A domain name is a searchable name that has been given to a static IP address.  The IP Address is a number pointing to the location of a physical memory space attached somewhere on the internet.  The domain name also associates the location the holder of the domain name.  For this reason you have to accurately identify your own identity in order to purchase a domain name.  In other words the owner of the domain name/ web space can be traced, making it an advertisable allocation in the eyes of a valid search engine.

No you do not.  You can have a web presence on a host with a given static IP address.  The difficulty is that you cannot advertise on search engines directly but only on other peoples web pages, however considering the low cost of a domain name purchasing a domain name is rarely neglected.

A hosting server is basically a computer that has allocated memory space (allocated its own static IP address) to be sold or given away, (usually for commercial purposes).  The host can usually provide services to the purchaser to enable the manipulation and availability of the space sold, such as file and folder permissions.  A good host will also provide a measure of security against intrusion, consistency of services, back up for data reliability and additional software for usability and accessibility.  The different packages provided at different costs are because of a varying of these conditions such as more space, faster services or the length of contract.  You can become your own host if you have a static IP address but this is quite involved, usually insecure, usually not as reliable, usually slower and more expensive.

In a very, very simplistic way the internet can be viewed like a forest of upside down trees or possibly like a sea of tree roots.  Every computer on the internet is probably going to be found somewhere on the very fine ends of the root system but these fine ends can protrude out from anywhere.  Now just to be a little bit more transparent, as I have described, there is not one computer at the top of the root system but many, and in truth there is not a top of the network but rather "thicker roots" that are all joined together, hence the term net-work.  It is a bit like discovering that the world is not flat but a globe.  So you discover the network is all jumbled up with thick roots, thin roots and a bunch of loose ends sticking out all over the place.  It works like this.  Every computer on the internet has a unique number called an IP address.  These numbers are used to name and help locate the computers or sometimes separate memory spaces allocated on a single computer.  All the numbers are contained in address books, in computers called DNS servers.  There are top end (like the thickest roots) DNS servers that hold the same lists of other top end (or mirror) DNS Servers and only contain lists of smaller DNS servers (which are like not quite so thick roots) that hold more address books (but not all holding the same addresses) which may lead to other smaller DNS providers or they may also contain individual IP addresses.  

Your host has placed your hosted allocated memory space in their address book.  So your space appears to be a computer.  The directory contains directions to the physical location of your hosting space and has given that space location an IP address of its own.  Likewise your host has their own IP address which is listed in an address book on some other higher server.  Remember the DNS address is not your address but the address of your host.  The search engines need to know the address of your host to be able to find your IP address (the location of your hosted space) and associate your domain name with it.

There are many ways of uploading your web pages and other files to your host.  It is most commonly done using a software package that created the web pages in the first place but many people prefer to upload the web pages using ftp.  When you first sign up for a hosting service you will receive an email with the ftp information included.

Browsers visit your host space upon request.  This request might have come from a person searching for you or it might have been from yourself, notifying the engine your presence.  Once the search engine locates and visits your host it will do several things.  To be polite it will look for a file called a robots.txt file.  This file will tell the robot locations it is not allowed to search.  Once it has done this it will seek out a sitemap.xml file because it will make the searching easier if the file exists.  Then it will look for your content and attempt to index record and index it.  The most important webpage the search engine will look for is your starting page or home page.  If undefined, the search engine will usually seek out a webpage called index, but again this will depend on the settings your host has defined.  It is an internet standard practice to use the index.html page as the home page.  This means if you are creating a website, you may title your home page whatever you want to in the html coding but it must be file / saved as / index.html

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TasWIZ offer the following services as well as a range of free advice and resources

We are a reseller of domain names, domain name re-registration and web hosting services.  We also provide custom web page design services and web page templates and web site templates. Our prices are very competitive, however we also provide additional human resource at your disposal by trying to make ourselves available to help you understand, setup and maintain an effective working web presence.  We have the technological expertise, artistic flare and view ourselves as partners with each and every customer using our services.

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