Why is the DB Server US based when the site itself is/was UK based?

Question

It was a .co.uk site when I first started using it, and it's pretty well known PM is from the UK (I think).

And if PM can upgrade the server, why keep it .psim.us?

Is it something with how psim works? Like the PS! in and itself?

Answer 1

It's actually a bit more complicated than Sciz's answer.

Firstly, domain names and web servers are completely separate things. You can have a .co.uk domain name pointing to any server in the world.

The first version of the site was hosted in the UK and with a .co.uk domain. Later on I changed to a .net domain to make it more global, but still hosted in the UK. When we started getting really popular after Black/White came out, I looked into better servers and got a new VPS which is hosted in the US*.

The Showdown server is actually hosted on a different server to the website (a smaller server, also in the US, that I host a few random sites on). The psim.us domain is required for Showdown for some reason which I don't remember exactly... I think it's to do with security for logins since those are not handled by our server.

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* Longer explanation: I chose that so it was faster for most of our users. It's on the east coast so it's not too slow for people in Europe. Incidentally we also now use something called a "Content Delivery Network" which serves some content (like images) from one of over 100 data centers around the world, whichever is closest to you.

Comments

That makes a bunch of sense, thanks! :D

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Apologies w/ the messing around the BA bit, I wanted to check what happens :0

Answer 2

It is hosted in the UK:

showdown.pokemondb.net:8000

The link you guys use to connect to the server is the one generated by PS!
psim = Pokemon Simulator
If you go to http://psim.us it'll take you to the PS homepage, but by putting the server name in front of that domain gives you a link to that server. This is called a sub domain.

And yes, I still lurk this site.

Comments

Can I just say: Woah?! :0

>mfw Sciz (omfg SCIZ) responds, the one we (mostly) owe the Server to
> mfw it's actually hosted on .uk, but psim lies to us xD
> mfw Sciz responds in like, half an hour. Do you like, hang around to see if we have questions about the server or what xD

Your explanation makes sense (mostly, because I'm a n00b), so thanks a bunch! :D

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So like, the .us is because PS! itself is hosted in the States, even though the sub domains are themselves in other countries?

Also, who actually /hosts/ it? Is it you (Sciz), PM, Ninja, or someone else, like Deso, or is it "automated" (How do I say this, I'm no good with the process) and the host systems are in the US, run by the PS! servers (which I assume are dedicated for this purpose only)? Or is that in the UK too? Is it like someone's home  system that acts as the "main" host, or is it (well, commercial isn't the right word, but something I like that)?

Sorry if these are too n00bish :(

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PM has a paid program service (which I can't remember the name of right now) that hosts this website. It seems he just hosted the showdown server with the site server using the same service. The service domain is usually the same country as the host domain. So it's all UK based as far as PM's end goes.

Someone correct me if this is wrong though.

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As PX said, it's hosted by Pokemaster on his server that I believe he buys from CloudFlare (unsure). With this one machine/server he can run loads of different processes on it by running them on separate ports. As you can see from the "code" section in my answer, the PS server runs on the port 8000 of his server. For clarification, the server is UK based.

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Sciz <3 <3 <3