An operating system is to web hosting what education is to mankind – it fosters growth, adds flexibility and enables you to earn more. Therefore, as the choice of an appropriate school is necessary for accruing the benefits of education for a long time, the task of choosing an operating system is important for the web hosting if the online entrepreneurship is desired to acquire the shape of a successful venture.

Since there is no one-size-fits-all operating system, a strong recommendation would be to learn about the different operating systems in detail prior to selecting one that would be apt for your specific requirements. Some of the common operating systems which deserve consideration are –

Microsoft Windows – Windows NT featuring 2003/2008 server versions is a popular choice for desktops not just due to its user friendly nature but also because of its ability to provide a variety of commercial applications and merge seamlessly with other Microsoft technologies like ASP, Front Page and MS SQL. The fact that it comes from an environmental protection agency (EPA) also adds to its credibility.

Linux – Linux is a natural alternative to Windows as being a UNIX system it scores high on factors like reliability and stability. Apart from being suitable for most of the Internet related functions, now this system is not only compatible with many of the Microsoft products but also makes available open source technologies such as PHP scripting language, MySQL and Apache. Over all it is an economical and flexible option which enables the user to choose privileges in accordance with his requirements.

FreeBSD – Because it is based on the original UNIX system conversion, FreeBSD is preferred because it is flexible, stable and well designed. Being the cheapest hosting option amongst all the alternatives, this operating system has been known to perform well over the years and courtesy of its variety of applications is considered to be an open source solution as well.

Sun Solaris – This operating system is not available for shared hosting because it is very powerful environment and hence is suitable for large and reputed Fortune 500 companies only. Although a product certificate is mandatory Sun Solaris is known for its immense capacity and undeniable stability which makes it ideal for handling critical tasks, supporting a variety of programs and using a plethora of developmental tools. Owing to these reasons this operating system is suitable for servers which are intensively used on a daily basis.

Rhizomes RaQ – Web hosting on RaQ entails the services of a VPS and the main advantage of this is that not only is the user provided with administrator rights but is also allowed to avail them for distributing various administrative tasks amongst his employees. Undoubtedly, the clear interface facilitates ease of use which is a big advantage of this operating system.

Mac Web Hosting is a good Consideration, While choosing an apt platform for hosting your website, it is but natural to feel confused because of the number of available options as also the fact that some options appear trendier when compared to others.

In such a situation, it is recommended to include Mac in the list of considerations as well not only on the basis of its reputation of being intuitive and user friendly but also because this operating system has become immensely powerful over the years. Every time a new version is released there are new introductions in form of functionalities and applications which make the platform more advanced and hence increasingly suitable for web hosting.

Mac’s journey in the web hosting industry commenced in 1999 when Apple introduced the Mac OS X Server in which it claimed to combine the plus points of various other operating systems like user friendly interface from Windows, power and flexibility from Unix and so on. When this operating system was released in 2001 it gradually acquired popularity thanks to its varied functionality and usage.

Two years later in 2003 when the 10.3 version of this operating system was released it became the main web hosting platform for Apache 1.3 web servers by using the GUI administrative tools. A further leap was taken in 2007 when this operating system was able to support Apache in native form through an in-built GUI management tool and this version was named as Leopard.

There are many reasons as to why Mac web hosting is worthy of consideration, the foremost being that it revolves around the powerful UNIX operating system which is renowned for its invincibility and rock-solid reputation. Some of the additional benefits are listed as follows:

• It is capable of pre-emptive multi-tasking.

• Apart from protective memory, there is advanced memory management as well.

• Security is better than before due to which the system is safer than ever.

• Provision of fault detection and tolerance features which monitor system activity incessantly and help it to recover from system failure.

• Downtime is kept to the bare minimum as the system restarts automatically, especially after a power outage.

• Web friendly characteristics like efficient network management, multimedia streaming and so on make Mac worthy of a thought.

When you look for a web hosting platform, the two factors which concern the entrepreneur the most are stability and safety and if efficiency is also added, then such a web hosting platform is definitely worth acquiring. Hence, even though Mac web hosting is not commonly found and is a bit more complicated and technical than others, it is a perfect platform for a large administrative body.

More Information : http://www.macworld.com/article/1166270/switch_your_iweb_site_to_a_mac_friendly_web_host.html

SEO in web hosting is a tricky undertaking that requires a meticulous search of a provider who is up to the challenge. A multitude of aspects need to be taken into account to facilitate in picking the suitable provider. Technical support, relevant features, cost and reputation of a provider are crucial in aiding you to make a choice.

