What is Web Hosting?

What is Web Hosting?
If you have a company and want web presence than you need a website. With the website any one from the world must be able to view your pages, images etc.

Website is actually a collection of computer files including the images, sound files, flash files. These files need to be store in a computer with high speed internet connection and these computers are called the servers. These servers and placed in a good place where there is no dust and temperature are maintained. These places are called datacenter. Many companies host their web servers in datacenter for providing the server space to the people for hosting the web site. These companies are called web hosts or web hosting services providers. They charge monthly or annual or both the fees for providing the space for your site.

Different Level of Web Hosting
There are three level of hosting

• Shared Hosting (Virtual Hosting)
  Servers are expensive so hosting service provider shares the sever space to host many sites on the same machine. So the one server servers many web sites. Usually on one server 1,000 web sites can be hosted. This makes web hosting affordable because you pay a portion of the server fee instead of the entire server. Over 95% of websites of the internet are hosted on shared hosting environment.
  
  Shared hosting is an economical, flexible Web solution for both individuals and small- to medium-sized businesses looking to establish an online presence through static, personal and "test" Web sites.
  
• Dedicated Server
  If you planning to host big application on the internet in that case you need a full server for running the application. In this case you are using the Dedicated Sever (server dedicated to your web site only).
  
• Server Co-Location
  In some cases you can buy your own sever and setup the applications according to your requirement and place the your server on some ISP with high speed internet connection. This is called Co-Location hosting.

Linux vs. Windows Hosting?

Which is better?

We are often asked which hosting platform one should choose: Linux or Windows. Below, we've listed the major differences between the two that you should consider in making your decision. In the process, we have also tried to dispel any common misconceptions regarding these platforms. Generally, we recommend to use Linux, unless they need specific features/applications only available on the Windows platform.

Reliability
The general consensus is that Linux is more reliable and our experience also shows this. We have had servers up for over one year without any downtime. Microsoft's Windows 2000 is much more stable and reliable than previous versions, but there are still cases where a server will require a reboot to resolve an issue.


Functionality
This is where these two platforms differ the most. There isn't much that can be achieved using one platform that can't be done on the other one. The main difference are the underlying technologies. For example, if you need a database driven web site, you can choose either PHP/MySQL combination under Linux or ASP/MS SQL combination under Windows®2000.

Security
Out of the box, neither Linux or Windows is very secure for Internet use. So some modification is required to make it secure.

Price
Linux holds an edge due to the fact that the most of the software we use is open source (free) and that it's easier to maintain Linux servers than Windows servers for the same level of reliability and performance. On Linux apache web server is nearly bullet proof and it is very stable and gives high performance.

Hosting Choice
When it comes to Web hosting, Linux has, for some time, been widely considered the best OS for Web servers. It's typically found to be the most reliable, stable and efficient system and, as such, it's commonly used for the demanding environment of Web and mail servers. If you use PHP, Perl or MySQL, Linux is the way forward. If apps are Microsoft-specific, then Windows is what you need. But the fact that over 75 per cent of all sites are hosted on a Unix platform tells you something.

Speed
There is no difference in terms of speed between the two platforms.

File Types
Almost all the file types are supported on Linux web server. Commonly, the following extensions are supported:
.cgi, .html, .htm, .pl, .php, .shtml, .asp (requires additional plug-in), .xml, and others. Basically it means that you can host web sites that use different types of server side scripts including .cgi, .pl, .php, and .asp (with plug-in).

Easy to move to other Hosts
A web site designed to be hosted on a Linux based web server can be hosted on a Windows web server easily, where as the reverse is not always true. This provides flexibility in changing hosts as required.

Scalability
Usually, a web site starts with a few pages of html and grows over a period of time to suit the customers requirements. It is preferable to design a web site keeping this requirements in mind. A web site designed for compatibility with a Linux/Unix based web server meets the scalability requirement easily without making any site wide design changes .

Introduction to Domain Name

What is Domain Name?
If we have to send a letter to someone, we must know his/her mailing address. In the same way if we want to visit a website, we also need to know its 'address', and this address the domain name. Here are some examples of domain names

• roseindia.net

• Google.com

• Amazon.com

• Internic.net

• Linux.org

• Yahoo.com

Domain name is case insensitive, which means Google.com, google.com and GOOGLE.COM are the same. A dot act as a separator in a domain name. The part after the last dot is called the Top Level Domain (TLD). From the examples above, their TLDs are

Domain Name	Top Level Domain (TLD)
Google.com	.com
RoseIndia.net	.net
Amazon.com	.com
Internic.net	.net
Linux.org	.org
Yahoo.co.uk	.uk
Natalie-Portman.ws	.ws

What is WHOIS Record?
A searchable database maintained by the registrar, which contains information about networks, networking organizations, domain names, and the contacts associated with them for respective domains. Also, the set of rules that describes the application used to access the database. This site uses fasterWhoIs, an advanced engine that quickly searches all registrars' databases for domain name availability.

WHOIS record consists of several components, all or most of which are asked to complete when registering a domain name. These are:

Registrant: The person/organization that registered the domain name.

Administrative contact: The person/organization that will be responsible for all administrative issues pertaining to the domain name, including registrant information.

Billing contact: This is the person/organization responsible for handling any billing issues related to the domain name.

Technical Contact: The technical contact is one of the most important aspects of your registration record. This is the person/company that should be contacted regarding any technical issues pertaining to your domain, and usually contains the contact information of the domain name registry that registered the address.

Should you ever wish to sell, transfer or otherwise modify your domain in a significant manner, there is a good chance your technical contact will have to become involved. As a result, it is absolutely crucial that your technical contact information remain up to date ? otherwise, making any adjustments to your domain will become frustrating, and potentially impossible.

There are also several pieces of information that are only when a domain name is queried via a WHOIS service. These include:

Registrar of record: The domain name registry that registered/approved the domain name.

Record last updated: The last time any sort of alteration/update was made to the domain?s WHOIS record.

Record expires on: The date the domain name expires. When a domain name expires, the registrant risks losing control of the name.

Record created on: The date the domain was initially registered.

Domain servers: This contains the DNS (Domain Name System) information for a domain; there are usually two lines of DNS information. The first is typically a site?s primary DNS information, while the second contains secondary/back-up information.

Why do you need a Domain Name?

You need a domain name to create your own web site and make a presence on web. Buy your own domain name (yourcompany.com/yourcompany.net etc..) and create good looking web site. You should register a domain name for your company. Once registered, the domain name becomes your property as long as you pay the annual fee to the registrar. So the first step of web presence is the domain name. Then next you create a good looking web site for your company.

How to Choose your Domain Name?

You can take the name of domain on your company name or your own name, I mean the same should be related to your business or profession. It should be catchy and easy to remember.

Where to Host the Web Site?
Host your site with a commercial hosting company (with your own domain, you won't find free hosting anyway). As you are paying for the hosting the hosting company will keep it up 24x7 and maintain the server. If you are not satisfied with your hosting company you can move your site to some other hosting company. Paid hosting company gives many features like Ftp upload of files, Front page support, Database support etc.. plus choice to upgrade the hosting plans at any time .