To really get the most out of you VDL server you are going to want to "get hacker". Download a copy of a program called PuTTY - this is your secure telnet program.

Once you have this baby going fire her up and type in your server's domain name.

You should get a black window that looks much like a DOS window. Do not try to use DOS commands as this is something totally different. It is a shell script driven interface.

Don't worry if you don't understand what that is. It is enough to know that you have left GUI (Graphical User Interface) for CLI (command Line Interface) where you type your commands directly. You should now be connected to the server and talking to it directly.

It will ask for your username so type it in and press return (sometimes called enter).

Now it will ask for your password. You will see nothing appear as you type. Press enter/return when you are done.

All things being equal you should now be logged in as a user and probably with the shell called bash or a near relative. There is a more powerful account called root. Root has authority to do whatever it wants. With out server your root password should, by default, be the same as the one you logged in with. So for goodness sake keep it secret and change it from time to time.

Now if you want to look around type "ls" (no quotes) and you will see a list of files and directories in the working directory (where you are now). To change directory (folder to those too used to windows) type "cd" (no quotes) followed by a space and then a command such as ".." (two dots no quotes) to go up one level ("cd .." remember the space) or the name of a folder ("cd thisfolder").

You can switch directly to your web-space by typing something like "cd /home/USERNAME/".

Now if the server is messing about on you you might want to restart it type: "su -" and (unless you used "su root") type your root password (should be the same one you logged in with) and then type "reboot". You should get a system message saying the server is going down.

This can take a few moments so dive off and grab a fresh coffee. When you get back you can kid yourself that you have made it to some geekish higher level.