

Desk Evolution 2022

Over the years at Reclaim, my desk/workspace has seen several iterations. I’ve worked through CoWork, the dedicated Reclaim Hosting office, then shifted to work from home at the beginning of the pandemic and back to the Reclaim Office. Reclaim recently went “fully remote” (as if the pandemic made this transition easier), where we retired the physical office space and allow all employees to work remote.

Reclaim always had some idea of a remote company back in it’s history, really since it began. When I joined the team back in 2017, the team was still scattered across the world, and we had just started renovations on CoWork. I clearly remember Tim and I huddled in the back corner of the space to avoid all the construction noise. Once the summer rolled around CoWork was in full swing, and my desk space was super flexible where I would need to grab a different desk per day. Then I took over office management of CoWork and I had my own dedicated desk with a monitor and everything! It took me maybe 2 years at Reclaim before I got one and I’ve never looked back. Stay tuned to see how many screens I’m up to now (LOL).

After CoWork shut down, we shifted to moving into Reclaim’s dedicated office! Or so we thought… The week after we moved in and were expecting to start working in the space, we made the tough choice to start working from home at the start of the COIVD19 pandemic.

My desk changed once again! I decided I’d spend some time with my parents for a couple of weeks, and I had a friendly face with me for a bit! He definitely made writing tickets a little bit harder (spoiler alert he loves keyboards).

 

After that, I went back home and had to figure out where I could work. I was living in an apartment with a couple of roommates at the time and we all needed to balance working from home in the same space. I moved to the dining room, then made some space in my room for the final evolution.

My dining room setup

I will say working from home was rough at first. Going from working with people in an office, not just Reclaim Hosting employees, but the other CoWork members was so fun. I’d spent more time moving things across the building to our new space than I’d spent working in the space to start so I was sad to move from home. I was excited to shift to Reclaim Employees to Reclaim’s space! I also needed that extra “commute” time to shift my mindset from work time to “home” time, that I would get while driving home. I couldn’t get that mindset shift when I worked and lived in the same space. It took me some time to work through being intentional with that change, I found that as long as I had the dedicated space within my home, I could work through the transition. All about that balance!! (2022 mantra). So I finished out the work from home time with a dedicated workspace!

Dedicated space in my room

In July 2020 I shifted back to the office and worked in the space until 2022, when Reclaim Arcade commandeered the space, ever so slowly. I felt like I would come into the office after a long weekend, and there was a new arcade cabinet in the space LOL

I kid, I kid, but in all honesty, Reclaim Arcade has expanded is so cool to see, and Fredericksburg needed an old-school arcade!

Then in 2022, my desk space changed into its current form, in a permanent work from home space. I moved in with my partner and we began envisioning what that space would look like. With us both working in the Tech space, we wanted a space that was flexible but also multifunctional. I’ll get into a more technical mindset in my next post, to walk through how I actually use a dual-platform with 2 monitors, using my Mac at work, then my PC for fun stuff for gaming. I also just added the PS5 in the back so that’s fun too!

Mine is on the left, Brandon’s is on the right side!

I’m pretty happy with how this turned out! The WFH transition was much easier this time, where I have more of a routine with the pup to help me break up the workday and finish up the day. And I have a built-in coworker with me (when he isn’t commuting). I also have a permanent space this time, where I know my desk isn’t going to change in a matter of time.

Scared pup underneath my desk. Dexter does not like Thunderstorms

I call this “Do you have snacks?”

I also just love looking through other people’s workspaces and how it works for them, so I’ve spent many an hour watching desk setup videos on YouTube. Lots of Inspiration came from them LOL So stay tuned for a little Tech Spec on how I make this space run!

Professional Development: Activating Omeka User With Our Password Reset Email

Recently, I’ve found that I’ve needed access to an Omeka admin dashboard without a previous admin user on the site. Installatron makes it easy to log into sites like WordPress automatically but they don’t offer this option within Omeka or other applications.

We’ve been able to figure out a way to access the site through the dashboard directly from the database. This method relies on receiving an email reset to confirm the password, but what happens when you don’t receive the email? Well, let me teach out!

Omeka Login

Once you’ve added the user to the Omeka database following the steps listed above, you’ll want to request a password reset.

This generates a user activation link that we’ll need to get to the password reset screen. Once you have the login email, you’ll want to move to the database in PHPMyAdmin.

