 FAQ:
- My browser never prompts me for a password when I attempt to
logon to Xenoplanet's customer service page, or when I am trying to
enter a restricted area. Instead, I get a "401 Unauthorized" error.
- Have you received my payment?
- Occasionally, I find access to Xenoplanet to be slow, however
my friends are able to load my site at normal speed. What could be
causing this?
- What is the frequency of your backups?
- Do you offer mailing list, listserv, or majordomo?
- Do you offer a referral or client list?
- Do you provide database support?
- Do you offer telephone support?
- Can subdomains or web aliases have their own eMail accounts?
- What is the difference between a "page hit" and a "hit"?
- When do my stats become available?
- My site comes up as a blank, white page.
- What is my domain's IP address?
- How do I add a subdomain/subweb or a web alias to my account?
- I'm having a problem with logging into one of my ftp accounts.
It is giving me a "500 Illegal PORT Range Rejected" message. What
is this?
- Someone is spamming me! What can I do?
- How do I copyright material on my web site?
- I keep seeing 408 Errors in my access logs. What is this?
My browser never prompts me for a password when I
attempt to logon to Xenoplanet's customer service page, or when I am
trying to enter a restricted area. Instead, I get a "401 Unauthorized"
error.
This is often caused by Internet Explorer 3.x and lower, as these browsers
tend to cache usernames and passwords. There are several solutions:
1. (recommended) Upgrade your browser to Internet Explorer 4.x, or Netscape
4.x.
2. (not recommended) Delete all .PWL files from your Windows directory.
Have you received my payment?
Payments are normally credited within 24 hours of when they are received.
You may check your balance by sending an eMail to billing@xenoplanet.com.
Occasionally, I find access to Xenoplanet to be slow,
however my friends are able to load my site at normal speed. What could
be causing this?
To understand the reason behind this, you must first understand
a little bit about Internet topology:
There are several major "transit" providers on the Internet which
include Sprint, MCI, UUNet, ANS (AOL), PSI, BBN, and Agis. Your dial-up
provider peers with one or more of these providers. Likewise, Xenoplanet,
and Xenoplanet access providers peer with one or more of these providers.
So you might be in a situation like this:
Your computer <-> your provider <->
MCI <-> CRL <-> Xenoplanet
In this case, packet loss and slowdowns can occur at any of the exchange
points:
Your computer <-> your provider
Your provider <-> MCI
MCI <-> CRL
CRL <-> Xenoplanet
In order to accurately determine where packet loss is occurring, a
"traceroute" is extremely helpful. A "traceroute" shows the path that
data travels between you and Xenoplanet. If you experience slowness
or problems accessing your site, please follow our traceroute instructions
(below) and send us a traceroute. This will assist us in accurately
determine where the problem may be occurring.
Xenoplanet connects through divergent fiber to divergent backbones,
including Sprint, Verio, CRL, Geo, and others.
How to obtain a traceroute
To assist you in determining the cause and location of the network
problem, Xenoplanet support representatives need a "traceroute". The
following documentation describes what a traceroute is, and how to
obtain one. This will greatly increase the likelyhood that the problem
will be identified. If there is a network problem, the traceroute
will identify the problem. If another problem is to blame, the traceroute
may give us an insight into the cause:
A traceroute describes the path that information takes as it passes
from your client to our server, and back. As there are normally several
routers between your and our end, there are several points at which
packet loss and routing instability may occur.
A typical, well-behaved traceroute to Xenoplanet might appear as follows:
Tracing route to www.xenoplanet.com [216.104.166.28]
1 <10 ms <10 ms <10 ms DNS-STARGATE [192.168.0.1]
(Local Area Network)
2 55 ms 55 ms 55 ms fa5-0.ffm9.nacamar.net [62.27.220.249]
3 96 ms 55 ms 55 ms fe4-0-0.ffm4.nacamar.net [194.162.162.171]
4 83 ms 54 ms 55 ms atm1-0-17.core1.f.nacamar.net [194.112.20.165]
5 83 ms 55 ms 55 ms ffm2.net.tiscali.com [213.200.82.17]
6 82 ms 55 ms 55 ms lon12.net.tiscali.com [213.200.81.245]
7 82 ms 55 ms 55 ms fe3-0-0.ar1.lon2.gblx.net [195.66.224.112]
8 96 ms 55 ms 55 ms pos5-0-622M.cr1.LON3.gblx.net [208.49.136.53]
9 261 ms 219 ms 220 ms pos0-0-622M.cr1.LAX1.gblx.net [206.132.112.82]
10 261 ms 220 ms 220 ms pos0-0-0-155M.ar2.LAX1.gblx.net [206.132.112.154
]
11 261 ms 220 ms 219 ms TierraNet.s2-0-1.ar2.LAX1.gblx.net [206.57.3.62]
12 248 ms 274 ms 220 ms xenoplanet.com [216.104.166.28]
As you might expect, in a healthy traceroute, where #1 is your computer,
and #11 is Xenoplanet, the average times (in milliseconds) gradually
increase, but remain relatively low. No stars ("*") are found in the
traceroute. If you are connected via a modem, times displayed may be
consistently higher, but you should still notice a gradual increase
in time with no large jumps.
