A few questions on networks/servers..
 

Ok Im not an expert at this stuff so bear with me.

Say I wanted to setup a server. Would I connect it directly to the modem, then to the hub/switch/router? If so, how?

Talking about hubs/switches/routers, whats the difference between them all?

Talking about internet, how do people host a web site on their server? Do you need any special software?

thanks in advance

Okay, here we go:

1. If you want to setup a server, the server will have a network connection (NIC Card), rather than a modem. The NIC card will connect to the switch/hub/router with an RJ-45 cable, also called CAT-5, or CAT-5e. The cable looks like a phone cord on steroids, with 8 copper wires in stead of a phone cord's 4.

2. The difference between a hub and switch is they're both on the same LAN. A hub will forward all packets through all ports all the time, so if you have 5 computers on a hub, all packets between two of those machines will be heard by the other 3. A switch, on the other hand, has intelligence enough to know which machines are plugged into it where, so, if the same 5 machines were plugged into a switch, and 2 were talking, the other 3 wouldn't hear anything, since the switch is smart enough to send the packets only betwen the two machines.
A router, on the other hand, will connect your LAN to antoher network. For example, a cable router will connect your home network to the cable company's.

3. You need a web server to host a web site. If your looking to host a site publicly, you'll also need a domain name (tfproject.org is a domain name), and a public IP address. Apache (www.apache.org) is free, good, but can be difficul for the novice. Microsoft has server software for the Professional/Server lines, called IIS, which is easier to manage for the newer user.

BTW, if your looking to host a simple web site, nothing too big or fancy, and your not too sure how to do it, you might want to look into hosting services. There are a number of comapnies that will (for a fee) setup the domain name, the server, and give you an ID and password, so all you do is log onto the server, put in your files, and your rocking.

there are a few considerations....

1) Most isp's block the traditional ports (web:80/443 ftp....). Many cases hosting a website violates your service agreement. You can still use an another port, but its kinda funky (looking).

2) Does your ISP give you a static or dymanic IP? A dynamic IP changes periodically, so you'd need a dyndns service to keep your domain and ip "synched." If your not planning on using a domain name, you can still hand out your ip, but again, if it changes, you'd have to let everyone know. It might not be so bad if only a few friends used it, but otherwise....

3) Since you probably have only 1 IP, you most likely would need to connect the server to a firewall/router box and set it to forward the appropriate traffic (eg traffic on port 80) to the server (the firewall/router sits between the internet and your server).

4) You need web server "software" like Apache (runs on everything) or IIS (windows).

I think the switch/hub/router subject has been discussed before. Search the board and see what you find.

What he said.

I run my own webserver as a project to host my webpage. It is fun, but can be a lot of work too. It isnt something for the faint of heart. If you dont have the time or patience to sit and tinker for a long time, its probably best to find a host.

You kinda misunderstood me. I meant the cable modem, not a phone modem. My bad.
Thanks for the input.

BTW I know what Cat5 cable is. And a NIC. not that ignorant in this subject.

If your running a cable modem, do you have a router (Linksys) behind that? If so, what you can do is turn on port forwarding so that a request to the cable modem gets sent to your web server's IP address. Then from the outside, you can go http://123.123.123.123 where the 123's are the outside address of your cable modem.

And sorry for the Nic/Cat 5 stuff, but when people say their new, I try to get all the info I can in there. ;)

Another question: If I add another NIC to my PC, could I use two connections to my router and double the internet speed?

Wouldn't make it faster but it would leave one less port to use on the router. One NIC has normal Cat5 cable that comes from the modem and the other has crossover cable going into the router uplink port.

no, the bottle-neck would be the internet connection itself. unless the router has some kind of weird bandwidth throttling rules, the speed coming out of the router to your single card should be pretty close to, if not max (as long as no one else on your side of the router is downloading).

The cable modem is probably giving you ~1-2Mbs, the wan port that it connects to (on the router) can usually handle 10Mbs, and the "switch" on the router which your computer is connected to, is usually 100Mbs along with the nic in your PC.

confused yet? this is one of those cases were diagrams come in handy