Changing Web Hosts

At some point of time you may want to change web hosting providers because maybe you have found a less expensive solution for your website or maybe you are not satisfied with the services that your current host is providing. When you are switching hosts, you will want to do so without losing any files and the design of your website. Here are some steps that you would need to follow when you are changing hosts.

1. Make a copy of your website. Use your favorite FTP utility to download all files to your computer from your web host. Don’t make the assumption that you have all the files on your computer because there might be some scripts that you may have added from the Net that are on your server but not on your computer. If you are using Dreamweaver, then you should use the GET command to make a copy of all your files. On the other hand if you are using Frontpage, then you should use the import feature to make a comprehensive copy of the previous website.

2. Select your new web host. It is important that you choose a new web host that will meet all the needs of your website.

3. Transfer your domain name. You will be required to change the domain name server (DNS) or Name Server Information to your new hosts DNS information. For this you have to contact the domain name registrar. This is the place where you had your domain name registered. Your website would experience a downtime while your DNS record is being changed. It will then be propagated through the world’s WHOIS severs. You should maintain all existing services set up on your old domain name till the completion of the transfer.

4. Upload all files to your new web host. Upon the completion of the transfer of your domain name, you will need to upload the files to your new web host. With Dreamweaver you will need to first define your site, and then you need to use the PUT command to transfer all files and html pages. With Frontpage you will need to create a new host from the site files that you have imported from your old host. After you have done this you can have them published to the new host.

5. Transferring web pages to the new host. Another way to transfer your web pages is to copy the source code by right clicking on the page as you see it when you visit the website and select ‘view/source’. It will then turn up on Notepad. You can then save it on a place of your choice as an HTML file by selecting ‘file/save as’.

6. Amending your website. Your website may not look the same as on your last web host. This happens if the html code and/or files don’t entirely transfer. Make the necessary design changes will emulate the site that you had formerly hosted. You may have to eliminate or add some code to completely reflect your original website.

7. Testing your website. When the transferring of your domain name and your website is complete, you should test to see if all the services are working on your new host. If everything is working as you wanted it you can go ahead and cancel all your remaining services with your previous hosting service.

How Much Hosting Space Do You Need?

There are many web host providers that always try to sell more than the required amount of web hosting space to users. This will only result in you paying a lot more each month for space that you probably don’t need. To start of, you need to know how much disc space (MB) your website uses. This is what will determine how much you need to spend for a hosting solution for your website. Don’t pay more than is necessary for the actual space that you need.

How to calculate the file size of your website

1. Get to know how file size is measured. The smallest unit on a computer is a bit. One bit is one electronic on or off pulse. 8 bits strung together make one byte. One byte of information can put a letter, such as “B” on your screen.

If you combine 1024 bytes together, you will end up with one unit of information called a kilobyte. Now if you combine 1024 kilobytes together you will get a megabyte. Most graphics and web pages are measured in bytes or kilobytes.

2. To find out your total website file size, you will need to right click on the root folder where your website is located. By doing this you can also find out how many files and folders are contained in your website.

3. If you are using an editor, such as FrontPage, you can go to the reports view and click on the site summary. Here you will find a reading of the total site file size. In Dreamweaver you can use the technique in No 2.

Expanding your hosting plan

If you want to add pages, graphics, features such as scripts, databases etc in the future, you will need to begin with a small web hosting plan. You can start off with 5MB and then expand as you add on new features.

You will need to check with your web host, if you can easily upgrade your hosting plan as your website grows. If your hosting plan can be easily upgraded you will not have to go through the hassle of changing hosts every few months.

Once the total size of your website is determined, you can check on what hosting plan has been purchased and how much disc space has been allocated for your website. If you are using 3MB of disc space but are paying for 100MB, then it means that you are spending much more money than is necessary. This means that you need to switch hosting plans so that you can save money over time.

