How To Run Your Own Blog Site For Free
Gain Independence from Big Blog Sites
Do you want to start your first blog, or do you call the blogosphere home and want to gain total control over your own blog website? If you want the absolute control and independence and you are comfortable with some installation, this article is for you.
You can gain independence from big blog sites by installing your WordPress blog on your own web hosting account and registering your own unique domain name.
Here is how you can get a a blog software, a matching web hosting plan and a real domain name for free.
Step 1: Get the latest WordPress blog software for free
Download the latest stable version of WordPress from wordpress.org to your hard drive.
Step 2: Finding the right free host
The WordPress software has to be installed on a web server which is accesible over the internet around the clock. For a small or medium blog or website, you do not need to rent an entire web server. A shared web hosting account should do the job just fine. In most cases you can even go with a free hosting plan which allows you to upgrade later on when your site is growing. There are several free hosting providers out there providing a hosting environment which may meet the requirements for a successful WordPress installation. Fortunately our own free offer on PhpHosting4free.com is matching all of the following requirements perfectly:
PHP 5
Even though the actual version of WordPress is supposed to run under PHP 4.3 and greater, it is way better to go with a hosting plan providing a stable version of PHP 5. This gives you the advantage of improved performance and security as well as the ability to run some WordPress modules requiring PHP 5.
MySQL
WordPress will store all blog entries and pages in a MySQL database. For this reason the hosting plan has to provide at least one database, MySQL 4.1.2 or greater.
Apache Module "mod_rewrite"
WordPress can create user and search engine friendly URLs. For example a call with parameters like
http://www.example.com/?p=73
can be rewritten into
http://www.example.com/blog/my-article
Rewritten URLs are easier to read for people and search engines and is one factor for successful on site search engine optimization.
Even though WordPress does not need URL rewriting to function, we do not want to miss out on this feature.
Own Domain Name Support
When you want to run your WordPress blog under your own domain name, the hosting plan has to allow you to point your domain to your hosting account IP address or name servers.
Step 3: Get a free domain name
Most free hosting providers allow their users to host their sites using a sub-domain under one of their domain names. But using a sub-domain can turn into a problem when the user decides to move the website to another host. Loosing the internet address of the site means to loose all incoming links and users which do not know the new address.
To avoid this, you want to get a real domain which you can point to any hosting provider you want. It may even give your blog a more professional appearance.
In general I recommend to register a domain name under a top level domain like .com or a country TLD. But this article is about not spending a penny for the whole site. So you may go to the only place I know which allows to register free domain name under a official top level domain controlled by the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers): dot.tk
At dot.tk we get a free domain name under the top level domain .tk, which we can point to our free hosting plan. Note: You will loose a free .tk domain name when it counts less than 25 visitors in 90 days. This does not apply to a paid .tk domain name where we would gain legal ownership for the period paid.
Step 4: Pointing the domain to your blog
The domain name provider gives you detailed information about how to assign a domain name server to a domain. Most hosting providers provide instructions about how to add a domain to your hosting plan as well. Follow these instructions step by step.
Step 5: Installing WordPress
When the domain is pointed correctly, you can install WordPress on your Server. Pleas follow the Installation chapters in the WordPress documentation.
Web Links:
wordpress.org - WordPress
phphosting4free.com - PHP Hosting 4 Free
dot.tk - Dot TK
