VesperNet History,
section MacDomain
Throughout the many years, I have in one way or another provided hosting services to friends and family, and even a few strangers. I have always been a fan of the idea of having your own space on the internet. However I would also like to do it slightly differently, and I had a few ideas in mind.
Quota Considerations
While I do not have a problem with providing a certain amount of space for free, I do have one where the services are abused. I have seen it happen before, and I would like to avoid it. Especially when it comes to users who have no intention of using the space for its intended purpose, and instead use it for file storage / file sharing / file dumping.
So, I decided to implement a quota system. Each user would have access to a whole floppy disk's worth of space, and if they needed more, they could request it. I would then review the request and decide whether or not to grant it - but as a general rule of thumb, the quota is otherwise never increased.
FTP
I just put this here to get your hopes up, FTP is not available, and I have no plans to implement it at this time. Everything is instead managed via the web interface.
Web Interface
Via the web interface, users can create, edit, rename and delete files as well as upload and download them. Directories are currently not supported, but it is something I might look into adding support for in the future.
Users can also see how much space they have used out of the total quota, and the cache status of their files - which can also be invalidated by the press of a button.
Directory Index and Default Index
The default index files are index.html and index.htm, and if neither of these files are present in the user directory, the directory index is shown instead. The directory index is a simple list of files in the user home directory.
Subdomains
If a user has requested web hosting, and the request has been granted, the user also has the option of setting a different subdomain for their account, in place of the username. This is done via the web interface, and the subdomain is then used in place of the username in the URL.
It is also possible to delete the subdomain, which effectively also cancels the web hosting for that user.
Quick listing the features
Hang on, hold up!
Why is there not directory support? No FTP? This doesn't make any sense! you might think. Well, in a way it does when the stack is taken into consideration. The user space was done a bit differently, we're not actually hitting the filesystem - at all. While it is a fairly simple task to implement and emulate the functionality of directories, it is not something that is currently prioritized. The same goes for FTP support, it's not entirely impossible to emulate and simulate the functionality of a filesystem, however as with directories,. it is not prioritized.
Anyways, there are of course perks if the user is behind the Vesper DNS, such as connecting the registrar account to your MacDomain account. This will allow you to bind your domain to your free web hosting account, and you can then use your domain in place of the subdomain.
Next subsection: AIM / ICQ