Get your DNS under control. It can take you down, like it did Facebook
The symbol of the pixel dinosaur that comes up when a domain name can’t be found is an accurate symbol given the DNS system dates back before the Internet.
“IT’S ALL GONE — All of Facebook is down, as far as we can tell, everywhere. Users are reporting that Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp are unavailable from desktop and mobile browsers, as well as through each individual app.”
The majority of our clients have had issues in controlling their domain name. We were once delayed from releasing a brand new site for over a month when our client could not get control of their domain name.
It’s crazy to think about how much time, money and effort can go into building a new website and then to have all of that thwarted because we can’t manage the DNS.
A DNS issue was what brought Facebook and billions of users down yesterday.
It’s one of the first questions I ask:
“Do you have access to your domain name?
Are you absolutely sure?
Please double check that.”
Our domain name system dates back to the formation of the ARPANET which was the precursor to the Internet when it was established in 1966.
Every website, email address and internet access point maps to an IP address. A number — like a phone number. A DNS or Domain Name System maps a friendly name to the not so friendly IP address.
orbisDesign.com = 198.185.159.144
Without getting too deep into the weeds, the most important thing to remember is that most often, the place that stores your domain name is not the same place where your website is stored.
For example, many register their domain with Network Solutions or Godaddy.
People often call it their “URL” but a URL or Uniform Resource Locator is most commonly an address that contains the domain.
This is why you’ll often see a development URL for a website before it’s ready to go live:
For example: https://orbisdesign.squarespace.com is our development URL which actually uses the Squarespace domain (not the Orbis domain) — our designation actually resides with the “subdomain” orbisdesign.
Ok, probably a little too deep but this is how you can build a new website somewhere while your existing website (and email) still functions without interruption.
When you’re ready to release your new site, you log into your DNS account and change the pointer of the name — the IP addresses — to point to the new location of the website — i.e. a different IP address.
And that’s where the problem typically resides: getting access to the DNS account.
One of the worst things I’ve seen developers do is set someone up with a domain name and then hold that name hostage because they have control.
I’ve seen people have someone set up a domain name and then that person leaves and they can’t get access to the domain any longer because that person used an email address to register the domain that the company doesn’t manage.
Because domain names are rather technical to manage, most people are in the dark when it comes to managing their domain name and finding out who can manage that for them has been considerably difficult for many clients.
What You Should Do to Get Control of Your Domain Name (DNS)
Be sure you can log into where your domain is registered.
Many times that’s Godaddy or Network Solutions. Wherever it is, don’t delay in finding that log in and confirming you have access and can get to the admin of your domain.
Nothing really matters until you can do that and whatever you do, do that before you do anything else. I’ve seen getting that under control taking weeks and even months at times. You don’t want to be ready to launch your site and finding that out last minute.
Once you can log in, see if you can add users.
This is why I like using Godaddy. A customer can add me as a user to their account where I can then go in and make their site live without anyone on their end having to worry about any of that.
Better yet, only make me a user when we’re ready to go live and then delete me immediately afterwords. It’s a minor but important and healthy security practice of not leaving straggler editors access to anything on your backend.
Consult me on what service you’re on immediately if we start a site
Some of the smaller, more obscure domain name registrars can be a nightmare to manage even by someone with experience. We’ll want to check into that immediately once you can log into your account.
Sources
Wired: Why Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp All Went Down Today
Wikipedia: Domain Name System
MDM Web docs What is a URL?
