Web Hosting is a service through which organizations and individuals can display their websites to the entire world via the World Wide Web. Web hosts are those organizations, which offer space on a server,which is leased or owned for the clients to use, they also provide internet connectivity, like in a data center. Web hosts can even offer data center connectivity and space to Internet, for other servers situated in their data center. This is called co-location, and it is also named as Housing in France or Latin America.
The room of cheap web hosting services differs greatly. The basic kind of web-hosting is small-scale file hosting and web page hosting, where files are uploaded using a Web interface or File Transfer Protocol (FTP). The files are generally transported to the Web,as they were or after very less changes. Many Internet service providers also offer this service free of charge to their subscribers. Organizations and Individuals may also get Web page hosting from other service providers. Individual web site hosting is obviously free or inexpensive. Business web hosting generally has a higher cost depending on the type and size of the website.
The availability or presence of a website is measured as per the percentage of time that the website was available to the public, and was reachable by internet. This is although different from measuring the uptime of the system. Uptime is the time for which the system was available or was online. If the system is down, then that is not taken into account.
Following are some types of hosting services:
• File hosting used to host files.
• Image hosting
• Video hosting
• Blog hosting
• Paste bin
• Shopping cart software
• E-mail hosting
Web hosting can be free or dedicated.
Free Hosting:
Some ISP’s provide free web hosting also. Free web hosting is best in cases where there is low traffic and sites are of personal nature. It is not used for high traffic or typical websites. Technical support is also limited in such hosting. You cannot use your own domain for such a free site.
Shared or Virtual Hosting:
This is cost-effective. Your website will get its own domain name. The website will be hosted on a server which will be powerful. Maybe some other 100 sites will be on the same server. Generally, one will find database, e-mail, and editing options on such hosting. The advantages of such hosting are:
• Cost is lower and is shared by others
• Good for businesses of a smaller scale which do not have much traffic
• Domain name is owned
• Support is also good
Dedicated Hosting:
If your website is on a dedicated server. This is the most expensive and suitable for large businesses having higher traffic. It is secured and powerful, and software solutions are also unlimited.
The advantages are:
• Domain names are multiple
• Email solutions are powerful
• Database support is powerful
• Software support is good
Collocated Hosting:
It helps you in placing your web server on the service provider’s location. Generally, an ISP will have devoted possessions like high-security against vandalism and fire, controlled backup power, devoted Internet connections etc.
So web casting, if done with precision, and as per one’s requirement, can be economical and good quality at the same time. It can come to you at a package of $110 per year excluding VAT. You have to define your needs properly and do not pay for the services that you don’t need. You need to find out what value will you get for the money that you are paying. In case, you want to post some audios and videos, you ought to be very careful as they require extra bandwidth.