The options available with a web hosting package are very wide ranging, and can be a bit confusing to understand – especially since the options are presenting in a large number of ways, and condensed in various ways, while shopping for a package online. Hopefully I can give you a breakdown of the categories these features fall into and help you to focus on the features that are important to you.
I break the features down into 10 categories, and will discuss the categories one by one to give you a firm grasp of the options and make an informed purchasing decision.
10 Categories of Web Hosting Package Features
1. Operating System
2. Web Server
3. Bandwidth
4. Disk Space
5. Domains
6. Email
7. FTP
8. Database
9. Control Panel
10. Applications / Programming
1. Operating System
The operating system is the underlying software https://www.ucartz.com/ that runs on the host. It manages the physical hardware of the server and attempts to optimize the use of RAM, disk space, network, and CPU for the requests coming into the machine. The underlying OS does not have to be the same as your desktop or even the OS you use to develop your website. In fact, due to most of the management functions being driven through a web GUI, you might never know or care what the server operating system is.
The predominant operating systems you will find while shopping for a web hosting service are Windows and UNIX. With Windows you will see versions available such as Server 2003 or Server 2008, and with UNIX you will see many brands of Linux, usually CentOS, Debian, or Redhat. Choosing between UNIX and Windows is an important decision, and involves a lot of variables, but in the end it simply means deciding if you want to build your website with open source technology or with Microsoft technology.
Research the application you want to use or run as your website and check to see if it has any Microsoft technology requirements (MSSQL database, MSAccess database, ASP, ASP.Net). If you find no pressing reason to use Windows, then UNIX will most likely be a better choice for you. UNIX runs the open source scripting languages slightly faster and is also slightly cheaper than Windows.
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