Unless you are running a lot of scripts on your page or you are offering downloads, then you will not require more than the standard amount of 10-12MB. If you want to add more disk space later, you should be able to do that without ant trouble. You should only do it if it is needed. In other words wait to see how your website progresses and this is what will determine if more disk space is necessary.

Cheap and Reliable Web Hosting & Domains

When looking for a web hosting provider, you need to look for one that is reliable, so that there will be no need to change services because your current provider is proving to be a disappointment. Here are a few rules that you should follow before deciding on a web hosting provider.

1. Check on some forums to see what people are saying about a particular company. Here you will find experts who know what they are talking about.

2. Choose a company that is not too big, neither too small. If it is a one man show company, you will never get to know what the guy is doing with your files, with nobody looking over his shoulder. If you go for a company that is too big then there is a good chance that it is very impersonal and that means they will be unable to focus on you individually.

3. If you are already using the service of a web host, then don’t move all your sites right away. You should first test the waters for a minimum of 10 days.

4. It is important that you list all your needs in advance. For example if you need shell access (SSH), then there will be no need for you to test the host and like it and then later when you need the shell access, they will not have it. If you know that you will not require shell access, it would then be better to go for a company that does not offer it, since this will mean more security for you.

5. When going for a new host, check if they are offering a 30 day money back guarantee. In such situations, there is usually a catch; for example you might find that it is a pro-rated refund, which means that you will not get a refund for the period that you used their service. So make sure that what you are getting is a full money back guarantee.

6. When you are looking for a host, you would like one that will be a long term host. Web hosting companies can easily vanish due to the cutthroat nature of the business. When you check on the page rank of their website it should be no less than 3 or 4.

7. If you are looking for cheap web space and a web hosting provider who has a “community feel”, then you will need to find out if they have a busy forum and other community features like a most wanted list of new features.

8. If the company is not too big, you can try to ask for a special deal or a discount. There are some companies that go to the extent of offering a free domain with the packages.

When looking for a web hosting provider, you will find that there really isn’t a best hosting service. If you are putting up with a bad web host, then it is time to make a change, because there are many good web hosting companies out there with great deals. When you want to change your web hosts, some will even transfer your websites for free.

Multiple Domain Hosting

If you are planning on having several domains running on the web, then you will need to think about getting multiple domain hosting. With this kind of hosting, you can host several domains under a single hosting plan. It is commonly known as shared hosting.

The foremost advantage of multiple domain hosting is that it helps to merge all your domains under one hosting plan. This allows you to manage your domain easily and at the same time it become easy to alter any settings since everything will be done from the same control panel.

When looking for a shared hosting service there are a few things that you will need to consider.

Hard Disk Space

These days most shared web hosting plans provide ample disk space to satisfy your needs. This means that it will be vital for you to know how much disk space your website will require, before you decide on the web hosting
plan. You shouldn’t only think about the disk space needed at the current time, but of the disk space that will be required 1 or 2 years down the road.

There are some web applications that would require more disk space than others. One good example is file hosting sites. Remember to check on the cost of upgrading your disk space in the event that you will need one. Web hosting providers generally charge on a per GB basis.

Bandwidth

The majority of web hosting providers cap a limit on the bandwidth on each hosting plan. This is something that you will need to check on, to make sure that it provides adequate bandwidth for your current websites, with room for growth. For any exceeded bandwidth, you will be charged on a per GB basis.

The speed of a website is equally important because no one would want to visit a website that loads slowly. File hosting and video sites for example would require an acceptable speed.

Number of Domains Allowed

The number of domains for each hosting plan is usually limited by some web hosting providers. This is why it is advisable to get one with unlimited domains.

Emails/FTP accounts

Web hosting providers usually provide web based or outlook based email accounts. It is wise for you to get one that has unlimited email/ftp accounts. Separate email accounts will probably be required for each domain that you have.

Ease of control panel

The control panel should be easy to use and all the information should be easily accessible. Nearly all web hosting services provide cpanel while some web hosting services use their own tailored control panel.

