An explanation of web hosting

As its name hints, web hosting is a service, which entails hosting web content. There are various forms and types of web hosting, depending on the purpose and on the objectives. Yet, they all are associated with hosting files, which, once hosted, are made accessible throughout the World Wide Web. A host is actually a web hosting service that is connected to the Web and has its own personal Internet Protocol address, which allows people to access it via the Internet. The hosting server's configuration and its limitations are dependent on the type of hosting solution it will be utilized for.

What are the various forms of web hosting?

Depending on the purpose, the web hosting service may be:

File Hosting - this form of web hosting permits the clients to keep their files on a given hosting server. With the customary file web hosting service, the files that are stored may only be accessed by the person that's using the service. This hosting service mainly concerns backups of personal computers , documents, private files and even other web hosting servers. This solution may also involve given limits with regard to the server storage and the root privileges. There may also be bandwidth limitations, but that depends on the actual hosting provider.

Warez Hosting - the so-called warez hosting service is quite similar to the previous web hosting service type. Nevertheless, in contrast with the file storage hosting solution, the warez web hosting solution is utilized for propagating licensed work without being given the go-ahead by the license possessor. To cut a long story short - it entails the illicit circulation of files and documents. There are multiple ways for this to be achieved, but the 2 essential methods are - through simple Hypertext Transfer Protocol downloading and through P2P connections. The first one entails either a particular web page, or, most typically, simply a directory on a hosting server that's been made available for everybody to access it and thus download licensed materials free of cost. The second way involves a peer-to-peer connection, making use of the so-called Torrent servers, through which users exchange files between each other. There aren't many site hosting providers that permit such form of hosting on their hosting servers, chiefly because of all the legal problems that it entails. Usually such web sites are hosted on personal dedicated servers that are registered by third-party corporations either in the Middle East or in Asia.

Electronic Mail Web Hosting - this solution is utilized with both shared web space hosting and dedicated servers, depending on the user's desire. If you would like to create your very own private SMTP server, then you will require either a VPS hosting server or a dedicated server that provides the access level required to execute such a task. For customary mail web hosting purposes, though, you can utilize a standard shared web page hosting account, to which you can point the MX records of your domain. This is not a solution that's very used, because the website hosting and the email hosting services are being served by 2 separate servers, usually belonging to separate companies.

Web Page Hosting - the most widely spread and immensely utilized hosting service at present. It's utilized for hosting site files, whose sort is determined by the OS the hosting server is using - Linux or Windows. Different types of files demand specific hosting server OSs, or else they won't be displayed properly on the Web. This sort of web hosting may impose data space and web traffic limitations, server root access and CPU usage limitations.

Depending on the purpose and on the usage, the customer should pick the sort of server that he needs for his work, and, of course, the hosting corporation that's going to provide it. There are several types of web servers, depending on the specs and the hosting services that they provide. These are:

Shared Hosting Server - a shared web space hosting server provides a smaller quantity of system resources, which, of course, is reflected on the cost of the service. It can be utilized for hosting small and medium web portals, which do not demand huge amounts of web storage and bandwidth.

Semi-Dedicated Servers Hosting - they operate on the very same principle as the shared website hosting servers. Yet, there are much fewer customers sharing the same server. For that reason, each of them will enjoy a greater share of the server's resources like RAM, web storage space, traffic and CPU. Perfect for hosting bulky web pages that do not require complete server root access.

VPS hosting - the Virtual Private Servers are perfect for medium size web pages, which do need root access to the web hosting server's config files. Generally, there are a bunch of Virtual Private Server hosting accounts accommodated on the same server. In spite of that, each of them is isolated from the others and runs its own Operating System.

Dedicated Server Hosting - a fully dedicated server configured and accessed by you and solely you. It ensures a tremendous amount of system resources. It also gives complete server root access, which makes it an ideal platform for any sort of online portal that necessitates a webspace hosting solution.

The only question that remains is:

Which site hosting corporation should I opt for?

As mentioned, there are not many web hosting providers offering warez web hosting solutions because of legal problems. Such hosts are being closed down almost every month. That is why, if you wish to set up such a service, you should do it on your own computer. The shared site hosting solution is the most widely spread type of hosting service. That is why, each hosting corporation provides it. Not all of them, though, provide solutions such as private virtual servers, semi-dedicated web hosting servers and dedicated hosting servers. Most of the small scale website hosting companies do not have the means needed for offering those solutions. Because of that it's always best to settle on a bigger host that can supply its clients with all the services that they are searching for. You can easily recognize such hosting companies by the types of services that they are supplying and by the manner in which they introduce them to the clientele. For example, certain web hosting companies permit you to commence with a small sized hosting package and afterwards shift to a more advanced one, if you deem it mandatory to do so. This is very suitable, because you do not have to relocate websites between servers and there is no chance of suffering service outages due to all the predicaments that may take place. Providers like BitLife Host offer all kinds of services and have the required web server resources and personnel to assure that their clients will not chance upon any troubles when changing services, which is what a top hosting supplier is in fact all about.