Search engine optimization like any other aspect of web hosting requires a provider with a reasonable experience in the business. The length of time a company has been in business tells a lot about the quality and reliability of its services. The nature of webhosting business requires after sales services that provide support for years. A continuous interaction between the host and the clients is mandatory to ensure performance is optimized. Do not fall prey to a company that makes a grand entry into the industry as they have been known to leave equally fast as well. They disappear along with your websites and investments that you have painstakingly accumulated over time.

To successively attain SEO objectives other aspect related to your website operation should be taken to account. Depending on the level of activities your site is handling, ensure enough disk space and bandwidth is allocated. Keywords optimizers, Google webmaster etc, are some of the features that you should expect from your host.

Support services from your host are critical to the optimal performance of your website. The extent of the support you get depends on the hosting plan, whether managed or unmanaged. Whatever the arrangement, the support due from your host should be a 24/7 affair. While looking for a hosting provider this is one aspect you should be very wary about. The tricky bit about it is that you only come to learn about it when the deal is done. If your provider ignores your e-mail for more than twenty four hours, you are in the danger zone.

Cost of a web hosting plan should be looked at against the quality of services on offer. With so many providers to choose from you can be able to pick a reasonably priced plan with SEO quality services. It is rational to incur extra cost if it means improving your search engine ranking.

Most potential clients find sites they are interested in through search engines. Optimizing your site increases your traffic which converts into buyers at your online business. It is therefore profitable to invest in a hosting plan that increases your search engine ranking. It should be noted however that your personal efforts as a user also count in SEO. While expecting the hosting company to provide top notch services what you do with it makes all the difference.

Negligence and inexperience on the part of programmers is the major cause of security lapses that occur online. As web developers hurriedly put up website security precautions are overlooked either due to time constraint or sheer ignorance. Minor discrepancies occurring in the process of web designing often build up into a security nightmare for the users.

PHP is one the most widely used programming language because of its simplicity and ease of use. Even developers who are newly venturing into web design find it the programming language of choice. With only elementary skills, inexperienced developers erroneously apply PHP to create software with little regard to safety precautions. On the other hand PHP has several inherent weaknesses that hackers easily exploit to gain unwarranted access to information.

Traditionally hackers used phishing where e-mails purporting to come from a popular site guides unsuspecting user to disclose vital information such as passwords. Alternatively a hacker could use pharming where traffic is cleverly redirected to another site by tampering with domain-name server system. Presently hackers have discovered flaws in web applications which they exploit to gain access to information from your website.

To stop hackers on their track customize your PHP configuration. If your PHP is in default setting disable some functions that hackers can manipulate to their advantage. EVAL, passthru, shell-exec are particularly vulnerable. Immobilize these functions which can be used singly or together with others to control your system and retrieve information from your website. It is important however to check if any of the functions is in use by any application in your website. Alternatively you can enable them on need basis.

Coding is another tool normally exploited by hackers to gain access to your website. Similarly disable options that are likely to be manipulated. Flexibility and ease of use make some applications more vulnerable to coding maneuvers. Sometimes it is a case of choice between functionality and security. Since security is paramount then due diligence from the programmers is expected to offer secure applications without compromising functionality.

As implied earlier, programmers’ sense of responsibility and expertise is the critical determinant between safe and unsafe applications. Programmers use simplicity and ease of use of their applications as the enticing bait to users. The same qualities are exploited by hackers to breach security in the websites. The choice of your programmer is therefore important to avoid security nightmares. A programmer who has positive reviews from previous clients is particularly ideal; it is an expensive affair to apply trial and error method to choose one.

One of the most crucial aspects which should be kept in mind when selecting a web hosting service is that the customer service should be adequate. There is always a need for a standby support team for the purpose of providing their help and service when it is required. So that is why it is important to find out the efficiency of customer support prior to purchasing a web hosting service.

In order to gauge this, one can call up the support team and ask them questions or share doubts with them. If they are successful in dealing with your problems and clearing your doubts then you should go ahead and purchase that web hosting service because it would be evident that the customer support group is competent. Now if the customer service executive seems clueless or fails to solve your problems then it is obvious that you should look for another company.

Most people are often under the impression that a reliable company has prompt and good customer service, but the truth is that this isn’t always the case. There can be a lot of problems cropping up which would be responsible for a bad web hosting experience. That is why it is important to have a good customer support standing by and ready to help you at your beck and call. An efficient and fast customer service can help these with problems in a timely manner, which would otherwise have caused huge financial losses to your online company.

Probably the most important aspect of having a customer support team is that they should be able to deal with problems in a quick and efficient manner, otherwise it would be useless to have such a team. When it comes to online business, every minute counts and even a single minute carries the potential to cause huge losses to your company which is why timely response and help is crucial. You should hire the web hosting company whose response time is the fastest. So if you aren’t connected to the customer service representative within a period of five minutes then you should move on to another company.

