Registering new web hosting service.

Once the above step is complete, user must go for a new web hosting service and must sign it accordingly within 24 hours so as to enable new account earliest.

Taking Files Backup.

As soon as you created a new web hosting account, you should take back up of all your web files for the new provider. Generally you already have all files of your web site on your local computer still it is beneficial to backup all your files from old web server. Further including HTML files, backup of any script file, database file and even of server logs file should be taken. Thereafter create a directory structure similar to directory structure on web server and then load the file in their respective directory.

Uploading of files

You will receive a notification email from your new web-hosting provider after the notification of your new web hosting account. Information needed to set up a website including FTP server information all will be provided within that email. With the help of that FTP information user can now FTP his new web-hosting server and can upload all his files. First the user should create a directory structure and then can upload all his files in their respective directories. User can also install any script file or databases if used in his website and also should setup his email accounts with the help of administration panel.

After finishing of uploading of all the files and installation of script files or databases temporary URL can be used to test the new site. This temporary URL can be obtained from through notification email from new web hosting provider.

Testing of new website

The new website can be tested online by using temporarily URL directory. As different web hosting server require different server environment to work, that’s why user needs to verify all the scripts like CGI, Perl if they are working as per the requirement or not. Further all the hyperlinks should be tested in the normal web pages so as to confirm that no broken links are there. Your website hosted on the old web hosting provider is continued to be operational, even when you are testing through the temporary URL directory. Transferring of domain name After finishing of testing new website on the temporary URL and verification of its perfect execution, next step is to contact the new domain name registrar so as to change the old domain name server to point the new DNS of the web hosting provider. There after the user will get DNS information through email after he finishes the successful registration with new web hosting provider and also would get the information from website of his new web hosting provider. The purpose of Domain name servers is to control how to resolve the domain name. Commonly the domain names are in following format:

NS1.THE-NEW-WEB-HOSTING.COM

NS2.THE-NEW-WEB-HOSTING.COM

Some domain name registrar requires the IP addresses of the DNS. In this case you have to provide the IP addresses of your new DNS. For example:

NS1: 216.193.194.212

NS2: 216.193.207.106

DNS record to change and propagate through all the WHOIS servers takes typically 24 to 72 hours. Whois tools such as whois.com can be use on Internet to monitor the status of DNS transfer. New DNS will be displayed once the transfer is complete. Even minor modifications are possible like the user can upload his own file or picture to the new web-hosting server. When the user checks his homepage through the normal domain name he can notice the new home page, which makes sure that transfer of DNS is successful. Final Testing Now, your website on the new web hosting provider is officially transferred and online. You should repeat all the tests to ensure it is fully functional.Thereafter you can go ahead to terminate your old web hosting account after the final confirmation is received.

Now what is dedicated web hosting? Dedicated web hosting is having one single server rented to a single customer by the webhosting provider. Virtual dedicated servers and co-location web hosting are two similar solutions relatively familiar in the web hosting industry. In virtual dedicated server hosting plans one does not get an entire computer just for oneself this means that the virtual server shares the resources of a web server computer with other customers of the web hosting provider. There are many similarities between both Co-locating web hosting and virtual dedicated servers but the main difference is that, in co-locating web hosting the customer owns the web server computer and web-hosting provider only houses the web server computer and sells bandwidth to the customer whereas in dedicated web hosting the web server computer belongs to the web-hosting provider and is only rented by the customer.

When single web server is rented to a single customer it is called real dedicated web hosting.

For businesses that work with high traffic, dedicated web hosting is the idyllic way out. Application required for its operation and functionalities of web site falls under ones specific control.

There are many advantages of dedicated webhosting:

• Concerns regarding the maintenance, the security, and the reliability of ones web server are all handled by hosting provider.

• One doesn’t have to bother about maintaining the hardware and the connectivity of the computer as it is on rent and not been purchased

• One is freed from replacing the component or solving the problem, as everything is provider’s responsibility

• One gets compensations as part of the Service Level Agreement (SLA) by most o f the web hosting providers.

