Opening Up Apache To The World how?

I've installed Apache on my Windows XP system -- it works nicely. The problem is that I can only access it via my own computer. Would there be any chance of me enabling access without having a proper DNS?

I was thinking that there would be a way to specify an IP adress in order to do this. Obviously I can't do 127.0.0.1 (or whatever it is).

I've gone on the command promt and looked up my IP. I get the following:

Windows IP Configuration

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.x.xxx
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.xxx.x
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.x.xxx

Ethernet adapter Network Bridge:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Autoconfiguration IP Address. . . : xxx.xxx.xx.xx
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : xxx.xxx.x.x
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :

Which one would I use? (sorry, I won't have access to another computer for another couple of days). Would there be anything else that I would need to adjust? I'm behind a router and a firewall (Panda Platinum 2005).

Thanks for reading this

~ Kushika


P.S I won't be hosting sites or anything, just for testing out things on different platforms, etc.

Kushika,I don't think you understand DNS properly, this is for resolving the NAME to an IP, e.g. if your computer is called Sam, then the DNS is to make sure that your computer and those on the network understand that Sam actually lives at 192.168.53.3. So just look at it as a NAME that is used instead of an IP address when refering to that computer.Without using a "Proper DNS", the IP Address is the only address you actually need, no need for names at all.First things first, lets make sure Apache is listening for all connections on port 80, in httpd.conf or the config file of apache, there should be a line that starts with Listen,That line should read:Listen 80Which means Apache will listen on all connections on port 80. If you set an IP address here, then Apache will limit it's connection to only that IP, not what you want to do if you want it to be available to everyone.Your network or localhost IP will be what you use to connect to your own server, outside of the network, those you give access to must use your Internet given IP, which might be static or dynamic, if dynamic you might want to get a dynamic DNS name to give out.You'll need to set up port forwarding or httpd service in your router, you'll make your network IP of your computer where to forward connections to, on port 80 using TCP.You'll need to configure your firewall to allow connections to port 80 on that computer.There's probably more to do, but I can't think of any right now, too early in the morning for me.Cheers,MC

have a look at DynDNS.orgthey provide a free DNS domain name, that even works on ISP that use Dynmaic (changing IP's)It quite usefull.If your router supports DynDNS, then your router can auto update your DNS account every time your ISP changes it,if not, then you can install the dynDNS software onto your computer, when will update your account when you re-boot.at one point i had registered qwijibow.homeLinux.net, (no-longer used)