A description of hosting

As its name signifies, web hosting is a service, which involves hosting online content. There are various forms and kinds of hosting, depending on the goals and on the functions. Still, they all entail hosting files, which, once hosted, are made accessible through the Web. A web host is actually a web server that is connected to the World Wide Web and has its own Internet Protocol address, which enables people to access it through the Internet. The web hosting server's configuration and its system resources are dependent on the kind of web hosting solution it's going to be utilized for.

What are the different forms of web hosting?

Depending on the mission, the business website hosting solution may be:

File Web Hosting - this form of web hosting allows the customers to store their files on a specific web hosting server. With the customary file storage web hosting solution, the files that are kept may only be accessed by the individual that's availing of the service. This hosting solution normally concerns backups of computers , docs, private files and even other web hosting servers. This service may also contain certain limits in relation to the server storage space and the root access. There may also be traffic quota limits, but that depends on the particular hosting provider.

Warez Web Hosting - the so-called warez hosting solution is very similar to the previous hosting service form. Still, unlike the file hosting service, the warez web hosting service is used for circulating proprietary work without the permission of the patent possessor. In brief - it entails the prohibited circulation of files and docs. There are numerous ways for this to be attained, but the two principal ways are - via plain HTTP downloading and via peer-to-peer connections. The first way involves either a given web portal, or, most commonly, just a directory on a web server that's been made available for everyone to access it and thus download licensed documents free of cost. The second approach involves a peer-to-peer connection, making use of the so-called Torrent servers, via which people transmit files between each other. There are not many web space hosting vendors that allow that type of hosting on their web servers, mostly because of all the judicial predicaments that it presupposes. Generally such websites are hosted on personal dedicated web hosting servers that are registered by third-party companies either in the Middle East or in Asia.

Mail Web Hosting - this solution is used with both shared hosting and dedicated servers, depending on the customer's desire. If you wish to establish your very own personal SMTP mail server, then you will need either a virtual server or a dedicated web server that offers the access level needed to execute such an assignment. For routine mail web hosting purposes, however, you can avail of an average shared web space hosting account, to which you can point the MX records of your domain name. This is not a solution that's widely used, because the web page hosting and the mail hosting services are being served by two separate servers, often belonging to different hosts.

Website Hosting - the most widely spread and widely used hosting service as of today. It's utilized for hosting website files, whose sort is determined by the Operating System the server is utilizing - Linux or Windows. Different sorts of files request concrete web hosting server OSs, otherwise they won't be shown correctly on the Internet. This sort of web hosting may include web space and bandwidth limitations, root access and central processing unit usage limits.

Depending on the goals and on the objectives, the client should pick the type of hosting server that he requires for his project, and, of course, the web space hosting company that's going to provide it. There are various kinds of web hosting servers, depending on the configuration and the website hosting solutions that they provide. These are:

Shared Web Hosting Server - a shared hosting server provides a smaller quantity of system resources, which, of course, reflects on the cost of the service. It can be utilized for hosting small scale and middle scale online portals, which do not need huge quantities of server storage and web traffic.

Semi-Dedicated Servers Hosting - they are based on the very same principle as the shared website hosting servers. Still, there are much less users sharing the same server. For that reason, each of them will enjoy a larger share of the server's resources like RAM, data storage space, web traffic and CPU. Excellent for hosting immense online portals that do not require full root-level access.

VPS - the virtual web servers are ideal for medium sized web portals, which do require root-level access to the hosting server's configuration files. Normally, there are a bunch of virtual private web server hosting accounts accommodated on the same server. Yet, each of them is independent from the other ones and has its own OS.

Dedicated Server Hosting - a completely dedicated web server set up and accessed by you and only you. It ensures a great amount of system resources. It also gives root-level access, which makes it the optimal platform for any sort of web page that needs a web hosting solution.

The only question that remains is:

Which web space hosting distributor should I choose?

As already stated, there aren't many hosts offering warez hosting solutions because of judicial problems. Such providers are being closed down virtually every month. That is why, if you want to set up such a service, you should do it on your own personal computer. The shared web site hosting service is the most famous type of web hosting service. For that reason, each and every web site hosting vendor provides it. Not all of them, however, offer solutions such as virtual private hosting servers, semi-dedicated servers and dedicated web hosting servers. Most of the small scale site hosting firms do not have the means demanded for maintaining those solutions. Hence it's invariably best to choose a bigger web hosting company that can furnish its customers with all the services that they request. You can quickly recognize such web hosting companies by the types of services that they are supplying and by the way that they present them to the clients. For example, certain web hosts permit you to begin with a small sized web hosting account and then upgrade to a bigger one, if you consider it mandatory to do so. This is quite suitable, because you do not have to relocate websites between servers and there is no risk of suffering network downtime because of all the problems that may take place. Web hosting providers like AfterHost offer all sorts of solutions and possess the required server resources and staff to ensure that their customers will not face any problems when changing services, which is what a top hosting vendor is in fact all about.