• In the occurrence of failure one may get reimbursement with the cost of ones hosting plan for a month or a fraction of it, depending upon the severity of the failure.

• When compared to having to pay for the component and for the technical support required for actually replacing the component, while web site in not online all these advantages seems quiet good as at the day end one will just be paying for functional hardware.

Imagine the business with all the resources being saved on the above maintenance issues. One can choose between “managed” or “unmanaged” service levels as the costs of administering and maintaining the web server one has taken on rent will vary depending upon the web hosting provider.

One can choose “managed” dedicated hosting which means one will have access to “control panel” if one is uncomfortable with the technical expertise required by the management of a web server computer. All the essential tasks required to be performed by the proper functioning of ones web server via a simply point-and-click user-friendly interface are allowed by control panel.

This way one can setup, administer and maintain all the web sites on web server without knowing or typing any command lines nor having any in depth knowledge of the operating system.

Those with great degree of technical expertise in mastering a root access to the server can go for “unmanaged” option. “Unmanaged” option offers complete server administration, thus having possibility of configuring every service on the web server. But if necessary services are not configured properly it may result in failure of system. Due to these reasons unmanaged dedicated hosting is recommended for only people having solid server administration background or for web developers who require custom applications for their web sites, or a customized environment. Thus people having dedicated server computer’s stability will not be prone to the plagues affecting shared web hosting solutions.

Imagine-

-errors in programming usually made by the beginners,

- Or overload i.e. server being crowded with applications and components required by the other customers

- Or in a shared web server when the processor time and the installed memory are both shared by the software applications needed by the other users.

Instant support is provided to its customers when required by the dedicated web hosting whether managed or unmanaged which is not possible on a shared hosting plans where one will be facing delays and possible additional technical support fees.

If one is having prompt support service from ones side then the customers will be happy and at the same time there will be growth in business. For those doing business in web designing advantage to have his own dedicated server is priceless not because he will be able to offer pure hosting services, but because he will able to offer them packaged with the web design activity also. When one is having access to web server for 24 hours, then within minutes one can modify a website for a customer or upload a new one.

If complete web presence solution, design and hosting, is offered by the studio to a customer there is chance of that customer being regular this is an added advantage.

The benefits of a good dedicated web hosting are:-

• Businesses solutions being translated into sales growth

• Better customer relationship results to improved company image

• Reduced cost compared with in-house web hosting solution, and so on.

• One can run a better business and better business gives good profit.

Web server in addition to making site visible performs several other functions as well like it provides the ability to create email addresses based on one’s domain name and even helps in sending and receiving emails with them. There are several types of software installed on the web server that allows one’s website to run programs, create and manage databases, display video, etc. One must note that almost any type of computer can function as a web server, but it’s the software that’s on it that makes it a server.

When one goes buying a web hosting, the monthly fees to be paid includes cost for maintenance and upgrading of the server’s hardware and software, the cost of keeping it online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in a secure data center with a fast and powerful internet connection, and cost of professional proving these services. It is surprising to know that it is possible to turn one’s home or office computer into a web server if one really desires, but it is just not economical. Therefore it is better to outsource it. There are several kinds of web hosting available which are discussed below:

Kinds of web hosting:

Shared Hosting – Through a shared server one can save a high amount. If one talks about the drawbacks then Spamming and blacklisting from different search engines are the key problems. Such problems arise due to the reason that several sites are assign to one particular IP address. One should demand for a separate IP address for his/her website (on additional monthly charges) to secure the user from such problems.

Dedicated Hosting –Dedicated servers are best for big, highly trafficked websites, which will require large amounts of server resources to run. One of the downsides to shared hosting is that the server’s resources are divided across all the sites it’s hosting and answering page requests for. If you are in a dedicated environment you can better monitor your server resources. The downside is that dedicated servers will run you generally $50 per month or more. Shared hosting can be purchased for as little as 5$ a month. Most small or medium sized businesses will have neither the website size or bandwidth requirements to make dedicated servers cost effective.

