I want to register a domain and run it on my apache server, which I installed using apt-get, but I don't know how configuring and buying a domain name for apache works. My web server is currently running off my IP address.

I'm running Ubuntu 11.10 on a VDS/VPS.

Thanks in advance.

Hi,

you can read this to understand.
Domains are registered through a registrar (this one is just an example).
Then also you can read about Apache configuration here and here or here.

One question so far. How do you do this part if you didn't configure apache from source, but instead used apt-get.
1. Uncomment httpd-vhosts.conf in httpd.conf

If you’ve installed Apache 2 from source, by default, the following line will be commented in the httpd.conf file. Uncomment this line.

# vi /usr/local/apache2/conf/httpd.conf
Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

Also, why does it have a windows 98 thing at the bottom left of all my posts. I've always wondered.

Then consult with your distribution's documentation to find what the location and name of the configuration file is. Virtually all distributions will place configuration files for system-wide services in a subdirectory within /etc.

You said you used apt-get. That implies a Debian-based distribution. I have an Ubuntu machine (a Debian derivative) with apache installed. Ubuntu places the configuration file for apache2 at: /etc/apache2/apache2.conf.

If all of the above "sounds greek" then you should search for an apache server howto for your distribution. The howto should direct you to where the configuration file exists on your system.

Regarding the "Windows 98" issue, the forum tries to determine what operating system you use by looking (presumably) at the user-agent string your web browser provides. The forum does this partly to help people responding to questions. The reason is because the answer might depend on the distribution being used (like my above reply to your original question), but the question-askers do not always know to include their operating system/distribution or overlook it as a possible influence on the solution.

No it all makes sense. Thanks.

I'll try it out and see if I get any errors.

It's probably because it doesn't recognize Windows 8...