Understanding Domains: Transfer, Forwarding, and DNS Management

Here is an overview of domain management, for if you ever need to move your domain to another provider, forward it to another website url or you need to change your DNS (Domain Name System).

Transferring a domain

When you are transferring a domain there are two types of processes:

Domains with the extensions .com, .net, and .org (and a few other country-code domains) use Auth Codes. This means the domain has to be unlocked, and you need the Auth Code before you transfer your domain to another provider. You may be asked for the domain code before you initiate the transfer.

Domains with the extension .co.uk and .uk (and a few other country-code domains) use IPS tag (Internet Provider Security tag) which is the identifying code of the provider. To transfer the domain, once it’s unlocked, you will need the code of the new supplier - it’s usually a piece of text all in uppercase without spaces. The new supplier will provide this tag code for you when you initiate the domain transfer.

What the common DNS record types mean

Address Records (A and AAAA):

• A record:

  Maps a domain name to an IPv4 address. This is the most common type for basic website and service access.
  This is usually the main record for pointing the domain to the website hosting(IP)

  It can also be used for the subdomain www. to point to an IP address.

• AAAA record:

  Maps a domain name to an IPv6 address. Used for websites and services that support IPv6. This isn’t used as often as A records.

Canonical Name (CNAME):

• CNAME record: Creates an alias for a domain name, for pointing it to another domain name. Useful for creating subdomains or aliasing one domain to another.

  This is often used for the www. part of the url and it’s pointed to a text value (like ‘yourdomain.co.uk’) rather than an IP number.

  It’s also used with some builders like WIX/Squarespace to help connect the domain to their platform.

Mail Exchange (MX):

• MX record: Specifies the mail server responsible for accepting emails for a domain. Directs email traffic to the correct mail server.

Name Server (NS):

• NS record: Defines the authoritative name servers for a domain, indicating which servers hold the domain's DNS records.
  Nameservers can be used to transfer DNS control to another place - for example hold the domain and renewal of your domain on X provider but have your website and DNS control on Y provider.
  The benefits of this are; it can help save money, or it can keep the owner of the domain separate.

  But this change is usually done in a different place to where the DNS records are listed as mentioned on the video.

Text (TXT):

• TXT record: Stores text information about a domain, often used for verification (e.g., SPF records for email authentication) or other administrative purposes, like validating a domain, for use on a platform like WIX/Squarespace etc. or even for using Google tools like Google Search Console.

Subdomains

Subdomain are like ‘domain extenders’ - for example www.yourdomain.co.uk is a subdomain as it has www. prior to the root part of the domain yourdomain.co.uk.

A subdomain can have any text (or even numbers but not as common) before the root part of the domain - you could even have a completely different website on a subdomain, if you wanted. For example https://support.thesmartbear.co.uk has my support website for my clients, and https://www.thesmartbear.co.uk has my main website. The DNS records are pointing to different places for each subdomain - either using A records or Cname records.
For example: the A record for support.thesmartbear.co.uk points to IP X, and the A record for www.thesmartbear.co.uk

Some builder platforms will give you a default subdomain when you sign up with them. For example WordPress.com will give you something like yoursite.wordpress.com which you can freely use for your website address or change it to a domain name you have purchased.

The other articles mentioned in this video are:

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