Server Co-Location – If one wants to have full control over every aspect of his/her web server, he/she might very well choose to buy one and maintain it himself/herself if he/she is having sufficient knowledge. Still there are possibilities that one is not having enough resources to keep his/her server completely safe from power outages, roof leaks, thieves, unwary employees and other problems and in addition it is not possible for him/her to keep it on the internet on a fast, high-bandwidth connection through out. Thus he/she needs a data center to provide those services for him/her.

Co-location is the center providing facilities like physical security on rental, continuous electrical power and a fast, reliable Internet connection for a server that one owns. However, the data center is not responsible for any of the hardware or software maintenance of a co-located server, rather user his/her self. Thus it is a cheaper alternative to dedicated hosting if one is having the necessary expertise and time to run a web server by own.

There are several web hosts offering UNIX hosting and Windows hosting.

UNIX Hosting

There are several web servers in the world running mostly on UNIX. UNIX is an operating system originally developed for servers and networking. Till now many different versions of UNIX have been written by programmers around the world under the open-source protocol, which means that the code for the operating system is openly available so as to enable programmers to customize and make improvements when and where necessary. The two most popular forms of UNIX are Linux and BSD that comes in several varieties, like Red Hat Linux, Debian, SuSE, and FreeBSD. The best part of UNIX is most of above mentioned versions can be obtained free of cost, making UNIX hosting cheaper for a web host in comparison to other operating systems. Other plus points of UNIX are that UNIX hosting platforms are generally considered to be stable, secure, powerful and fast. That is the reason why most web programming applications can be performed by software that is available for a UNIX platform.

Windows Hosting

Another very popular operating system developed by Microsoft is Windows operating system, Windows Server 2003. Like every thing useful it is having price and can be obtained by purchasing a license, which in turn increases the cost of operation for the web host and usually results in higher hosting prices. This is considered a negative point as compared to UNIX. Plus points of Windows include it is mainly user friendly however it is generally considered to be less powerful and secure than UNIX for operating in a network environment. There are several scripting languages like ASP, ASP.NET, and Cold Fusion, which will only run on a Windows server, as will the Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft Access database programs. Thus the above are some of the most popular scripts for certain web programming applications, and if one is thinking of using them while building his/her site, he/she will first definitely need to find a Windows host.

Before searching for a web host, it is essential to know some important terms used in hosting. They are discussed as under:

Storage or Disk space –As one’s website is a collection of files being offered on the Internet for viewing, it is necessary for storing them somewhere for retrieval and take up space. For each and every web server there is a limited amount of hard disk memory, which is divided up and offered to hosting customers. Different package levels are there, so as to enable to pay more for more space and vice versa divide specifically that space up. If one’s website expands its space then the user needs to buy extra space from the web host.

Bandwidth or Data Transfer –One of the crucial parts to verify is bandwidth. There are several sites, which loose their host due to excessive downloads causing budget going beyond their expectations. Occasionally, host even charges in hundreds of dollars for the additional bandwidth. One should confirm about this before dealing with any of the host. Usually, ideal-hosting providers deliver initial bandwidth of 25 to 50 GB to the users.

Uptime –It is a universal truth that if one talks about perfect web servers then they are the one, which would be up, and running and offering web pages to the world round the clock, whole year. But, it is also true that web servers are mere computers, and like any other computer, they may fail or needs repairing or updating. Often web hosts gives 99% uptime guarantee, and if they fail they refund a certain portion of user’s money depending on the amount of excess downtime they experienced.

Traffic Statistics – By traffic statistics we mean those programs that track visitors to one’s website. These programs are capable of telling how many times a user visited one site, how many visitors were unique and how many came back more than once, which pages were most popular, from where the visitors came to one’s site, what search terms they used in the search engines etc. In addition they offer several types of information which are useful for marketing one’s website to a target audience. There are several web hosts offering some sort of traffic statistics software with their hosting packages.

CGI Scripts – There are several web hosts offering a variety of free CGI scripts with their packages. CGI Scripts are the things like hit counters, guest books, form mail programs, message boards, and other programs that enable one website to perform commonly desired functions. Most CGI scripts are written in common programming languages like Perl, PHP or ASP.