There can be a lot of problems associated with web hosting services on a daily basis and that is why the frequent occurrence of technical difficulties is quite common. So when your website goes down, you should be having a support team who is willing to lend a helping hand to help revive things. A bad customer support team is one which does not consider the customers to be their top priority and therefore does not deserve consideration.

If you take a look at web hosting today then you will see a massive industry where an increasing number of companies and businesses are in the pipeline trying to enter into the industry with the main motive of providing web hosting services to individuals as well as companies out there. However things weren’t always like this and it took web hosting at least fifteen years in order to reach the position where it is at today – a multi-million dollar industry. Thanks to the increasing development of the World Wide Web, users began to feel the need for services like web hosting which can store the data and information depicted on their websites which are projected for the world to see.

Before web hosting was developed, anyone who wished to display some kind of information on the internet through their website had to own their own individual dedicated server in order to hold the data. Then a few clever entrepreneurs came up with the idea of buying and setting up a lot of servers and then renting them out in order to capitalize on the need of many people who do not have the financial resource, time or interest to own and operate their own servers. This is how web hosting was born.

The early 1990s witnessed the removal of commercial restrictions on the internet and hence a lot of commercial activity began to develop all over the world. As a result a lot of companies were vying for establishing a presence on the internet in order to stay in the competition. At that time web hosting provided a perfect platform for people to expand their commerce online limitlessly and so companies as well as individuals began using web hosting services for their benefits.

Because of this revolutionary change people began to view the internet in a different light. Previously the internet was considered as something which was meant only for proficient users who have the required technical know-how but thanks to web hosting people did not even have to worry about their website because the web hosting providers would look into all the technical aspects for them. It was also partly because of the advancement in technology that made the usage of the internet easier for average people.

In the beginning web hosting took birth as an expensive and complex venture but with the passage of time it became basic and it was offered to even amateur users. Web hosting surely has come a long way from its humble beginning and today it is a cheap and affordable option for everyone out there.

In order to bag a good deal with a web hosting package you will need to have some basic idea about the costs of different types of web hosting packages. In this way you will have a good idea about what the fair price should be like and you won’t be tricked into purchasing a pricey web hosting plan which is actually nothing special.

Now it isn’t possible to remember the price of each and every web hosting package out there because there are way too many, so you will need to sort of work out your own average price for most of the web hosting packages based on the prices of some of the basic web hosting plans. So this means that you simply have to remember the prices of a few basic web hosting plans and you will be able to judge for yourself.

Believe it or not you will only have to have an idea of the price of three common types of web hosting namely discount web hosting, Linux web hosting and Windows web hosting. The first one, i.e. discount web hosting is probably the most popular solution these days. A lot of people who wish to start an online business are using discount web hosting solutions because of the fact that these are extremely cost efficient. You can get discount hosting plans at just USD 5 or 6 per month and if you want a quality discount hosting solution then it is only going to cost you a maximum of USD 10 per month. If the discount hosting package you are considering costs more than ten dollars then it is probably overpriced, so don’t get cheated and don’t go for it.

For USD 10 per month you can purchase Linux hosting packages and Windows hosting packages too. Undoubtedly these two score over the discount hosting plan and that is why it makes sense not to go for discount hosting plans which cost more than USD 10 per month because you can enjoy the benefits of more advanced hosting price for precisely that amount. These two hosting packages offer features which aren’t included in discount hosting packages and so you will enjoy the additional bonuses. The price of a Windows hosting package or a Linux hosting package is most likely to be around USD 10-15 per month. If you need more space or more bandwidth then it is obviously going to cost you more than that.

So now that you know what is the average cost of the three most common and popular web hosting solutions, you will be a better judge when it comes to judging whether the prices of various web hosting solutions are fair or not.

There are a number of web hosting providers and they all entice their customers with incredible deals – it is prudent therefore to have a thorough understanding of the industry before seeking their services. The essence of webhosting is to provide you with a platform to display your wares, reach clients and be reached by a large number of potential customers. Your principle concern is to do it efficiently at a reasonable price.

The business of web hosting has a chain of players – at the top of the chain is the datacenter that provides the connection and houses the server, followed by a web host company that maintains the server and sells space to the webhosting company which hosts your website. Some time the webhosting company works directly with the datacenter to eliminate the middle company and shortens the chain.