Low Cost Web Hosting

Giving out space on a web server to individuals and corporate for purpose of creating websites can be termed as web hosting. The biggest task for any individual is to choose the right host. While looking for a web server, a usual consideration is the cost. Usually the cost factor depends on the type of hosting you are choosing. If you choose shared hosting it will be cheaper than dedicated hosting. Also the quality of server i.e. speed reliability and back up factors etc also plays a major role in cost factor. If you are looking for a reliable and cheap web host then my recommendation will be to check out PlanetOnline.net. They have great hosting plans to suit almost every individual need.

Now taking a look just a few years back, web hosting could only be afforded by big companies which have expensive Internet budgets. It was quite expensive. In the face of the increasing competition in the market, the prices of web hosting have really come down. All this has made web hosting services affordable to everyone who wishes to have their identities on the net. There is some web hosting which is free. Companies like Planetonline.net provide low cost web hosting to a large number of organizations.

There are some factors that you will need to consider when you decide to opt for low cost web hosting. Firstly you need to make a correct analysis of how much disk space and bandwidth you will require. When you do this, you will end up saving from having to pay any extra money. Another way of cutting down on costs, is to go for shared web hosting. This is where you have many organizations using the same server. Shared web hosting comes with one major drawback; it can create problems with identity and secrecy and hold limitations on the nature and volume of data that is usually stored on the website. By reducing or avoiding the number of streaming images or videos that you use, you can cut down on the cost of your web hosting services. These images or videos always end up taking a lot of space on the server. You can avoid them since they are not always necessary.

When looking for a web host, price is always a key concern. But this doesn’t mean that you have to settle for the lowest price. One factor that you must consider is the business potential that your website can create. To do this you must check on how much traffic the web server will generate. That is to say, how many clicks your website will have per day. Another important thing is that you will need to verify if the web server is restricting some areas or countries from having access your website.

There are those web hosting providers that claim to be able to provide unlimited web hosting. This means that they will allow unlimited domain registries on their web server which will slow down the website. This will affect the running of your business. So my opinion is a big no for them.

Low cost web hosting by companies like Planetonline.net have made creating websites economical to both large and small businesses. Web hosting generates more revenue and is fundamental to the business world as a whole.

Web Hosting Providers and their Services

Web hosting services can be categorized under Internet hosting services. It is the most fundamental facet of your web presence. Web hosting providers make it possible for users to stock up information, imageries, video or any other thing that is reachable via the World Wide Web. The web hosting providers assist their clients by providing them space on a server that is owned by them. In a data center, their customers are provided access to the Internet. There are quite a number of web hosting providers who run web servers.

Some web hosting providers have their services restricted only to the web. Free web hosting providers offer their services free, but it has to be totally backed by advertisements. Their services cannot be compared to paid web hosting providers, who usually provide everything that a user would need for their website.

There are also shared web hosting providers where websites share the same server with other websites. The task of collocation web hosting providers is just about the same with dedicated web hosting providers. Dedicated web hosting service providers help the user to acquire his/her own web server, thus giving the user total control over the web server. The server will then get hold of the physical space which is provided by the web hosting company. The most effective and pricey web hosting services are provided by collocation web hosting service. In such a case, the client will be outfitted with electrical appliances, Internet admittance and storage space for the server.

Web hosting is simply what you need if you wish to have a website on the Internet. In other words, it provides the services and technologies that are needed for web pages and sites to be viewed on the Internet. Once you have hosting, it means that when people place your website address (domain name) into a browser, it will then be open to anyone in the world. This is how web hosting works.

When you pay for the service, you will be paying for space on the Internet where you have your website stored. Your website would be stored on a web server which is always connected to the Internet. If the web server where you have your website stored goes down, it means that your website will also go down and no one will be able to view your site. That is why it is imperative that you use the services of a reputable company.

