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Web Site Hosting - Generalised
When you type a domain name into the address window or click on a hyperlink in a web browser, a web page appears in the browser window.
This web page has been fetched from a specialised computer called a web server.
A web server is very similar to your home (or business) computer, and has hard drive/s, a processor, memory etc, but the key difference is that it is permanently connected into the world wide web through high-speed data network.
When you buy website hosting, you are leasing space on a web servers hard drive to store your HTML and graphic files ready to be sent to whoever wants to view them.
In order that your website is always available to the world, your web site hosting ISP will have their web servers stored in a secure, climate controlled environment, and will have engineers available 24 hours a day to monitor them, in case a malfunction occurs on a server or the network it is connected to.
Unlike a home computer running Windows, web servers usually operate using Unix or Linux running 'Apache' as their operating system because it is far more stable than the Windows OS (we have all experienced computer 'freezes' and 'crashes' with the Windows OS!).
You store your html and other files on the web server by uploading using (FTP)... Which stands for File Transfer Protocol; this process always sounds mysterious and complex but in reality is as easy as moving files around or relocating them on your own PC.
After your website has been uploaded it is ready for the world to view, and to have it open up in someone's web browser in response to a request for your domain name your web site hosting ISP will also have additional and specialised computers called nameservers where 'zone' files are kept.
Zone files hold data about your domain, it's server IP address and email properties, and these files resolve the domain name to the server where your web pages are stored. This is known as DNS.
DNS - In General
The host ISP provides DNS (Domain Name Server) services for your domain name. This is a specialised server that is registered with all of the world's 'root' servers.
To locate your website/domain name, a web browser first asks one of the Web's 13 root servers where your domain name is registered to (it's physical server location).
These root servers only know the rightmost part of the answer: the .com/.net/.co.uk part etc. So it refers the query to the specific NIC server that handles .com/.net/.co.uk queries.
The root server then asks the appropriate NIC server about where yourdomain.com 'lives' by asking about the 'yourdomain' part, and it receives the answer that the DNS for yourdomain.com is handled by nameserver.yourhost.com... IP Address xxx.xxx.xxx.xx and the web browser then goes to that server location to retrieve your web pages.
Reliability:
Your ISP should be able to make your website accessible to the world as close to 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year as possible.
UK Trading aim to provide 99% server uptime.
Accessibility:
You need to have access to your domain space 24/7/365 in order to make changes, and upload new files or data by FTP.
Some ISP's limit this access.... UK Trading don't!
UK Trading guarantee 24/7/365 access to your domain space without limit or limitation.
Speed:
The speed that web pages are delivered to a users web browser is determined by (1) The users modem speed (2) The speed of the ISP's network, and backbone connection. A fast backbone helps to deliver pages quickly.
UK Trading's backbone is 100MB/s... That's f a s t!!!!
Bandwidth :
It's a fact of life that we all want to buy as cheaply as possible, however beware! This is where many so called 'cheap' hosting ISP's are known to cut corners by buying insufficient bandwidth to cope with the demand!
Bandwidth is like a water pipe, the bigger the bore, the more water can pass through it at any one time... If the 'pipe' is too small, then each end user will get a mere 'dribble' when everyone wants water at the same time!
Well, this is the same for a data 'stream' passing down a fibre optic cable... If the cable isn't big enough to cope with heavy demand, then there will be a 'bottleneck' and slow web page delivery will be the result.
If it's not important to you if your web pages are delivered slowly, or hardly at all, then buy as cheap as possible!
If you want your web pages delivered as quickly as the end users modem can fetch them, particularly when the net is busy, then you should be looking for an ISP who's service offers fast network connectivity speeds.
This is even more relevant nowadays because more and more people are using ADSL which is 10 times faster than a conventional analogue modem, so your hosting ISP should have enough bandwidth to cope with 100's of ADSL connections fetching web pages simultaneously.
Bandwidth is expensive! The broader and faster it is, the more it costs!
If we bought 10Mb/s bandwidth instead of 100Mb/s then we could comfortably host your website for £5 a year.... But you'd soon be complaining about slow web page retrieval, and start shopping elsewhere for your website hosting service!
UK Trading's server network is connected the the internet backbone at 100Mb/s, and is therefore capable of delivering a bit stream of 100 million bits per second.
Control:
The ability to control your domain without asking your ISP to become involved saves you a lot of time and trouble.... We hear of many people still waiting for their ISP to make a minor modification like adding a new POP3 email account, a week or more after they put in their request.
The UK Trading hosting service includes a user control panel which allows you to modify your domain via your web browser in 'real time'.
Website Statistics :
It's always nice to know, in fact in some cases, important to know how much, and where your website traffic is coming from. Many ISP's charge extra for providing statistical analysis of your log files.
With a UK Trading hosting account, graphical website statistics and analysis is free and inclusive.
Dynamic Ability:
This is the ability of your hosting space to create dynamic content, handle forms, and generally process information.
Most UK Trading accounts, with the exception of 'UKT Lite' have CGI, SSI & PHP built in which gives you a wide range of dynamic options to work with...
Having multiple options offers you the ability to 'seamlessly' combine any, or each of these technologies in order to use the best features of each one for the desired effect on your website.
FrontPage Extensions:
Microsoft FrontPage extensions offer you the opportunity to use a reasonable degree of dynamic ability on your website without needing to know or understand more complex internet 'languages' like Perl or PHP.
All UK Trading accounts have FrontPage Extensions inclusive & available at no additional charge.
Support:
No matter how experienced you are with the internet you'll probably need some form of technical support at some point in time... Poor quality ISP's will promise you the 'earth' in tech support when they want you to sign up for an account, but when it comes to delivery... They don't!
UK Trading's support policy is that our customers are always our first priority, and your support issues will be dealt with as speedily as humanly possible... Often within 2-4 hours of receiving the request.
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