Survival of the web hosting industry is courtesy of the economic notion of competitive market. Entry to this market is unrestricted since internet is a global medium that is not subject to unnecessary barriers. The cost of investing in the web hosting business is also minimal. This has seen a proliferation of webhost businesses resulting in an unbalanced market situation where supply exceeds demand. Consequently the price of space and data transfer which essentially is what is on sale, have been on the decrease. Larger webhosts companies which act as wholesaler’s device cheap hosting and reselling packages for smaller companies (retailers) thereby increasing the number of webhosting companies that you have to choose from.

This scenario means you are faced by myriad choices offering cheap webhosting services and that can be tricky. Cheap may actually mean low quality since the provider may be making so little from a single deal to be keen in offering after-sales services as required. The factors you should take into account are support services and stability. The provider should be able to guide you how to post materials on your website or issue warning about any anticipated interruption. Any delay in response from your provider is a red sign of unreliability.

Stability is all about uptime as opposed to downtime that you can get from your provider. Uptime indicates the stability and reliability of the provider which in turn depends on the provider’s servers and network. Excluding other factors which are out of control of the provider 99.5% is acceptable.

The cost factor depends largely on the use of your website and the budget. Business site may require more disk space and high amount of data transfer as compared to a personal website. The more the space and data transfer the higher is the cost.

Managed hosting refers to a hosting plan where the provider is responsible for the administrative aspects of the plan. There are two levels of managed hosting namely the partial and the fully managed plan and which ever option you take managed hosting saves you time and headache of server maintenance. There are several advantages that are inherent to managed plan which are outlined as follows –

Cost- Managed hosting will cost a bit more as compared to most hosting plans. The initial cost is however canceled out by the amount of time freed for the webmaster to perform other core duties. Maintenance is a time consuming undertaking that requires commitment and can easily compromise the time dedicated to your business which is the reason you have a website in the first place.

Enhanced performance-The provider avails superior software and hardware packages in a managed plan as compared to shared hosting or unmanaged hosting. Experts manning your website are up to date on the latest features that can enhance performance and readily avail the same in a timely manner. Performance can be affected by ignorance of the best practice on the side of the customer but with managed plan you have the ears of experts who you can fall back to in case of doubts.

Regular maintenance- To utilize the full potential of a hosting plan regular maintenance is mandatory. With managed plan there is 24/7 support that ensures that not only the hardware and software but the entire system is working. Any problem detected is fixed earliest possible assuring an outstanding performance. Left alone you may delay fixing defects due to lack of time or cheer ignorance and cause an untold damage to the system. With a managed plan a team of experts whose sole occupation is to maintain the system will take no chance with even the seemingly harmless faults.

Customized assistant- Managed hosting takes into account special needs that a customer may have.

Security-Security issues that are common in webhosting are limited in managed hosting plan. Frequent updates and backup are among the measures taken to minimize security issues associated with web hosting.

Extra resources- Apart from the usual resources allocated in many webhosting additional features such as more disk space and bandwidth are offered in a managed hosting plan. Programming language, web applications are also tailored according to the user’s need.

Reliability-Users who are not technically savvy experience downtime especially when they upgrade form shared hosting to dedicated hosting. It is safer to opt for a managed plan and let experts maintain the acceptable uptime consistently.

Web hosting can be found all around the Internet and can be confusing as to which one to go with. You want a hosting provider that is going to fit within your budget. It is best to make sure there is customer support in place for those times when you might encounter a problem along the way.

When surfing around you will even see web hosting that is free and you might be tempted to hop right in – the important thing about hosting though is the performance of the servers. If the servers are slow, or if they crash a lot this will affect the performance of your website which could become discouraging very quickly.

One thing to keep in mind is to make sure all operating systems are compatible with one another. If your computer has Microsoft Windows in place then you should look for the same on a server. The odds that Windows and Linux will work smoothly together could be a nightmare and you will want to stop the process before you even get started. If the server software is not compatible with your operating system then keep looking until you find the correct one.

Once the server has been located, look at the features that it is offering. If you are going to need more than one email address then make sure the host offers such a facility. It would not make sense to sign up with a hosting provider if they did not have the tools that you will need to use.

Keep a close eye on the different prices. If you are a small business and do not want to grow enormous then make sure you only pay for the amount of space you are going to use. It can be tempting to reserve a huge amount of space for the price but it is a waste of money if you have no use for it.

There is no reason for you to experience difficulties and not have the proper customer service in place. Make sure there are several ways for you to get a hold of customer service. The most poplar during business hours is the live chat which more companies are offering. This tends to get the problem corrected even quicker.

Finally decide on what kind of hosting will be best for your company. There is shared hosting, dedicated hosting, or even cloud hosting now. The hosting can be cheap or for the more established companies the hosting can be more expensive.