Free Web Hosting

In the market place there are different types of web hosting providers available. One of the options is free web hosting providers. This has a rather obvious advantage of being easy on the wallet. This is not popularly used as web hosting option, because it comes with a number of limitations. You will find that the web hosting providers that are offering these free services are also supporting themselves through advertising on the site. Since they will need to advertise they will then have to run some ads on your site. The problem with this is that, it may not be what your company would want, thus making paid web hosting a better option for your needs.

There is also the question of the domain name. Free web hosting providers would usually have your name with their name, which would make the name for your site look less professional. On the other hand, paid web hosting providers will give you a professional domain name since it will have a traditional look, such as www.webhostingproviders.com.

It is quite common for web hosting providers to offer their most basic packages for free and then offer slight upgrades at an additional cost. This subsequently makes them just a little different from paid web hosting providers. Free web hosting comes with drawbacks such as, limitation on the size of each hosted file, very small bandwidth per month, no hot linking, and no guaranteed uptime; this is just to name a few. Paid web hosting providers offer guaranteed uptime which would be very necessary for the successful and dependable operation of your website. Most web hosting providers would offer you a guaranteed of 99.9% uptime. With this kind of uptime, your site will be fully operational all but about 8 hours a year. This is an offer that free web hosting providers can’t beat.

Free web hosting at times comes with instant activation. In other words it means that once you sign up you will be able to start building and using your website. This is what can attract a number people to go for their services, because everything is done quickly. However, this quick kind of activation comes with its drawbacks. By offering instant activation, they also provide minimal storage space and bandwidth. This will eventually slow down the speed of your site. In addition to this it will become hard to add details to your site as well as store information such as graphics and links.

The information provided above should be taken into consideration when you are looking for a web hosting provider. Free web hosting providers may be offering a fetching price option, but the only setback is that they will be unable to offer you the kinds of benefits that you will obviously get from paid web hosting providers.

The Web Hosting Market

There has been a significant change in the web hosting market over the years. Consolidation and price reduction has made the services more affordable. But this has also reduced the number of choices available to businesses.

Web hosting service providers look to providing rack space and managing servers and storage. In addition to this they manage the applications that run on their customers’ Web sites. Competition is pressurizing web hosting providers to make unrealistic promises. With http://www.planetonline.net/, rest assured that you will be provided with quality service. There are some companies that raise the bar too high by promising 100 percent availability for websites and applications that they are providing. If you are providing 100 percent availability, it doesn’t leave much room for mistakes and disasters. This means that guaranteeing 100 percent will be stretching it a bit too much.

When Internet connections go down, web sites become temporarily unavailable or it also becomes a victim to denial of service attacks. An errant java script can crash a Web application. This is a normal occurrence. There are some companies that claim to provide a ‘time to repair’ commitment, which is as short as 15 minutes for the fully redundant systems. The fully redundant” part is unrealistic because it indicates that you will need to have an extra hard drive mirroring your hard drive and maybe a third drive just particularly for grins. On top of all this you would also have uninterruptible power supplies that would act as a back up for electricity for the servers, disk arrays and air conditioner.

With today’ economic slowdown, the web hosting market has grown more competitive. It has been noted that there are fewer companies launching web sites and also scaling back plans for multimedia Web casts and similar brand-building and bandwidth hogging activities. This is why web hosting providers are needed to focus on niche industries and to promote unique capabilities that will set them apart from others.

Claiming perfect uptime is a strategy that can be used. So if 100 percent uptime is implied, it doesn’t necessarily mean 24hrs round the clock service. When looking for a web hosting provider, just make sure that they provide you with the service that you need. Planetonline.net has been providing this kind of service over the years.

How to Get Started With Your Hosting Plan

A hosting plan is space on the hard drive of a server. It is also Internet bandwidth and a control panel of features to manage your site.

