Hosting
your Website
In addition
to having a Domain Name for your website and of course the content
that you wish to communicate, you also require your website to be
hosted so that it can be viewed by potential visitors.
Hosting
refers to the fact that your website needs to be stored on a computer
which is permanently connected to the Internet (preferably by a
fast connection) so that visitors can see and use your website when
they search for it on the Internet. Hosting comes in many forms
but, unless you have a large website which requires its own dedicated
server, to start with you would be best advised to choose what is
known as a co-hosting (or shared hosting) set-up where your website
in its own area on a server together with others. This is the cheaper
option and still gives you the security and problem-free backup
that you would require.
Website
hosting consists of different elements which you should consider
when choosing who should host your website for you. If you just
have static html pages, then the main elements to check are:
Webspace
- number of megabytes (Mb) that you have available to put your webpages
and the associated pictures and files from your website. 50Mb is
often the minimum offered but most small business websites use only
a fraction of that;
Bandwidth
- the amount of megabytes that visitors can download each
month. Your requirement will depend on the number of visitors to
your website and whether you have large files for them to view and
download. Again for a small business, 1Gb (gigabyte) will be more
than enough and you may well only use a percentage of that. However,
as your number of visitors increase, then do keep an eye on this
figure.
In addition,
there are other additional features which run on your website which
require other capabilities. For example, if your website uses a
database then you need to check which databases are supported or
given free with your hosting package. Check out these areas out:
- SQL
Database
- ASP
and PHP capability
- Full
CGI capabilities
- Perl
- Email
addresses
- Spam
filtering
Probably
the best solution is to find a smaller company which has teamed
up with a major supplier. In this way, you will have the security
and resources of the larger organisation together with the personal
service and support from the smaller company which may be willing
to customise a tailored hosting solution which exactly fits your
requirements.
For
any questions about hosting, Rosetta Alba offers a range of hosting
solutions to fit all needs. For more information, use our Call
back form and we will get back to you. |
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Rosetta Alba Services Limited 2003 - 05