What is Hosting?

The text and graphics of a web page on the internet are stored in computer files. When you visit a website, your computer downloads these files from another computer connected to the internet and your web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Chrome) reassembles the files to display the web page on your screen. The computer that stores these web pages is called a 'server'.

The server you use should be ON all the time. You never know when someone will visit your website. When they do, if the computer that contains your website is powered OFF, they will be unable to see your website. Our server is ON all the time and has backup generators in case of a power outage.

Your server should have more than 1 connection to the internet. Just as you are connected to the internet through your ISP (Internet Service Provider) such as cable or dsl, a web server must be connected to the internet in some way. The best hosting providers use servers connected to the internet through fiber optic data lines. Our web servers are connected to the internet by 10 major fiber providers! Although rare, occasionally a major network can go down, by using 10 seperate network providers we are diversified against an outage by 1 or 2 providers.

Your server should use RAID hard drive controllers to prevent data loss. Hard drives can and do fail. If your web host does not use a RAID hard drive controller, the failure of a single hard drive could take your website down for an extended period of time. Our servers use a redundant RAID array which provides protection against hard drive failure. In a RAID setup, there are 2 hard drives storing your data, in the event 1 hard drive fails, the RAID controller automatically reverts to the backup hard drive which is a mirror image of the primary hard drive. The system then notifies the onsite staff of a hard drive failure who are then able to replace the failed drive quickly and with minimal disruption to your site.

Your hosting provider should NOT sell more bandwidth/capacity than they actually have. A common offer among web hosts is UNLIMITED or hundreds of gigabytes of monthly bandwidth or UNLIMITED hard drive capacity or both. How can they possibly offer this? Simple. By assuming that not everyone will use there allotted capacity, they oversell the server. This is similiar to an airline selling more seats than they actually have. When the airline does it, they have to buy people off the plane. When a web host does it, they performance of all the webpages on that server suffers. Your site may generate a "503 error" which means the server is overloaded. Host only with companes that do not OVERSELL their bandwidth.

I hope you now have a better understanding of what web hosting is and some 'gotchas' to watch out for. If this explanation was not sufficient, send me an email and I'll be happy to help.