Firstly, to get started with a hosting plan there are a few things that a new web hosting customer needs to achieve and in many cases they will not have to adjust their accounts again. Here are the four steps that are needed to get a website working with your hosting plan.

Step 1: Domain name setup

The first step would be for you to purchase a domain name, which can cost you anything from $8 to $20 per year. Since this will be the actual name of your website, no one else will be able to use your name once it is registered. When you have selected your domain name, it needs to be pointed to the server that holds your hosting account. This is so that when someone types www.yourdomainname.com into a browser, it will be able to locate the website files that will be uploaded to your hosting plan.

Step 2: Logging in to your control panel

To view web traffic statistics, you will need to login to your control panel. This would also apply when it comes to setting up email addresses, databases or do to backups, etc. Every web hosting company, including www.planetonline.net would offer you a control panel to manage your account. The most popular control panels offered by the hosting companies are cPanel, Plesk, Helm and Hsphere. Some companies have built their own to customize it to their services. The control panels offer more or less the same features. You can read your email with the control panel, or you can have it set up to be read through an email program like Outlook. You will also be able to control databases in the control panel. On top of it all, you should find a way to login before your domain propagates. It will allow you to get started on your control panel while propagation is taking place.

Step 3: Setting up email accounts

When you are logged in to your control panel, you will want to set up not less than one email address. In the case that you do not want one, it will be necessary to at least define one so as a catch all to make sure that you don’t miss any of the emails sent to your domain.

Email forwarding

If you want to forward your email to an outside email address (e.g. from your ISP email address to your Gmail account), then you will be required to set your Default Address (a tool in the Mail Management section of your control panel) to your ISP email address or any other address. In this way, any email sent to ‘anything’@yourdomain.com shall be automatically sent to you on your other account.

Step 4: Uploading your website/files

Your website and files can be uploaded to your account using an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) like WS_FTP. This of course is done once your domain name has propagated. In case you don’t have an FTP program, you then have the option of downloading a free trial version of WS_FTP or you can use internet explorer as well for file uploading. All you will be required to do is to type ftp:// instead of http:// followed by the domain name. WS-FTP is one of the most popular programs in use today.

How to Estimate your Website Hosting Needs

Web space (disk space) is the amount of data you can store on the hard disk of the web server. Web hosting accounts come with a certain amount of space, usually over 50 MB and less than 1000 MB.

The amount of space needed depends on the size of the website. Most websites are composed of html (text) pages with a few images (gifs or jpegs) or even a little bit of flash animation. Text occupies very little space, thus making it very economical. Images and flash are much more expensive, since they require a lot of space. People who are new to the web might think that it would be great to have a lot of colorful images to make the website really beautiful. This is a common mistake that is usually made.

Your aim should be to say as much as you can on a page while maintaining its size under 50-60 KB, including images. The reason for this is that there are lots of people using slow dial-up connections of under 56 Kbps. For them a 150 KB will take more than 21 seconds to load. A 60KB page will take more than 8 seconds to load. That’s a lot of time. A good page is under 30 KB. A maximum page is 50-60 KB.

Considering an average page size of 30 KB, you can put approximately 33 pages on 1MB of space. If you have 10MB of space available, you could then host 330 pages. You should be more than fine even with 10 MB of web space.

Bandwidth is the amount of data that you are allowed to transfer per month. This would include all uploads and downloads regardless of the protocol used (HTTP, FTP, POP etc.) The average page size is what will determine the bandwidth. The bandwidth also depends on the number of visitors your website will have and the average number of pages they visit. All this will help you to estimate your needs.

If you are just launching your website, you will not need a huge amount of space, neither a huge amount of bandwidth. For 99% of people, a hosting account with 10MB of space and 1 GB bandwidth is more than enough.

Unless you have reasons to believe that your website will have lots of visitors, there will be little reason for you to worry about space and bandwidth.

You just need to make your own calculations and also try to make sure that the host you choose allows account upgrades. This is to make sure that you will be able to get more space and/or bandwidth if/when you need it without going through all the trouble of changing hosts.