Thus one should take care and keep all the above points in mind while selecting a web host.

One cannot deny the fact, for a successful online presence a dependable web hosting is must. Online presence and accessibility of a web site is must. If not, one should remain ready to loose clients and prospects. For an instance, if one compare this with a traditional business.

CATEGORIES OF WEB HOSTING:

One should select a web hosting deal according to his/her site. One cannot fulfill his/her requirements from same hosting deal for a personal web site, web site meant for email newsletter subscription and archives, e-commerce site or web forum. Web hosting can be divided into four prime categories:

1. Virtual (shared) hosting,

2. Dedicated server,

3. Collocation server and

4. Reseller hosting.

Two most applicable hosting are virtual (shared) hosting and dedicated server.

What is Virtual (shared) hosting? It is a condition in which several web sites share one server. It is a low cost hosting because price is divided between several users. One can locate a standard virtual hosting at a rate of $100 a year.

In a Dedicated server hosting company lease the whole web server from a particular web hosting company. The site of web server is the web hosting company. One can opt dedicated server as a suitable option who does not wish to share a server with other web masters. One can find a dedicated server in two forms managed and un-managed. If one talk about managed server, company will take care of all the setups of user’s server. However, in unmanaged server user needs to take care of all these by him/her self. The benefit of this sort of hosting is that one can fully lodge web hosting as per his/her requirements. Moreover, for a site with ample amount of visitors a dedicated server is the only rational choice. Due to higher cost, starting from $100 per month, those companies that know the worth of Internet business generally use it.

One can say that Collocation server is quite identical to dedicated server. Disparity lies in the fact that company doesn’t take the web server on lease. Their own web server is placed in the web hosting company. In addition to it, company has material access to their web server, which is not available while talking about a dedicated server.

If one mention about Reseller hosting it is aimed to those companies only wishes to begin their own web hosting business.

ASPECTS, WHICH ONE NEEDS TO CONSIDER:

There are many factors which a user needs to consider to prevent any future miss happens:

Web space:

Requirement of Web space vary from site to site. Off course, if user requirement is only a web site containing basic information about him/her and his/her work excluding the use of web applications, then space of 50 MB is quite sufficient. However, a complex e-commerce site along with numerous products in one’s database demands a capacity of 1 GB.

Bandwidth:

The term Bandwidth refers to data transferred from user’s web site and that comprise of graphic details, images, banners and files for download. One should have accurate knowledge of Content before going for an amount of bandwidth. When one talks about the majority of sites, bandwidth of 10 GB a month is quite sufficient, though for few other sites like sites related to desktop wallpapers can frequently consumes even hundreds of GB a month.

Up time or visibility:

It symbolizes time articulated in percents displaying the period a site remained online. One should not be cheerful because someone assured him/her to provide say for 98% up time because it is not going to fulfill his/her requirement. One should get at least 99.7% uptime. Believe it or not, it definitely matters.

Email accounts:

Email accounts are an integrated and crucial part of web hosting package. It is quite interesting to know for how much will one get only a so called catch –all forwarding which means that all emails sent to somewhere@mydomain.com will arrive to one’s email address or one can set-up email accounts for several users? Also the thing is for how much? Is it intended for 5, 10, 100 or limitless email accounts? In addition to it, there is no harm to verify whether user get a so-called POP3 email address (“real” email address), web mail or rather both? If one has a POP3 email address then he/she can check his/her emails via favorite email client and web mail facilitate the user to inquire his/her emails at any place demanding just a computer and Internet connection.

Form of Server, tools and control panel:

When one mention the two generally utilized hosting then the name of Unix-based or Windows platform comes first. It matters for the result program languages, databases and scripts that one can apply. When one talks about Unix-based platform, general selection is relayed to PHP language along with MySQL, however, when it comes to Windows platform ASP or ASP.NET language will be along with SQL Server. One should enquire that is database is available with package or not, if yes, then how many? Nowadays, contemporary web site must be database-driven.

Too, one should have full knowledge related to tools coming along with web hosting package, if there is only applications for web statistics, file manager and things it is not an concern issue.