PHPMyAdmin

In PHPMyAdmin, you’ll want to navigate to the users table. We’ll need to get the user ID of thecurrent user you just requested the password reset for.

In this case, it’s user ID 1, but it may be different for your install.

 

Next, navigate to the users_activations table. This table holds all the active Password resets for each user.

You’ll want to grab the text in the URL box next to the corresponding user_ID we got from the users table. Make sure you’re looking at the user_id section on this table as the id might be the same.

 

In the Browser

After you have that URL snippet, you’ll want to move back into the browser. We’ll need to craft out the URL from the Omeka site. You’ll go to the admin login, in this case, mine is currently at https://reclaimtest.meredithfierro.com/admin. Next you’ll want to add the code /users/activate/u. This will create part of the password reset link. Finally, add the URL box we got from the users_activations table. So the full URL should look like this: https://reclaimtest.meredithfierro.com/admin/users/activate/u/1140c618248acc34c9bdb924eafae99b62622b80.

Then load the page and you should see the password reset!

 

This method is super handy to get access to help troubleshoot, especially if you want to prevent back and forth between the person. I’m all for limiting any unnecessary communication.

 

Domain Tips and Tricks

Domains are honestly some of the coolest pieces of the web that I’ve worked with over the years. There are so many combinations to them. You can work with whatever you want on the beginning (like mine for example, meredithfierro.com) and there are a wide variety of domain extensions as well! Most folks know .com .net .edu .gov .org for example but did you know you can have extensions like .media .photography, even .yachts!

I even found some that I didn’t know existed looking through GoDaddy’s list of extensions (although I would recommend referencing the IANA list through data.iana.org instead) and even Wikipedia has an extensive curated list.

I’d like this post to be some running notes on what I’ve found are weird/procedural with domain names over my last 5 years in web hosting. There are a lot of specifics out there!

Domain Name Regulations

ICANN and Domain Hierarchy

First, domain names can fall under a lot of regulations. They’re overseen by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). This group oversees and regulates all domain registrations. They impose options like the 60-day domain lock for all newly registered/transferred domains, domains to be verified within 15 days of registration, and verify any contact information changes via email. I definitely recommend checking out their website to get a look at how domain names work and their plans. I used this several times while I was just starting out in the wide world of web hosting.

So ICANN oversees all different types of domain names right? So it just goes through one company? Not usually, there are so many different domain operators out there! These are different companies that are responsible for the extensions, so for example, .com, .net, and .name are all owned by a company called Verisign.

Each Operator offers different domain extensions to Registrars, which is the next step in the domain hierarchy. Registrars offer each domain extension to the general public. You may know some names, like GoDaddy, NameCheap, eNom, Google Domains, DreamHost among others. You may even have a domain name registered with them! Reclaim Hosting works with eNom, Logicboxes, and OpenSRS to register domains. We are considered resellers of domains which is one level below registrars.

But, even with that registrar hierarchy, users who purchase the domains names own those domain names. They can take those with them to another registrar or adjust their domain nameservers.

Requirements for Domains

So with the hierarchy in place, there must be a lot of rules for domains right? Yes and no– there are requirements set up with Registrars, then the requirements ICANN places on domains. Most of these are to prevent domain theft or spam domains. I’ve come across a couple of rules:

  • Domains are locked for 60 days after a major change happens. This can happen after a domain is newly registered or transferred to its current registrar. It is locked after any major contact information change, like changes to the registrant email.
    • Email is a primary point of contact for domain names, so you’ll want to make sure to use an email you check regularly.
    • Within the 60 day mark, you cannot transfer the domain to another registrar. The domain is locked at it’s current registrar.
  • Verify your domain within 15 days of registration: This one is really important for folks just starting out. You need to verify your domain via email after the domain is registered. If you do not verify the domain it’s suspended and pointed away from the current hosting company.
    • Tip: Be sure to use an email address that you check regularly to sign up for a domain. Reclaim’s found that users working with their University email, the email from our registrar does not make it to their inboxes. Emails from Gmail or Outlook are more reliable.
  • Make sure to use valid contact information. This includes a full billing/mailing address and email for the domain registration.

You can read through ICANNs list of FAQs and questions, they have an extensive list.

Domain Name Lifecycles

So, now that you know the hierarchy of domain names and you’ve registered the domain, what does the lifecycle look like?

