Help Centre / Domains And Going Live
DNS Records Explained
DNS is the internet’s address book. You own a name, and DNS is how you say which machines that name points at. Connecting a domain to Oxyforge means adding one line to that address book, so it helps to know what the lines mean.
What A Record Is
Every DNS record has three parts, which is why the Domains tab shows you three columns.
- Type is what kind of answer it gives.
- Name is which part of your domain it applies to.
wwwmeanswww.yourdomain.com.@means the domain on its own, with nothing in front. - Value is the answer itself, either an address or another name.
Your registrar may label these differently. Host, Points to, Target and Data all turn up. The order is almost always the same.
The Types You Will Meet
| Type | What it answers with | Used for |
|---|---|---|
| A | An IPv4 address | Pointing a name straight at a server |
| AAAA | An IPv6 address | The same thing on the newer addressing |
| CNAME | Another name | Pointing a name at a host that manages its own addresses |
| MX | A mail server name | Where email for the domain is delivered |
| TXT | Plain text | Verification, SPF, DKIM and similar proofs |
| NS | A nameserver name | Which company answers DNS for the whole domain |
You will use two of these for a website and leave the rest alone.
The Record Oxyforge Asks For
One record, a CNAME pointing at sites.oxyforge.net.
A CNAME means “ask that name instead”. It matters because we can then change servers, add capacity or move a site between machines without you touching DNS again. An A record pins your domain to one address and goes stale the moment anything moves.
We do not ask you to change your nameservers. Your DNS stays wherever it is now, and you add a record to it.
Why The Root Of A Domain Is Awkward
The DNS standard does not allow a CNAME at the root of a domain, the bare yourdomain.com with nothing in front. The root has to carry other records, like MX for your email, and a CNAME cannot sit alongside them.
Some registrars offer a workaround record (ALIAS, ANAME or CNAME flattening) that behaves like a CNAME at the root. In practice these proved unreliable at local registrars, so Oxyforge does not accept a bare root domain at all.
What to do instead: connect www.yourdomain.com here and make it your primary domain, then at your registrar set up URL forwarding from yourdomain.com to https://www.yourdomain.com. The forwarding is a redirect, so anyone typing the bare name arrives on the www address, and search engines treat the site as one address. This is how most well-run sites are set up, and it is what Oxyforge’s own redirects assume.
TTL, And Why Changes Take Time
Every record carries a TTL, a time to live, measured in seconds. It tells other computers how long they may remember the answer before asking again. A TTL of 3600 means an hour.
That is why a DNS change is not instant. Resolvers around the world are still inside the window they were given for the old answer. In practice most people see the change within minutes and a few stragglers take hours.
If you know a change is coming, lower the TTL on the record to 300 a day beforehand. The old answer then expires quickly when you make the switch.
Who Actually Runs Your DNS
The NS records decide this, and they are not always where you expect. The domain might be registered at one company while a different one answers its DNS, because a previous developer moved it or because you put the domain behind Cloudflare years ago.
Look at the NS records for the domain. Whatever company those names belong to is where you add the record. Editing the zone at the registrar when the NS records point elsewhere changes nothing, and it is the single most common reason a domain stays pending.
Email Records Are Separate
Oxyforge does not host mailboxes, so nothing we ask you to do touches mail. Your MX records, and the TXT records that back them up, carry on pointing at Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 or whoever you use.
Delete an MX record by accident and mail stops arriving, often silently. Change the web records only.
Checking What DNS Says
Public lookup tools will show you the live answer for a name from outside your own machine, which is more reliable than loading the site in a browser. Your browser and your operating system both keep their own caches and will happily show you yesterday’s answer.
The platform does its own check. Use Check Again in the domain’s row menu on the Domains tab and let it tell you what it sees.
The Mistakes That Come Up Most
- An old A record left next to the new CNAME. Two answers for one name, and visitors land in both places.
- The record added at the wrong company, because the NS records point somewhere else.
- A proxied Cloudflare record, the orange cloud, hiding the real answer. Set it to DNS only until the domain is live here.
- The value typed with a protocol,
https://sites.oxyforge.net. A CNAME value is a bare hostname. - A trailing dot added or missing. Some registrars want
sites.oxyforge.net.and some add it for you. Follow what the other records in your zone look like.
When you have the record right, carry on with connect a domain to your website.
Did this answer it? If not, open a ticket from the members area and someone who runs the platform will pick it up.
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