Where Do You Begin?

Who Is the Host?

Continuing with the "Host as creator" analogy could get you in trouble in some circles (not to mention with your editor!). Because DotNetNuke is an "equal opportunity application," we'll find another way to describe the Host that is less prone to cause this particular brand of excitement. (DotNetNuke generates plenty of excitement in business and technology circles and we're quite content with that.)

To clearly identify the Host requires you to first review a defining characteristic of DotNetNuke. You'll recall from Chapter 3 that DotNetNuke supports "multiple web sites from the same codebase." With one installation of DotNetNuke, you can create as many unique portals as you like, each with its own URL(s), identity, features, users, data, and so on. You learned in Chapter 4 that each portal has its own administrator, but this begs the question, "Who administers the creation of portals?" So this is how the scope of the role first comes into focus. The Host is the user who creates portals. But the Host does a lot more — so much more that this entire chapter is devoted to the role.

Prior to version 3.0, the Host was alone in his sovereignty, carrying all the responsibility that went along with being the only user in that role — big title, big job. There was only one Host account. Version 3.0 introduced the role of SuperUser, so instead of being forced to play deity a Host could open ranks to allow for a more Justice League approach to configuration and maintenance. All SuperUsers have "superpowers" in the DotNetNuke universe, including all of the capabilities traditionally associated with the original Host account, such as access and full administrative permissions to every portal in the installation.

So the first thing you've learned is that "Host" is a legacy term, carried forward from previous generations of DotNetNuke. Understanding this, you can now feel free to interchange the terms Host and SuperUser — in all but one case. The default installation of DotNetNuke has one SuperUser account preinstalled whose username actually is "host."