Domains can be registered starting at 1 year increments and can register up to 10 years at a time from the date of expiry. After the domain name is first registered, there are a couple of key dates, to keep in mind. There is typically a 24 hour-4 day money-back period (dependent on the registrar). From there, users will have that 15 day verification period I mentioned earlier. Once verified the domain is good to go for its registration period. Once the expiry date is reached, the domain moves into the grace period. During the grace period, the registrant can renew the domain at any time up to 30 days (roughly, again dependent on the registrar, some are longer than 30 days and others are super short) after the expiry date.

After the Grace period, the domain moves into the next phase, redemption, lasting for another 30 days. This phase is a little bit trickier to manage, as the domain name now incurs a fee to renew and bring the domain out of redemption. The redemption phase is preparing the domain for deletion. It’s also important to note that anyone can bring a domain out of redemption and register the domain in their name. So it’s important to keep track of your domain name’s lifecycle and make sure to renew it before it reaches this phase. The fee can range from $15-$200+ and is set by the particular registrar. Some can set the fee by the ICANN regulation or have a flat fee for redemptions where all domain names are the same fee to redeem.

Finally, there’s the deletion phase. After the redemption phase, the domain is moved into deletion where no one can renew or redeem the domain. The deletion lasts for 5 days, where the domain is released back to the public for anyone to register. There is a great graphic on our Domain Lifecycle guide that illustrates this as well.

Domain Name Transfers

Once you register the domain, you can move registrars as needed. But there are a few things to keep in mind. First, the domain must be outside of the 60-day mark (as seen above) this is very important because you can’t transfer your domain within that period.

Second, you’ll want to disable the domain’s registrar lock (sometimes called theft protection). This is enabled by default to prevent the domain from being stolen.

Next, you’ll want to make sure to turn off privacy protection. Reclaim Hosting includes this within our pricing model to help protect our users’ data. Privacy protection masks your information from the public whois.com database for all domain names. Emails are sent out during this transfer process that you need to address to approve the transfer. The transfer uses whatever is listed within the WhoIS database, so it grabs the privacy protection domain as well. So it’s important to have the correct contact information listed to receive the emails.

Obtain a transfer authorization code/ EPP code. This code is unique to your domain and acts like a key to prove ownership. You’ll need to request one from your registrar or through your domain account from there.

After you receive all that information and make sure the domain name meets the requirements you can transfer the domain name. The domain transfer all in all takes 7 days to process from the time the order is placed. You’ll want to make sure to leave enough time for the domain to transfer before it expires.

Also important to note– when transferring a domain name, you are not transferring any content hosted on the domain. You’re only transferring the domain name registration. The content remains where it sits.


Whew ok, hopefully, this gives you a glimpse of what working with domain names looks like! There are some little quirks in place with the registrations but once you know what to look out for you can manage these easily!

 

 

Featured Image: Photo by David Travis on Unsplash

Domain Tips and Tricks

Domains are honestly some of the coolest pieces of the web that I’ve worked with over the years. There are so many combinations to them. You can work with whatever you want on the beginning (like mine for example, meredithfierro.com) and there are a wide variety of domain extensions as well! Most folks know .com .net .edu .gov .org for example but did you know you can have extensions like .media .photography, even .yachts!

I even found some that I didn’t know existed looking through GoDaddy’s list of extensions (although I would recommend referencing the IANA list through data.iana.org instead) and even Wikipedia has an extensive curated list.

I’d like this post to be some running notes on what I’ve found are weird/procedural with domain names over my last 5 years in web hosting. There are a lot of specifics out there!

Domain Name Regulations

ICANN and Domain Hierarchy

First, domain names can fall under a lot of regulations. They’re overseen by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). This group oversees and regulates all domain registrations. They impose options like the 60-day domain lock for all newly registered/transferred domains, domains to be verified within 15 days of registration, and verify any contact information changes via email. I definitely recommend checking out their website to get a look at how domain names work and their plans. I used this several times while I was just starting out in the wide world of web hosting.

So ICANN oversees all different types of domain names right? So it just goes through one company? Not usually, there are so many different domain operators out there! These are different companies that are responsible for the extensions, so for example, .com, .net, and .name are all owned by a company called Verisign.

Each Operator offers different domain extensions to Registrars, which is the next step in the domain hierarchy. Registrars offer each domain extension to the general public. You may know some names, like GoDaddy, NameCheap, eNom, Google Domains, DreamHost among others. You may even have a domain name registered with them! Reclaim Hosting works with eNom, Logicboxes, and OpenSRS to register domains. We are considered resellers of domains which is one level below registrars.

