WEB HOSTING is having your website files on a group of computers which will display your website 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
Most websites are hosted on servers using the Linux operating system which provides for MySQL databases and PHP programming.
Maybe 20% of websites are on servers using the Windows operating system which provides for MS Access databases or MS SQL Server databases and use ASP and ASP.NET programming languages.
Hosting will also provide email servers, so that you can have email addresses containing your domain name instead of an ISP’s name.
There may be thousands of web hosting companies, so how do you choose one for your website?
We always recommend choosing a web host in your own country:
- Time delays in screen refreshes between locally hosted websites and those hosted half a world away can amount to a quarter of a second.
- Time zone differences can be annoying when you are trying to contact your host. Sure they may have a 24 hour phone service, but when it’s 3 am their time you may be speaking to someone who can only pass on your request to the technical people the next day.
Cost is always a factor in choosing a host. However:
- Cheapest may not always be the best.
- Dearest may not always be better than average.
Reputation is a good deciding factor. If a host’s clients can recommend them for continous uptime and helpful service, what more can you ask?
Resellers who have only a few hundred hosting clients can provide more personal sevice than the hosting companies with ten thousand clients. Resellers won’t let your website disappear if you forget to pay the hosting fee.