Inexpensive ASP.NET hosting with wildcard subdomains?

9 Comments

• Jon,
  
  
  
  It's nothing to do with the ASP.NET hosting. As long as you can change the DNS settings for your domain, you're fine.
  
  
  
  Just add a wildcard DNS A record to the zone file for your domain.
  
  
  
  So if the IP address is 62.1.2.3, the A record line in your zone file then looks like:
  
  
  
  * A 62.1.2.3
  
  
  
  That way, all requests to any sub domain will end up at specified IP address and you can then handle them appropriately.
  
  
  
  Hope that helps.
  

• I hosted some sites at LFC a couple years ago. I wasn't impressed with the service and switched only a couple months thereafter. It wasn't horrible, but i do think there are better options out there.
  

• Wim, that is ignorant.
  
  
  
  DNS settings will do nothing if the ISP configures IIS to listen to the host headers. Yes, the DNS will make sure all subsites are mapped to the correct IP - they sadly will not be served by YOUR iis instance, though, as it does not listen to them.
  
  
  
  I just checked our own setup (HELM), and it seems to be the same. Not sure you CAN set things up properly without a separate IP. I am not sure IIS accepts wildcards.
  
  
  
  That said, $15 a month for hosting is pretty much nearly zero.
  

• Thomas,
  
  
  
  I think you're being completely ignorant.
  
  
  
  Of course you need to make sure you have your own dedicated IP address. But that's self-explanatory.
  
  
  
  And don't talk to me about IIS host headers - I passed an MCP exam for IIS.
  
  
  
  All I'm saying is, if your website has been setup with a blank host header - the default (it can still have specific host headers), and you have a dedicated IP address, which you get at each decent host, then this sub domain problem is very easy to solve by adding a wildcard A record in the DNS zone file.
  
  
  
  Without your own dedicated IP address, this is indeed not possible.
  

• Okay, guys, play nice or I delete comments. I want a host that supports the configuration, and DiscountASP does, so this seems like a great solution.
  

• Hi John,
  
  
  
  For the hosting company, you just need any host that will let you purchase an IP address. For example, GoDaddy lets you purchase an IP address for $2.95 per month, on top of the hosting plan you pick.
  
  
  
  For the zone, you need a registrar that will let you create a wildcard entry, I am pretty sure that GoDaddy do *not* let you do this, but definately Enom(.com) do, alternatively you can just use a free service like zoneedit to create your zone (they do support wildcard zones).
  
  
  
  You could definately to the whole thing at GoDaddy (but possibly need to setup the zone at ZoneEdit for the wildcard) for under $12 per month.
  
  
  
  The only other warning I will give you is that some hosting companies limit what you can do with your account. For example, GoDaddy run ASP.NET 2.0 with CAS (Code Access Security) enabled (not sure which trust level), while if you run your site as a .NET 1.1 site, they give you full trust (for some reason), using the NetworkService inbuilt account.
  
  
  
  Other thing you need to watch with some cheaper hosters like GoDaddy is they block all outbound network calls, so your ASP.NET app cannot call external web services (etc). That is unless you purchase a full dedicated server, or a Virtual Dedicated Server account for $40 per month or so (ie you get RemoteDesktop access then).
  
  
  
  Hope that helps.
  

• Jon,
  
  If you're going to go the route of a free DNS provider, I like/recommend EveryDNS.net. I've used them for a couple of years with great results. I even have a wildcard record set up as Wim talked about up top and it work find w/IIS.
  
  
  
  You can configure your DNS records however you need, and the cost is $0. Of course, if you like the service then they will accept donations.
  

• Was very helpful. Thanks
  

• Hi John, As you said in the start of this post "[1] Wildcard subdomains means *.domain.com, where any thing entered before the domain maps to .domain.com. As an example, blue.domain.com, red.domain.com, yellow.domain.com, and anycoloryoucanthinkof.domain.com would all map to the same site. This is different from unlimited subdomains which require manual setup - this should all happen on the fly."
  
  I am excatly want to achieve this, that any string (as subdomain) should direct it to main page, I am able to create * record for A record in zone file, now how to achieve rest? I am getting 404 error.