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Alias Your IP Address

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Revision as of 00:20, 25 November 2016 by Zehra (Talk | contribs) (improved wording)

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The IP address is many times be hard to memorize, especially if one has a dynamic IP address (one that changes every so often). This page explains how one can associate a memorable name such as bzflag.game-host.org to ones IP address. Even if ones IP is static, it is much easier to remember bzserver.domain.org than something like 169.19.123.234

One way to alias ones IP is to get a free account at www.dyndns.org. Once one registers and logs in, one will be able to attach a domain name to ones IP address. There are dozens of top-level domains to choose from. Once one logs in to dyndns.org, one must choose static or dynamic DNS depending on whether ones provider assigns one a static or dynamic ip, one must click on "add a new host", and choose the name of ones preference.

If ones IP is dynamic, one also needs to download and run a client program that will periodically tell dyndns.org what the IP of ones machine is. The dyndns.org site has a page with a list of clients. It is fairly easy to set them up (basically, one needs to install them. Most of them will let one to specify if one wants the client to startup every time one starts their computer, and also how often the client should check whether ones IP has changed (for example, every 10 minutes).

NOTE: dyndns.org will *NOT* let one choose any top-level domain (the xxx.org part of the domain name). It will give one a list of a few dozen domains (such as game-host.org) to which one can add their own preferred name (resulting in myname.game-host.org). If one wants to register and use ones own domain name (something like my.domain.org), one will have to pay them for this type of service. Depending on the registration service one uses, prices range between $8 and $20 a year. If one does not want to pay, one will have less of a choice, but at least one can get a name.