Technical support:

A crucial aspect while selecting a web hosting particularly for a user without having adequate technical skills is technical support. A proper technical support does not take a responsive time more then a day. This is not liable only to selection of web hosting company, but, crucial to any of the company selling products and services, Software Company can be one of the examples.

The coordination of few of the companies is so well thought-out that it takes only 1 hour to give response to user’s queries! Through their source of contact one can predict about the future response. Do the concern company has only email support or also have phone support? Does they provide a toll-free number? Do they offer the facility of trouble-ticket system? Working time is another crucial aspect. What is their strategy of providing technical support is it during working hours only i.e. 9 to 17 or does they provide the facility of 24×7 technical support? An ideal way to detect their professionalism one can create a list of fake queries, drop a line to them and hang around to know their reply time.

Testimonials:

Several web hosting and software companies have this smart way to increase their customer strength. Testimonials section contains the approval of satisfied customers, attracting more people to their service. This section is not completely reliable. Several hosting companies offer their clients to analyze their portfolio, instead of doing that one should contact webmasters who are taking the service of concern host and register their opinions. One can take help of several sites for further information regarding best web hosting deals and suggestions.

In general it is considered a good idea to go for shared web hosting if the user is in a small business and wants to save cost. However before finalizing the deal it is good to know what is shared web hosting service and what are the merits and demerits of shared web hosting.

Defining shared hosting:

If extremely high performance and high bandwidth are not the points in question, then shared web hosting service can be a most convenient and economic way of hosting web sites.. As name implies, in case of shared web hosting service, the web server that hosts the web pages is shared by several other websites. Talking about number of websites on a shared hosting server, they can be in thousands. Now due to the fact that just one server is fulfilling the requirements of many other websites, the plus point is they can offer cheap prices for their server.

As there are so many websites hosted on a single web server, still there is no pint of worry for the user as the web hosting providers will not compromise on any kind of security and performance issues in case of shared hosting servers. Not only that, shared hosting web servers are operated, monitored and look after around the clock by IT professionals, so as to minimize server downtimes.

Shared hosting servers run on UNIX or other multi-user operating system and each website hosted on the web server is provided a separate account in the operating system. These websites hosted on shared servers are provided unique shared IP addresses and are provided with a fix amount of web resources.

The following are some of the merits and demerits of shared web hosting:

Merits:

1. Cost effective: Due to the fact that many websites are hosted on a single web server, web hosting providers provide economic shared web hosting services. Generally, the cost is as low as $5-10 per month for shared web hosting services. Now-a-days due to cut throat competition in web hosting industry, one can find several web hosting companies offering huge web space and bandwidth with as high as 1000 MB disk space and 40 GB bandwidth.

2. Feasible: Due to the fact that shared hosting web servers are operated, monitored and look after around the clock by IT professionals, who are experts in their respective field, one can concentrate more effectively on his/her web business and the problem of downtime and maintenance will not bother him/her any more.

3. Utility options: In case of shared web hosting, though web resources are shared, utility options are provided by the hosting company so that user can manage his/her website using control panel or similar tools. User is having an option to upload files, modify /remove web pages, add database, check web statistic etc. Not only that, user is also provided facility to create domain name specific e-mails accounts.

4. Efficient: Now-a-days shared web hosting service usually comes with web space and bandwidth that are more than sufficient for small business websites. Efficiency lies in the fact, that in addition to above, one can add more resources and can even overrun the web space or bandwidth usage.

Demerits:

1. Problem with response time: As the web server is shared, websites in the shared web hosting have to face problem of slower server response time as compared to dedicate server hosting.

2. Problem of Reliability: In case of shared web hosting, problem of reliability remains as usually web hosting providers may take care of the security and performance of the shared server but it is also possible that some of websites hosted on the shared server run a nasty program or script or over-utilize the resources, resulting in bringing down the web server. Thus due to fault of one all websites have to suffer downtimes and inaccessibility in case of shared web hosting.

