Hardware & Gaming Network

HwGN FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions

Who Is Eligible To Join?: Small to medium sized PC hardware, tech, or PC gaming sites are eligible to join. If you have an established site, or if your site is brand new, it is eligible to join HwGN. There is no minimum number of hits required to join. Sites are required to be in English.
What's provided with a HwGN hosted web site?: The default setup for sites provide up to 150MB of disk space, shell access (SSH), 1 FTP account, 25 e-mail accounts, 1 mail list, 2 MySQL databases, 2 subdomains for your domain, 3000 Megabytes of bandwidth, PHP, PhpMyAdmin, CPanel for your access panel, and more. More disk space and bandwidth can be provided as needed for larger sites.
What About Domain Names?: HwGN does not provide or purchase domain names for its members. If you have your own domain, it can be hosted on HwGN. If you don't have your own domain name, you can be given a subdomain on HwGN, such as "quake3arena.hwgn.net".
Does HwGN Charge for Hosting?: No. Hosting provided by HwGN for your site is provided as part of the services of HwGN. However, to help defer the cost of the server, banner ads are run in the required HwGN Header.
What is the HwGN Header?: The HwGN Header is run on all pages on all HwGN hosted sites. The header can be run on the left hand side of the page (as is currently done on HwGN), or at the top of the page (as is currently done on the HwGN Forums). The header currently includes the HwGN Text Exchange, banner ads, and the HwGN logo. Content of the header can be updated by HwGN without requiring the sites to make any updates to their pages. Sites place the header in their pages by inserting <HWGN_LEFTHEADER> to run the header on the left hand side of the page or <HWGN_TOPHEADER> to run the header on the top of the page. The HwGN Header tag is placed immediately after the HTML <BODY> tag. The HwGN Header is mandatory for all pages on all HwGN hosted sites.
Do I Have To Transfer My Site To The HwGN Servers If I Join?: If you have your own domain name and you want to keep your site where it currently is hosted, that is fine.
What Do I Need To Do To Join?: Click the Apply For Membership button displayed near the top of the page and fill in the form. Be sure to provide all the info requested on the form. There are no minimum number of page views or unique visitors per month to join HwGN, but include those numbers if you have them. Your information will be stored in the HwGN site info database and a message posted to the Contact HwGN Messages. HWGN Committee members will process your request. You'll recieve an e-mail response when a HwGN Committee member acts on your request. The action taken by the HwGN committee member on your request will also be recorded in the Contact HwGN messages. You'll be able to contact HwGN Committee members through the Contact HwGN Messages. If your site is accepted, you will be provided with further info for logging into your site.
What is the HwGN Committee?: The HwGN Committee is a new approach (as of Jul-24-04) being used by HwGN to help promote the community aspect of HwGN. Member sites are selected from those who are willing to serve on the HwGN committee to look over and approve or reject membership requests, help answer questions about HwGN, work with sites to insure that HwGN grows and meets the needs of its member sites, etc. The HwGN Site Info and Contact HwGN Messages are setup such that HwGN committee members can carry out tasks related to setting up accounts for users simply and easily. The Contact HwGN Messages insures that all committee members can see and be aware of responses to sites done by other committee members.
Can My Site Expect to Get Any Exposure on HwGN?: The HwGN Text Exchange is run on all HwGN hosted member sites through the HwGN Header. The HwGN Text Exchange has replaced the previously run button exchange. The HwGN Text Exchange provides exposure for your site on all HwGN hosted member sites. The text displayed for each site includes a link to the site currently being displayed. The exchange runs through the list of HwGN member sites displaying the text for each site. The script running the exchange remembers where it left off as pages are loaded. This helps insure that each site gets the same number of displays as any other HwGN member site. The text run for your site on the HwGN Text Exchange is entered by you in the HwGN Site Info database. The text to be run for your site in the exchange is initially entered when you fill out your membership request. Your site's exchange text will start being displayed in the exchange as soon as your site is accepted as a HwGN member site. You can update it at any time by going to HwGN Site Info and editing the text. The exchange is currently being run at the top left of the HWGN_TOPHEADER and the top of the HWGN_LEFTHEADER. Each member site is also encouraged to e-mail other member sites with news about updates and posts at their sites. Correspondingly, each member site is encouraged to post news from member sites when possible.
Will you help me make a site?: The Hardware & Gaming Network is not setup to build or assist in the design or content of a web site. However, we encourage each member site to help other member sites who may be experiencing problems getting their site setup. However, you must realize that each member site will be busy with their own site and can not be expected to offer extensive time consuming help.
Does My Site Have To Have A Minimum Number Of Page Views Per Month To Join?: No. HwGN only requires you to have a quality PC hardware, tech, or PC gaming site. One of the goals of HwGN is to provide sites a place to get started and hopefully expand and grow. Also, if you're satisfied with the size of your site and don't ever intend to make it bigger, that's fine too.
I don't have my site built yet, and I don't have a web site to put it up on so you can take a look at it. What do I do?: There are free Web-space providers that you could check out and setup a version of your site for HwGN to review. This will allow you to post enough of your web pages to give an idea of what your site would be about and how it would look. If you are just starting out and can provide enough convincing info about the site you will be running and can show some examples of your work, HwGN will not require you to setup a whole new site just to move it again to our servers. You are required to be convincing and sincere about creating a quality PC hardware, tech, or PC gaming site (it doesn't have to be the worlds best right off!). However, if you fail to build a quality site, you will be informed and your site will be removed from HwGN.
Will I Get E-Mail Accounts on My Domain?: Yes. E-mail accounts along with your own mail server address are provided. Even sites on a hwgn.net subdomain will have their own e-mail accounts and server address. For example, someone named mike running a site on a subdomain at quake3.hwgn.net, could have an e-mail account name like mike@quake3.hwgn.net.
Do I have to run HwGN's banner ads?: Yes. Banner ads are run to help cover the expenses of operating HwGN. The banner ads are included in the HwGN Header that is run on all pages of HwGN hosted sites.