Yes you can ! (Though for me your name has propogated, still this is a very useful question. Please mark this thread as resolved.)
The DNS system is so that the whole world can discover the ip address assigned to a name, but since you already know this assignment, you can bypass the DNS. Also the only computers that need to know the assignment are:
– The server
– Your computer
Remarkably enough none of the networks in the middle NEED to KNOW !!!!
I find this quite exciting, it means that I can use this technique to test new host sites BEFORE changing the DNS referal settings.
This is the information that you need:
– the name the server has been configured to serve the website for
– the IP address of the server.
As part of every computers network configuration is a file usually called “hosts”, the full details are here for your operating system:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosts_%28file%29
This file is consulted for a match BEFORE the name is looked up otherwise.
So on my ubuntu system I add two lines into my /etc/hosts file:
<ipaddress of server> secondrunreviews.com
<ipaddress of server> www.secondrunreviews.com
Once the name has propogated in the DNS, then you can (and probably should) delete these extra lines from your hosts file.
You can test that your entry is working by:
ping secondrunreviews.com
You can see if the name has propogated with:
dig secondrunreviews.com
It seems that the dig utility does not consult hosts.
I have just tested this technique, I have some old WordPress accounts where the name subscriptions have lapsed, but is still setup on the server, I can access this site again.
Ross, thank you so much! This along with, what was some cryptic information from my hosting company now makes sense! I appreciate your simple concise explanation. I can now access the admin side.
I’m excited to do all my setup and get everything looking just right before I make the move.
Thank you again. I am very grateful.
