Before running an internet resource there are 3 fundamental things to know about hosting a website. It is crucial to explore what web hosting is,  how to choose domain name and finally how to make a good web hosting choice.

Hosting and domains are concepts which define the “place of residence” for a website on the Internet. Hosting includes the necessary space, electricity and bandwidth for your data located on a server, while the domain is responsible for it’s online address and directing traffic to the site. Hosting and domains are usually leased options. It means that you can’t buy them once and for all. Instead, you pay for them at regular intervals. In most cases the minimal order period for a domain is one year, while hosting bills are normally paid once per month or there may be discounts involved when paying for hosting in periods longer than one month. Let us dive deeper into the topic to make it more clear-cut.

1) What is web hosting? Hosting is like renting a home. First you decide what kind of home you want and can afford, in one example – a shared or dedicated server, (your apartment or mansion, respectively). Once you’ve decided where you want to live, you “move in” to a hosting provider (let us call him the ”online landlord”).  he provides you with particular “amenities” such as technical support, necessary disk space, and an environment which is compatible with your web site software. Now your site has it’s home online and you can begin painting the walls and decorating your site, er, home, any way you like. Your site’s is maintained in specially organized buildings which are called datacenters. Inside that datacenter there may be other hosting companies and there are thousands of other homes just like yours. These are called your neighbors, and Just like in real life, you want to pick a spot where you have good neighbors.

Do you want to live in the ghetto or on the beach? A good landlord will not allow bad tenants to share the same block as you. If you have a bad landlord, who allows criminals, hackers, and other bad guys  to live near your new home, your home’s property value will go down (visitors do not want to come to your site) because there will be problems with your homes in your neighborhood being broken into (hacked web sites), or traffic jams in the streets (slow sites) and numerous other issues. That is why it is important to choose a quality hosting company, (like GlowHost!) not just the cheapest web host you can find.

2) What is a domain name? Continue reading →