But, even with that registrar hierarchy, users who purchase the domains names own those domain names. They can take those with them to another registrar or adjust their domain nameservers.

Requirements for Domains

So with the hierarchy in place, there must be a lot of rules for domains right? Yes and no– there are requirements set up with Registrars, then the requirements ICANN places on domains. Most of these are to prevent domain theft or spam domains. I’ve come across a couple of rules:

  • Domains are locked for 60 days after a major change happens. This can happen after a domain is newly registered or transferred to its current registrar. It is locked after any major contact information change, like changes to the registrant email.
    • Email is a primary point of contact for domain names, so you’ll want to make sure to use an email you check regularly.
    • Within the 60 day mark, you cannot transfer the domain to another registrar. The domain is locked at it’s current registrar.
  • Verify your domain within 15 days of registration: This one is really important for folks just starting out. You need to verify your domain via email after the domain is registered. If you do not verify the domain it’s suspended and pointed away from the current hosting company.
    • Tip: Be sure to use an email address that you check regularly to sign up for a domain. Reclaim’s found that users working with their University email, the email from our registrar does not make it to their inboxes. Emails from Gmail or Outlook are more reliable.
  • Make sure to use valid contact information. This includes a full billing/mailing address and email for the domain registration.

You can read through ICANNs list of FAQs and questions, they have an extensive list.

Domain Name Lifecycles

So, now that you know the hierarchy of domain names and you’ve registered the domain, what does the lifecycle look like?

Domains can be registered starting at 1 year increments and can register up to 10 years at a time from the date of expiry. After the domain name is first registered, there are a couple of key dates, to keep in mind. There is typically a 24 hour-4 day money-back period (dependent on the registrar). From there, users will have that 15 day verification period I mentioned earlier. Once verified the domain is good to go for its registration period. Once the expiry date is reached, the domain moves into the grace period. During the grace period, the registrant can renew the domain at any time up to 30 days (roughly, again dependent on the registrar, some are longer than 30 days and others are super short) after the expiry date.

After the Grace period, the domain moves into the next phase, redemption, lasting for another 30 days. This phase is a little bit trickier to manage, as the domain name now incurs a fee to renew and bring the domain out of redemption. The redemption phase is preparing the domain for deletion. It’s also important to note that anyone can bring a domain out of redemption and register the domain in their name. So it’s important to keep track of your domain name’s lifecycle and make sure to renew it before it reaches this phase. The fee can range from $15-$200+ and is set by the particular registrar. Some can set the fee by the ICANN regulation or have a flat fee for redemptions where all domain names are the same fee to redeem.

Finally, there’s the deletion phase. After the redemption phase, the domain is moved into deletion where no one can renew or redeem the domain. The deletion lasts for 5 days, where the domain is released back to the public for anyone to register. There is a great graphic on our Domain Lifecycle guide that illustrates this as well.

Domain Name Transfers

Once you register the domain, you can move registrars as needed. But there are a few things to keep in mind. First, the domain must be outside of the 60-day mark (as seen above) this is very important because you can’t transfer your domain within that period.

Second, you’ll want to disable the domain’s registrar lock (sometimes called theft protection). This is enabled by default to prevent the domain from being stolen.

Next, you’ll want to make sure to turn off privacy protection. Reclaim Hosting includes this within our pricing model to help protect our users’ data. Privacy protection masks your information from the public whois.com database for all domain names. Emails are sent out during this transfer process that you need to address to approve the transfer. The transfer uses whatever is listed within the WhoIS database, so it grabs the privacy protection domain as well. So it’s important to have the correct contact information listed to receive the emails.

Obtain a transfer authorization code/ EPP code. This code is unique to your domain and acts like a key to prove ownership. You’ll need to request one from your registrar or through your domain account from there.

After you receive all that information and make sure the domain name meets the requirements you can transfer the domain name. The domain transfer all in all takes 7 days to process from the time the order is placed. You’ll want to make sure to leave enough time for the domain to transfer before it expires.

Also important to note– when transferring a domain name, you are not transferring any content hosted on the domain. You’re only transferring the domain name registration. The content remains where it sits.


Whew ok, hopefully, this gives you a glimpse of what working with domain names looks like! There are some little quirks in place with the registrations but once you know what to look out for you can manage these easily!

 

 

Featured Image: Photo by David Travis on Unsplash