This is weird, two domain names resolving to the same IP
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So as not to be seen as self-promoting with a URL, please note that the domain names used here are obviously faked. I'm really just after some logical explanation of the situation described below. My main company website, sample.com is hosted. I was checking the error logs and found quite a few where the referrer was listed as someothername.com. Out of curiosity, I pasted the referrer (someothername.com) into a browser and was greeted with my company's homepage! I ran a ping on someothername.com and it shows my dedicated IP address. I also ran a ping on my sample.com and it also shows my dedicated IP address. WTF? :confused: How can another domain name point to my dedicated IP address? Is it possible that somebody screwed up a DSN record with their registrar? I just did a lookup on the someothername.com and see that they changed their records more than a few months back, but then, it seems like they might have noticed it by now. :zzz: Now, it just so happens that for the past few months, certain web resources at my hosted site have been acting flaky...static xml files become unavailable, then a few seconds later, it's fine...images failing to load with the same behavior, a quick refresh and they now show up. It doesn't seem to me like the first thing would have anything to do with these problems, but the timing does seem weird. :~
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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So as not to be seen as self-promoting with a URL, please note that the domain names used here are obviously faked. I'm really just after some logical explanation of the situation described below. My main company website, sample.com is hosted. I was checking the error logs and found quite a few where the referrer was listed as someothername.com. Out of curiosity, I pasted the referrer (someothername.com) into a browser and was greeted with my company's homepage! I ran a ping on someothername.com and it shows my dedicated IP address. I also ran a ping on my sample.com and it also shows my dedicated IP address. WTF? :confused: How can another domain name point to my dedicated IP address? Is it possible that somebody screwed up a DSN record with their registrar? I just did a lookup on the someothername.com and see that they changed their records more than a few months back, but then, it seems like they might have noticed it by now. :zzz: Now, it just so happens that for the past few months, certain web resources at my hosted site have been acting flaky...static xml files become unavailable, then a few seconds later, it's fine...images failing to load with the same behavior, a quick refresh and they now show up. It doesn't seem to me like the first thing would have anything to do with these problems, but the timing does seem weird. :~
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
Having multiple domain names resolving to the same IP address is perfectly reasonable. The server typically uses the "host" header to determine which site hosted on that address to route the request to, usually with a fall-back site for unrecognised hosts. However, if the other site isn't associated with your company, and you're not using shared hosting, it sounds like someone's made a mistake with their DNS records. You could try running a "whois" query on the other domain to see if you can contact the owners to let them know. Having a second domain pointing to your IP address wouldn't cause any technical problems. If you're worried about your company's site appearing for requests to the other domain, you could add a dummy site to your server with the specific host header, which would serve up a static HTML page notifying visitors of the mistake. Configure a Host Header for a Web Site (IIS 7)[^]
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined." - Homer
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Having multiple domain names resolving to the same IP address is perfectly reasonable. The server typically uses the "host" header to determine which site hosted on that address to route the request to, usually with a fall-back site for unrecognised hosts. However, if the other site isn't associated with your company, and you're not using shared hosting, it sounds like someone's made a mistake with their DNS records. You could try running a "whois" query on the other domain to see if you can contact the owners to let them know. Having a second domain pointing to your IP address wouldn't cause any technical problems. If you're worried about your company's site appearing for requests to the other domain, you could add a dummy site to your server with the specific host header, which would serve up a static HTML page notifying visitors of the mistake. Configure a Host Header for a Web Site (IIS 7)[^]
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined." - Homer
Richard, Thanks for the quick answer! I looked through the account information for my web host and it does not mention 'shared' anywhere. I think the issue lies with an incorrect DNS record and looking at my web stats (hits almost doubled) it all started back in August...yep, it has been at least half a year since I checked web stats or error logs! X| I suppose I should be a nice guy and at least inform my web host...maybe it's something they have to sort out, or at the very least they can tell the owner of the other domain about the problem. Thanks again! :)
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