Dedicated Servers or Shared Servers

Today all businesses are using the Internet to compete more effectively. They are now able to do this without spending too much of their time and money. PlanetOnline.net has given business establishments, an opportunity to host their website on world class servers at reasonable cost.

Majority of small businesses usually use so-called shared servers, where their website shares a server with the different other websites. Shared servers can cost anywhere between $10 and $100 a month depending on server quality and the hosting plan selected.

Shared web hosting is a cheap solution for small and medium sized businesses. For bigger businesses, “Dedicated Servers” are recommended. Dedicated servers are bit costly affair as compared to shared servers. Choice between dedicated server and shared servers is totally dependent on the web site size, server performance desired and hosting requirements in terms of space, bandwidth desired server security etc. Though shared servers provide a cheap solution for hosting small and medium sized sites, they lack in having access to core administrative functions of server. Server issues are generally handled by a technical support team in case of shared server hosting plans.

Unlike shared servers that hosts thousands of sites of different companies, dedicated servers host just one or two sites of same company. Dedicated servers are considered to be much more safe and fast in comparison of shared servers. When we say fast, it means that in shared hosting environment it is possible that another website is using more resources and thereby rendering your site to be surfed at a slower pace. In case of dedicated servers you may need a server administrator to provide you support. For many companies this may be an unwanted expense and effort. For such companies “Managed Dedicated Hosting” is a great option.

In managed dedicated hosting, the hosting company provides you a dedicated server and their staff manages and administers the hosting server for you. Managed dedicated hosting is bit costly in comparison to simple dedicated hosting.

While choosing any server just be sure that you don’t choose a bad host. Be sure that the server is not banned by various search engines or anti-spam agencies. If the server is banned by search engines, it can be made sure that you won’t get business on that site through search engines like Google. Also, if possible, in case of shared hosting, try to know about others websites that are hosted on the server. If some site is engaged in spamming activities, then it is possible that the whole server gets banned for their miss deeds.

Most of the webs hosting companies provide various plans for web hosting, Depending on your requirement, you can choose them. You may find great plans to suit everyone’s requirement at www.PlanetOnline.net – Number one in Web Hosting.

Cheap Web Hosting – Good or Bad?

While choosing a web hosting company there are a number of things that you would need to watch out for. There are quite a number of hosting companies that are offering web hosting for quite low prices. They usually offer everything unlimited for a monthly charge. At the same time they talk about global sales, special trained staff, and fiber optics and so on.

These companies render themselves quite economical by making promises that are impossible. At the same time they also reveal the amount their technical knowledge by claiming to offer unlimited anything. The truth is that nothing is unlimited, especially when it comes to bandwidth and disk space.

The major concern while choosing a web host should not be bandwidth and server space, it should be the “server speed”. Bandwidth or the disk space can always be increased, since you can always get more. If your host offers unlimited features with a low price, you can be sure that the servers need to be filled with a lot of customers to get profit from the server. This would of course result in slow speeds with no chance of improvements.

The next concern is “What you can do with the service?” Many companies like to play it safe and simply install everything into their servers and offer that as a single package. On computers that run ASP, NET, PHP, Python, MSSQL, and SSI and so on, nothing would happen but when they get it all working, the server will get slow and will have security issues. Unfortunately in some companies this doesn’t apply and instead of them being concerned about a client’s security, they’re more concerned to get everything working so that they can write all the fancy features in a single ad on their site.

So while choosing an affordable host, you should search for a host with reasonable prices compared to the services they offer. This way they can afford keeping the entire technology working top notch. Your environment will be stable and working and the development on the server should be as fast and cheap as possible. One thing to remember is that do not believe in unlimited mailboxes, disk space, bandwidth etc. These are all marketing gimmicks, which are even impossible. It just goes to prove that the company is driven by marketing people biased to improving their own economy, rather than that of the customer.