Domain management
In the Service Centre, you are offered the possibility of managing your domains. You can create subdomains and redirects. Also, can customise the DNS and the name servers. Here we will outline the different possibilities.
Contents
Domain redirects
The redirection of a domain name to an (externally hosted) website or web address can easily be set within the Service Centre. It could be the case that you have claimed multiple domain names, for example, and want the visitors from all different domains to immediately be redirected to the one domain under which your website is running. Domain redirection is then the most simple way to get your visitors where you want them to end up.
Redirecting a domain
Under the 'Hosting' tab in the Service Centre you can click 'Domain redirects' in the bottom left-hand menu. There, under the 'Overview' tab, you can simply insert the URL where you want the selected domain to redirect to. When entering a URL use the format https://yourdomain.com.
Changing domain redirects
In the 'Advanced' tab you can see which domain redirects you have in place. The redirection from the 'www.' subdomain to the primary domain is there by default. You can change whatever redirect you have set by clicking on a URL, entering the desired URL and saving.
Undo domain redirects
When you want to undo a domain redirect, e.g. because you built a new website, first delete the existing domain redirects by clicking the bin icon to the left of each of them. Then add the '@' subdomain again under 'Subdomains' in the bottom left-hand menu. Finally, navigate to 'Domain redirects' again, click the 'Advanced' sub tab and create the 'www' domain redirect anew. When creating the 'www' domain redirect, fill in 'www' as the subdomain and '@' as destination. The '@' signifies the primary domain without a subdomain prefix (not https://subdomain.yourdomain.com but just https://yourdomain.com).
Server alias
For multisite solutions you may want several domain names to be redirected to one website, where the URLs originally entered in the browser by visitors do not change. If this fits your needs, please contact us to ask us to configure a server alias.
Subdomains
A subdomain is a domain prefix to the primary domain (for example https://prefix.yourdomain.com). Subdomains can be useful to separate different parts of an organisation or company, or to give an important part of the website it's own spot.
Creating a subdomain
When logged in as account administrator in our Service Centre, click 'Subdomains' under the 'Hosting' tab in the bottom left-hand menu. Then click 'Add subdomain' to create a new subdomain. Fill in the name of the subdomain in the 'Subdomain' field, and click create. Unless you know what you are doing, the 'Webroot' field should be left empty.
After creation, your subdomain has been added as a separate folder next to the DEFAULT folder on the SFTP server. If the domain is registered with a different provider, or if you are using SSL on your domain, you may need to add a separate DNS-record for this subdomain. If you are using our name servers, this manual shows how you can add a DNS record.
Changing subdomains
In the same overview you can see which subdomains have been created. The primary domain is there by default, do not delete or change it. You can change whatever subdomain you have created by clicking on a subdomain, entering the desired name for the subdomain and saving, or you can delete a subdomain by clicking the bin icon.
DNS records
To be able to see and use a website and the email connected to a domain name, the internet browser needs to know where these services are being hosted. To this end, the internet uses the DNS (Domain Name System). Within this system, a domain name that a human types into the browser is being translated into the associated IP address that computers use to communicate with each other. This is very much like looking for a name in the phone book and finding the phone number associated with that name. This infographic shows how the DNS works.
DNS settings in the Service Centre
Greenhost automatically configures the DNS settings when you register a new domain name. When the domain name registration is active, you can immediately start using email accounts and managing a website, without making any changes to the DNS settings. Would you like to view or change DNS settings, then log in to the Service Centre using your administrator credentials. Under the 'Hosting' tab select the intended domain name from the drop down in the upper left-hand pane and click 'DNS' in the bottom left-hand menu.
Caution : when changing DNS settings, make sure that you know what you are doing. Changes in the DNS settings could cause the website to be unreachable for a significant period of time.
Changing DNS settings
In the 'Overview' tab you can change the DNS settings in four different ways:
- Toggle DNS off or on: in some specific cases it could be useful to stop all traffic from and to the respective domain name. You can toggle DNS for the respective domain off or on using the switch.
- Add new record: click the blue button '+ New record' to add a new DNS record. See below for a detailed explanation about adding a DNS record.
- Delete record: to delete a DNS record, click the bin icon of the record you want to delete, in the first column.
- Modify record: you can modify existing DNS records by clicking one of the different fields, changing the content and saving. See below under 'adding a new DNS record' for the meaning and significance of different fields.
Adding a new DNS record
When clicking '+ New record', a drop down appears where you fill in the four
aspects of a DNS record: the Record, Type, Destination and TTL. These
aspects are described below. 
Record
The record specifies for which subdomain you want to add a record. Filling in just the name of a subdomain signifies the name of a subdomain extended by the primary domain. (for example: 'www' results in 'www.yourdomain.com') Filling in the '@' signifies the the primary domain name, for example 'yourdomain.com'. Filling in the '*' signifies every other possible subdomain extended by the primary domain name.
Type
Type includes the type of DNS reference that is made. In the drop down you can choose one of the types:
- A is the most important type, it always refers to an IP address.
- CNAME refers to another domain name, never to an IP address. You can use this type to refer subdomains to your primary domain or to an external domain name, at DNS level.
- MX 10 refers to the full domain name of a mail server, not an IP address. The number 10 signifies the first priority reference to a email server.
- MX 20 is almost the same as MX 10, but signifies the second priority reference to a mail server,
- AAAA is like A, but refers to an IPv6 address. IPv6 will in the long term replace all normal IP traffic.
- SPF refers to mail servers which are then authorised to send email for your domain.
Destination
The destination field specifies where you want to point towards. The format this should take depends on the type. When referring to a server or subdomain, the rules as stated under 'Record' apply here as well. If you want to point to an (external) server which is not under your domain, you should end your input with a full stop. (e.g.: "mx1.greenhost.nl.")
TTL
TTL stands for Time to Live and signifies the number of seconds that this DNS record may be kept in cache memory. The lower the TTL the faster any changes in the record will become active for visitors or users, but after the TTL has expired a page may load a little bit slower. Keeping this field empty results in a default TTL of 3600 seconds (one hour), which is advised in most cases.
Name servers
When you register a domain at Greenhost, it is configured to use the Greenhost name servers by default. In the Service Centre you can easily change the name servers for your domain.
Changing name servers
To change the name servers, log in to the Service Centre, click the 'Hosting' tab and click 'DNS' in the bottom left-hand menu. Within 'DNS', under the 'Name servers' tab you can change the name servers in the fields by entering their names (IP addresses are not necessary) and saving. If you change our records it can take up to 24 hours for the changes to take effect. If you change the name servers to those of another hosting provider or entity, their DNS records are used for your domain name.
Restoring name server settings
To restore the name server settings to the default Greenhost name servers, click 'Default values' and save. It can take up to 48 hours for this change to take effect.
