Web Hosting Service

Before you start looking for a web hosting provider, you should know the terminology used in this field. The following terms are also considered to be key factors in choosing the suitable hosting plan.

A web host, also known as web server, is a computer connected to the internet that is more powerful than normal PCs and is set up to serve up websites. Your website content will be located on this computer so that people would be able to access your website. Web hosts can be categorized into the following main categories based on the price level and common features: free hosts, shared hosts, dedicated hosts, collocated hosts, reseller hosts, and other hosts.

Domain Name is a name that points to where your website is located. Space / Storage is the amount of web server’s disk space available for user’s website files, images and databases. Bandwidth is the amount of data transferred from web server to clients’ internet browsers. Server Type usually means the operating system that runs the web server. Common types are Windows, Linux and UNIX. There are different types of databases; the most commonly used is mySQL because its an open source software and can serve a lot of online applications’ requirements.

As for Server Side Scripting, many users prefer to use PHP as server side scripting, as it can meet a lot of webmaster’s requirements. Other users still prefer to use Cold Fusion, CGI, ASP or PERL.

Most hosting plans include the feature of having some email accounts with customer’s domain. A standard way of transferring files across the Internet is file Transfer Protocol (FTP). Most webmasters upload and download their websites contents using FTP. Most web hosting companies provide their customers with a control panel - a web based application that helps in managing websites. Uptime is an important feature of web hosts that is usually measured in percentage.

With the wide variety of options available for customers, the price also varies greatly. It’s not recommended for business website owners to select very cheap plans (less than $5) as these plans usually presuppose a compromise in the quality of support and dependability of the server.

Linux Web Hosting Services

The open source Linux web hosting alternative allows websites to be built on the Linux Operating System. By using this particular platform for your web site, you have access to the effective and efficient open-source technologies, which include PHP, MySQL, Python, and XML. Linux web hosting is usually very affordable, and at the same time Linux platform is by now one of the most stable ones.