3. Problems related to sharing: As discussed above also, due to fault of one all users have to face the problem for example if there is any one “bad” website in shared web server, due to it all websites on the server can be banned altogether by ISP or search engine due to shared IP address. However it is worth to note that one can always pay extra to get a dedicated IP address to avoid the above problem.

4. Problems related to Security: As many websites shared one server, problem of security always remains in case of shared web hosting as it is quite easy to hack one’s sensitive datas by another on the same server.

Thus in conclusion it can be said that before deciding to deal with shared web hosting, one should consider all the merits and demerits of shared web hosting as highlighted above. One should not forget the success of his/her business depends upon his/her website which in turn depends upon good host provider.

Web Host

Web host refers to a computer connected to the internet. Web host can also be termed as ‘web server’. The computer that is playing the role of the web server needs to be more powerful than normal PCs and the function of this web server is to serve up websites.

The website content of the user will remain will on this computer, so as the people who are surfing on the internet can get a way to access his/her website.

There can be three main categories in which the web host can be classified based on the economic factor and common features:

1. Free Hosts:

The users who are not professional but are making website only as a hobby then for them free hosting can be a good option. In free hosting space, bandwidth and other features provided are very limited. With free web hosting one can not only make his/her website successful but is also suitable for personal websites or for temporary usage. Generally free hosting enforces pop-up, text or banner ads. Reliability, best performance and customer support lacks in case of free hosting as well. When a user registers for a free host then the word free host gets added with the user’s domain name that gives an adverse effect in the eye of the visitors.

2. Shared Hosts:

The next type of the web hosting to be discussed is shared hosting. This hosting service is used by many of the web sites .This type of hosting service is Suitable for personal, small and medium businesses. This service can be used by paying $1 to $25 per month. The features provided by this service vary from very limited space/bandwidth to semi-dedicated servers. The users host their website by this type of hosting service and it has its own top level domain facility. No doubt that shared web hosting is quite better than free hosting but still it does not provide 100% satisfactory services. In case of shared hosting one server is shared by the number of websites so its performance and availability gets affected. More websites usually means less performance. If less number of websites are hosted by one server then it will be more expensive, but in this case there are more chances of reliability. There are many companies allowing customers to host multiple websites with different domains under a single account.

3. Dedicated Hosts:

The next type of hosting is dedicated hosting. This type of hosting is most reliable hosting. In this type of hosting a full server is dedicated to a single customer. Generally this type of hosting is used by large businesses, professionals and very active websites dealing with thousands of visitors daily. The customers having dedicated hosting can have their total control over the server as well as able to create as many websites as they like. Customers can run their own hosting company on a rented dedicated server. Payment module is mentioned according to specifications and services provided with the server, which varies from $100 up to about $800 dollars per month.

4. Collocated Hosts:

Now the other type of hosting service to be discussed is collocated hosting. This service is very much similar to dedicated hosting. The difference between collocated hosting and dedicated hosting is that in collocated hosting the customer owns the server hardware instead of renting it. In this service the server will be placed in provider’s data center. This service is more expensive than dedicated hosting.

5. Reseller Hosts:

In reseller hosting the providers offers web server storage to their customers, and resells the web server storage to them. Generally providers offer resellers a discount price.

6. Other Hosts:

Including the above type of hosts there are also many other hosts such as email hosts, media hosts, data hosts, etc but these hosts will not be discussed in this article.

Domain Name

Domain name is the name which shows the place where one’s website is located. The actual address of the website is a set of numbers. Each and every web server has its own unique address. Domain name indicates the real addresses of every websites. One can easily remember the domain name of any of the website. Remembering domain name is easier than recalling the IP addresses.

Space / Storage

Space is one of the services provided by the web host. It plays a very important role in the website development. It happens many times that the customer requires more space but the host fails to provide it, so customer should be very careful while choosing the web host. Storage is the amount of web server’s disk space available for customer’s website files, images and databases. Space can be according to the requirement; it can be as small as 5MB in some free hosts and as big as 300GB for some dedicated servers. Earlier prices of the space were very high but prices reduced significantly during the last few years. The hosting plans offering 3GB of space for less than $10 a month can be easily available.

