How to clear DNS cache in Windows, Linux, Mac

We have experienced Linux and Windows specialists on-site, so you can always contact our hosting support team, if you have any issues accessing your website. Even if it's hosted with other hosting provider.

by Alex Benko, 2by2host

DNS cache is something that your computer uses to quickly look up the IP address of for example a web site. There are some situations that will require your to clear your DNS cache in order to get the latest information.

To flush DNS cache in Microsoft Windows (98, 2000, XP, Vista, 7):

  • Go to Start -> Run -> type in cmd
  • from command prompt, type ipconfig /flushdns
  • that will reset your DNS cache

To flush DNS cache on Mac OSX (Leopard):

  • type lookupd -flushcache in the terminal window
  • that will reset your DNS cache

To flush DNS cache on Mac OSX:

  • type dscacheutil -flushcache in your terminal window
  • that will reset your DNS cache

To flush DNS cache on a Linux box you need to restart the nscd service/daemon:

  • type /etc/rc.d/init.d/nscd restart the terminal window
  • that will reset your DNS cache

How to enable IE developer toolbar

Are you developer or even a web studio? Switch your website(s) to our high quality professional web hosting or even earn money by referring customers to us.

Sometimes when debugging and developing web pages in IE we spend a lot of time refreshing the page to see the changes. To help us debug the pages Microsoft created a toolbar plug-in, very similar to BugZilla for FireFox.

These are the steps you need to install the toolbar:

  • Download IE Toolbar
  • Run the downloaded file
  • Restart Internet Explorer
  • You'll notice the icon in the IE userbar

Note for IE8 users

Please ignore the outlined steps above. You already have this toolbar built-in into your IE8. Just press F12!

Proxy server could not handle the request

Proxy server could not handle the request GET/POST message

Proxy Error

The proxy server received an invalid response from an upstream server.
The proxy server could not handle the request POST ...
Reason: Error reading from remote server

Usually you can see this error message on the websites hosted with overselling hosting providers. Their servers are always overloaded by a huge number of websites, so that they just stop responding to user's browser requests.

Solutions:

  1. A. Switch to a decent hosting provider like 2by2host.com
  2. B. Move to a fully managed hosting package, like managed shared hosting at 2by2host.com

How to install WordPress theme from cPanel?

Some older versions of WordPress do not support “one-click” theme installation from the admin panel of your site. In this case, it is easy to install a WordPress theme from the cPanel of your web hosting account. This is probably the fastest and the most reliable way as you don’t need a third-side program and even don’t have to unzip the theme archive. It is not even necessary to know your FTP logins.

  1. In my cPanel I entered the File Manager under the “Files” section. I expanded folders public_html — > myblog (optional) — > wp-content — > themes.
  2. I downloaded the theme onto my hard disk. There is no need to unzip it.
  3. I found the icon “Upload” in the File Manager and uploaded the theme to the themes directory.
  4. I clicked on the “Extract” button to unzip the theme archive.
  5. I returned to the admin area of my WordPress site and found the recently installed theme there. I clicked on it to activate it.

Concrete5 requirements

by Alex Benko, 2by2host

Concrete5 System Requirements

Concrete5 runs well on any web server that supports PHP. We prefer Linux based Apache

Recommended Web Servers

  1. Apache 1 or 2
  2. Microsoft IIS not recommended by Concrete5 developers but will run on that system

Recommended Database Servers

  1. MySQL 3.23.4 and up.
  2. MySQL4.0.15 and up with 5.x recommended

PHP Recommendations

  1. PHP 5.1.x and up with PHP 5.2.x recommended

Other Considerations

  1. Python 2.2 only needed when comparing versions of pages using HTMLDiff
  2. GD support

Our choice of the best packages to run Concrete5 is either our managed shared hosting or GoEasy plan both of them have been fine-tuned to run Concrete5. A lot of people recommend these as a perfect platform for Concrete5 web hosting.

How to clear my Facebook settings from application

If you used a Facebook application and don't want it to run there any longer you need to take the following steps:

Log in to your Facebook account. Then go through these steps: Account -> Application Settings -> Edit Settings -> Additional Permissions. On the last page you should un-check the checkbox next to the application you don't any longer need and save the form.

How to Find and eplace Data in MySQL

To update and replace some value of a key we would need to run this command:

UPDATE `pages` SET `content` = REPLACE(`content`,”wrong text”,”right text”) WHERE `id`=”1″;

Inserting youtube videos into WordPress

Sometimes it is important to insert a youtube video into your blog post.

I tried and found it was easy for me to do it.

I searched for the video I wanted to publish. In the right sidebar I found the line: “embed” and clicked inside the box with the code. The code immediately got highlighted and I could copy it. But first I clicked the button next to the code and saw the drop-down dialogue. There I could select color of the border, size and some other parameters.

I entered my blog — > wp-admin — > posts — > add new and switched to HTML code.

I pasted the code I had copied on You Tube.

I clicked “publish” and that’s it! The video is available on the pages of my blog.

I want to add some text, so I switched to the visual mode. The embedded video was displayed like a square shape and I typed in the text after that shape.

Do you see only visual mode and can’t switch to the HTML mode? Go to users — > your profile. Un-check the box in the upper line of your profile.

This is how it looks like in my blog.

What are widgets?

I created categories, tags and pages, but I didn’t see the list of them on my site.

I had to create menus in the sidebar of my blog which would provide an easy access to my content. All these menus have been already created for me by wordpress. I had to only activate it with widgets. Widgets are sections in the sidebars of your site. You can easily add them, remove and rename widgets in the admin panel — > appearance –> widgets.

Drag and drop the necessary widget to the destination side bar. If you have three-column theme, then you will see two sidebars in the “widgets” section.

Each widget has a drop-down menu. The name of the widget can’t be changed for wordpress, but you can change it for the readers of your blog by typing in the title. The title will be displayed as the name of the widget in your blog.

Don’t forget to click save each time.

What widgets to add?

If you have created tags, categories and pages, and you want readers to see them, add the correspondent widgets.

I would advise to add the “meta” widget because it has link to admin area and the log in/log out link. You can even put some text in your sidebar. This can be an advertising or an announcement.

This is how my sidebar looks now.

How to publish WordPress to Twitter?

The popularity of a blog depends on how many people had a chance to notice, to read and to subscribe to your blog. Popular social networks, like Twitter simplify blog advertising greatly and enlarge my audience.

  1. 1. I searched for the plugin.
  2. 2. I selected the plugin “Twitter Tools” and downloaded it from www.alexking.org
  3. 3. I installed the plugin to my blog.
  4. 4. I activated the plugin “Twitter Tools” in my admin area by checking the boxes next to this plugin and by applying the bulk action: “activate”.
  5. 5. I entered Settings — > Twitter Tools in the admin panel. I typed in my twitter account information. I configured the other options as I liked. There is an option to create posts from your tweets and I switched it off.

I excluded some categories from Twitter.

In the Appearance — > Widgets — > I found the “Twitter Tools” widget and dragged it to the Sidebar 1.

Now I can publish to twitter from the sidebar of my blog. It also can display my recent tweets. But it doesn’t display tweets that were created from posts.

I can also publish to twitter from the admin panel. Posts — > tweet subpanel appeared there.

When publishing a post, I can also specify if I would like to publish post to Twitter right under the Categories.

6. I was satisfied with the results. There were three tweets published from different places in my blog.

The tweet from post had tweet prefix (1) I configured in Settings — > Twitter Tools, the name of the post (2), the URL of the post (3), and the tag (4).

The URL of the post can be shortened with Bit.ly. The option is supported by Twitter Tools and can be activated in Settings — > Twitter Tools.