Explanation of Hosting

You have an idea that you want to transform into a site? Your first move should be to uphold your enthusiasm and find a spot for your website on the World Wide Web so that it will be always available for the whole world to see.

Where should you host your web site?

Because the number of websites on the Internet has increased rapidly during the last several years, the need for hosting services has also lead to the emergence of incalculable hosting service providers. These are firms that offer you storage space for your own web site on their hosting servers.

Types of hosting services

The reach of hosting services varies tremendously, so do the requirements of the web page owners. The most basic web hosting type is the small-size file hosting solution, where files can be uploaded via File Transfer Protocol (FTP) or a web-based GUI. Many Internet Service Providers (ISPs) offer this service free of charge. Personal web page owners and firms can also obtain website hosting services from various hosting vendors. Personal web hosting services are typically either free, ad-supported, or cheap. Business website hosting services normally cost more, but owing to the big rivalry on the hosting market, an increasing number of hosting companies, like us at CultHost.com, furnish business web hosting services at reasonable prices and with flexible invoicing intervals.

Sorts of web sites and their prerequisites

The free web hosting solution is normally sufficient for personal web pages like portfolios or online journals. A more resource-consuming site, such as a social networking web site or a corporate web portal, necessitates a more advanced hosting package that offers database support and web application development platforms (for example PHP). If you wish to set up an online shop, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) must be supported by the hosting plans provider of your choosing. At present, SSL certificates are provided by most web hosting companies.

The hosting Control Panel

The web hosting packages provider typically also offers a web hosting Control Panel user interface for administering your web content, e-mail addresses, email aliases, domains, DNS records, and so on.

Service stability

When choosing a hosting plans provider, website availability is a very important factor. The availability of a website is measured on an annual basis by taking into consideration the time when the website is publicly accessible and visible on the Internet. Network and service availability guarantees, therefore, should be mindfully taken into account when ordering a website hosting package. The best thing to do is double-check the SLAs and the Terms & Conditions of the web hosting services provider of your choice in advance. Reading reviews from current customers is also a pretty logical step before you decide to subscribe.

The shared web hosting platform

The most widely used and inexpensive type of web hosting service is the shared hosting solution. It includes 24-7 customer support, which is a big benefit for users who would not like to deal with server maintenance tasks, but could also obstruct customers who wish to exert more authority over the web server. For such customers, a VPSs or a dedicated servers would be more appropriate. Most standard apps and scripts work fine on a shared web hosting server. Moreover, the shared web hosting solution costs less than other types of web hosting solutions, like the dedicated hosting, since the web hosting packages provider divides the web server among multiple clients. The shared web hosting platform typically includes usage restrictions that guarantee that the different clients do not meddle with each other and that the shared web server stays stable.

Handling your shared website hosting account

Shared web hosting packages usually offer a web-based Control Panel interface, like cPanel, DirectAdmin, Plesk, and so on. The majority of the large-size hosting companies, again like us at CultHost.com, use their own custom-designed web hosting Control Panel interface.

Server maintenance

With the shared web hosting platform, the host is responsible for administering the web and e-mail servers, for installing web server software, security updates and patches, and for providing technical support to its clients. Most servers are based on the Linux OS. The web hosting service provider's sysadmins are in charge of keeping the OS up to date, unless you have a dedicated web hosting server and full root access.