A traceroute which indicates network instability and packet loss might
look something like this:
Tracing route to www.xenoplanet.com [216.104.166.28]
1 <10 ms <10 ms <10 ms DNS-STARGATE [192.168.0.1]
(Local Area Network)
2 41 ms 55 ms 55 ms 193.158.143.1
3 41 ms 55 ms 55 ms 193.158.132.38
4 401 ms 450 ms 394 ms TS-gw1.TS.net.DTAG.DE [193.158.126.121]
5 405 ms 397 ms 442 ms 62.154.17.194
6 397 ms 477 ms * 62.16.32.149
7 631 ms * 405 ms so2-2-0-622M.cr2.FRA2.gblx.net [62.16.32.61]
8 454 ms 416 ms 429 ms pos1-0-622M.cr1.LAX1.gblx.net [206.132.112.98]
9 417 ms 560 ms * pos0-0-0-155M.ar2.LAX1.gblx.net [206.132.112.154
]
10 420 ms * ms 446 ms TierraNet.s2-0-1.ar2.LAX1.gblx.net [206.57.3.62]
11 441 ms 420 ms * xenoplanet.com [216.104.166.28]
In this case, there is a most likely a substantial delay occurring
at the point between #3 and #4, with significant packet loss between
#6 and #7. Keep in mind that all numbers are affected by the previous
route. In this case, the Xenoplanet network is most likely stable,
but appears unstable because of the problems occurring between #3
and #4 (i.e. your ISP), and between #6 and #7.
Here's how to obtain a traceroute. Ideally, you will follow these
instructions during the time that you are experiencing the symptoms:
Windows 95/98/ME - Windows NT/2000
1. Press the "Start" button on your taskbar
2. Choose "Programs", then "MS-DOS Prompt" (or "Command Prompt")
3. Type "tracert 216.104.166.28"
4. Copy and paste the output into your favorite mail program and send
to support@xenoplanet.com
To copy from an MS-DOS window, use the "Mark" and "Copy" tools on
your toolbar. If the toolbar is not showing, press "Alt-ENTER" to
display it.
Windows 3.x
Contact your ISP for information on where to obtain a "traceroute"
program for Windows 3.x.
Macintosh
1. You will need to obtain a traceroute program, you may find one
at: http://www.allmacintosh.com/macintosh.html
2. Traceroute to "216.104.166.28"
3. Copy and paste the output into your favorite mail program and send
to support@xenoplanet.com
UNIX
1. Type "traceroute 216.104.166.28"
at your login prompt
2. Copy and paste the output into your favorite mail program and send
to support@xenoplanet.com
If you do not have access to the "traceroute" program, please contact
your system administrator.
What is the frequency of your backups?
We backup files daily. Backups are periodically taken off-site. Backups
are intended for disaster recovery. There is a $58 fee to retrieve user
deleted files from backup. To know more, visit the Non-Disaster
Data Recovery page
Do you offer mailing list, listserv, or majordomo?
Xenoplanet supports Majordomo on domain accounts. Documentation is provided.
Do you offer a referral or client list?
No, however we plan to add a "customer directory" page in
the future, where the customers can freely add themselves if they wish
to. We will announce when this feature will be available.
Do you provide database support?
Do you offer telephone support?
Yes: the number is +49 (0)171 7375757. However, we still encourage you
to eMail support@xenoplanet.com
during regular business hours for any questions regarding service. Technical
questions are best answered via eMail.
Can subdomains or web aliases have their own eMail
accounts?
Subdomains (subwebs) on a subdirectory
have their own IP address, and they are aliased to the directory using
the IP. Subdomains/subwebs may have their own eMail accounts. Some of
the bundled CGI utilities will work with these, but some do not work
or don't work as expected. The subdirectory aliases are intended for
minimal hosting needs when a full web account is not needed thus sparing
the added expense.
What is the difference between a "page hit" and a
"hit"?
"Page hits", as reported by our statistics program, count files which
end in .htm, .html, or .shtml. "Hits" includes all files, including
images, multimedia, HTML pages, etc. (.html, .htm, .wav, .gif, .jpg
etc...).
When do my stats become available?
Site statistics are usually available by 6 p.m. (CET), the following
day. This time may vary.
My site comes up as a blank, white page.
What is my domain's IP address?
How do I add a subdomain/subweb or a web alias to
my account?
You may add these to your account by going to the account control panel
select "Account Profile", then select "Upgrade Account", there are drop
down menus to choose which features to add to your account.
I'm having a problem with logging into one of my
ftp accounts. It is giving me a "500 Illegal PORT Range Rejected" message.
What is this?
Your computer is choosing an invalid source port. Source ports must
be of a certain range (as specified in the RFCs). Please make sure you
are using a recent copy of your FTP program, and that you are able to
FTP to other sites.
This problem is most common on Windows NT 4.0.
Someone is spamming me! What can I do?
We recommend that you download a spam filter. These enable you to specify
certain domains/eMail addresses to ignore and will delete them from
our server before your eMail client downloads them. There are several
available at our tucows mirror. One that we have instructions on setting
up can be found at: http://www.tucows.com.
How do I copyright material on my web site?
Copyright is legal and binding from the moment you create something
that is copyrightable, no action or registration is required. However
there are several things you can do to help strengthen the power of
your copyright including displaying a copyright notice on your web pages,
and registering your copyright with the Library of Congress. You can
find out more at the U.S. Copyright Office on the Library of Congress
web site: http://www.loc.gov/copyright/circs/circ1.html
I keep seeing 408 Errors in my access logs. What
is this?
This is a connection timeout error. It basically means that people are
pressing the stop button, closing their browser, or clicking on a link
while a page is still loading. There is nothing that can be done to
eliminate the occurrence of these errors, however, they are more likely
to occur on pages that have a lot of images or that take a long time
to load.
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