hi, new to xampp

[Litebulb]

Greetings,

I have just installed Xampp, and also a newbie experimenting on setting up a home web server. I had managed to get the server to go live, with my domain pointed to it.

Few queries for my understanding:

1) To get into the server, all i need to do is to point my web browser to my home ip. since i am using a router, there are several PCs attached to it. the questions is, how would it direct me to the PC where i had my xampp installed to? say my home ip is 20.20.20.20 and my xampp server ip is 192.168.4.45, wouldnt i need to point to http://20.20.20.20/192.168.4.45 in order to locate the server?

2) what if i have 2 PCs running xampp?

3) i have installed a firewall software with port 80 opened, and had my router forward port forwarded as well. in terms of security, do i need to beef up anything else? can i assume that with the installation of xampp, security has been taken care of? will users from the internet be able to access files within the server?

[Nobbie]

>how would it direct me to the PC where i had my xampp installed to?

You have to configure your router to forward all requests on port 80 to the IP of the Xampp PC.

>what if i have 2 PCs running xampp?

If you like to run more than one Server in your LAN and like to access them from outside, you must run them on different ports and install a portforwarding in the router for both ports, for each Xampp PC one portforwarding. That also means, if someone from outside would like to access your second Xampp, he must supply the port number in the URL (because if it is not supplied, the default value will be 80).

>will users from the internet be able to access files within the server?

No. Even if you totally switch of all firewalls nobody can access the files.