Bandwidth

Bandwidth can be defined as the amount of data transferred from web server to clients’ internet browsers. When ever a person outlook a page the data is transmitted from the server to that person’ PC. If any one is having audio, video and images in his/her website then the bandwidth consumed is more in comparison of the website having only text contents. The bandwidth available in free hosting can be as low as 100MB per month where as in some dedicated servers the bandwidth available is as high as 2000GB a month. The customers who don’t want to pay more for bandwidth can easily find hosting plans offering 75GB of monthly data transfer for less than $10.

Server Type

Generally server means the operating system than runs the web server. Some common types are Windows, Linux and UNIX. Server type refers the server side scripting and database types. The difference between Windows server and Linux/UNIX is that Windows runs ASP and ASP.NET with Access or SQL Server databases where as Linux/UNIX servers usually runs CGI, PHP or JSP with MySQL or Oracle databases. The other difference is that Windows servers are more expensive than Linux/UNIX servers.

Databases

As server type is discussed earlier also, we are able to know that there are different types of databases available. The mostly used is MySQL as it is open source GPL (free) software and can serve a lot of online applications’ requirements such as forums, content management, mailing lists, etc. MySQL, rather its features are limited. MySQL is sufficient for small concern but it is not powerful for the complicated large business sites. Large business requires more powerful databases such as Oracle or SQL Server.

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Server Side Scripting

Usually the new comers prefer to use PHP as server side scripting. The reason behind this is that there are hundreds of open source (GPL) PHP scripts that are able to fulfill the webmaster’s requirements. However PHP also has some limitations in features required by advanced websites same as in the case of MySQL, due to this limitation some professional web developers prefer to use ASP.NET or JSP. Some other developers still prefer to use Cold Fusion, CGI, ASP or PERL.

Email

Now the next very important aspect to be talked about is Email. At present no one can move further in this computer world with having his/her Email account. The one who is planning to do any kind of activity through computer such as to run a business or to provide any kind of service, then the first thing he/she need to do is to open an Email account. There are many hosting plans that include the feature of having some email accounts with customer’s domain. The availability of number and size of email accounts totally depends on the hosting plan one opted. Generally this feature is not included in free hosting. Small plans provide only about 10 accounts where as big plans do not have the limited number. Usually those email accounts are web based and accessible through POP3 clients as well.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP)

The other service is FTP. File Transfer Protocol is a usual way of transferring files across the Internet. Most of the webmasters used to upload and download their websites contents through FTP. The process of uploading or downloading is performed by using FTP client software. Webmasters require FTP username and password so as to access their web server. There are any hosts who use to provide more than one FTP account to their customers as per their requirement. Rather FTP is unspecified; it is not advisable as per the security reasons.

Control Panel

Control panel is the service available by many of the web hosting companies to their customers. It is a web based application that helps in managing websites. Some important functions performed by the control panel are that it used to manage email accounts, providing statistics, managing FTP accounts, managing domains and sub-domains and managing databases. The control panel application that is mostly used by the user is cPanel. There are many companies who use to develop their own control panel application.

Uptime

Now after having all the services, the thing of concern which remains is how the user keeps his/her website uptime most of the time. If anyone is having a website with excellent features but it remains down most of the time it will be of no use, as when ever the visitors visit his/her website and found it down then later on they will think twice before visiting it. In result he/she will suffer the loss of visitors. Uptime is very important feature of web hosts and that is usually measured in percentage. If a server remains down near about 30 minutes a day will have an uptime percentage of about 99.98%, which is acceptable for most small to medium business websites. If any of the business website is not having at least this percentage of uptime then that website is not suitable for a business website. Mission critical sites cannot tolerate frequent outages, thus they may use web monitoring services to notify web administrators immediately when an outage happens.

Price

Finally the factor left is price. In this option also there is a great variability found like for example customer is having option to choose between the prices ranging from 0 to $1000 per month. For most personal, small and medium websites the total amount of cost involved is just $15 per month. Thus its not at all advisable for business website owners to select very cheap plans let say less than $5 because this price can lead to huge cost indirectly afterwards.