Difference between Shared hosting and WordPress hosting

Hosting is the most important part of your website. By now we all know what hosting means and there are a variety of hosting plans most commonly being Shared hosting, VPS hosting and Dedicated hosting. You have to make sure that you choose the right hosting plans according to your use and business. Hosting plans can influence your websites earnings and traffic.

The aim of today’s article is to know the difference between Shared hosting and WordPress hosting. Shared hosting means many websites are hosted on one physical server. This is the most common type of hosting that is used by start-ups and small business. The Ram, CPU, etc. are on sharing basis, therefore the name “shared”. Whereas, WordPress hosting, as the name suggests, is specially designed and optimized for WordPress websites.

Let us look at some points that differentiate the two.

1. Cost

In shared hosting, everything is on sharing basis and there are many websites on one server, therefore it is the cheapest of all the hosting plans available.

WordPress hosting, of course, comes with a higher price tag since it serves to a very specific market. Higher the price of WordPress hosting, it will allow high traffic and if you have a large business, then investing in WordPress hosting is not a big deal.

2. Uptime & Downtime

You will suffer downtime on shared hosting server since it is on sharing basis. There are chances that you might have a bad neighbor and it might influence the performance of your website. You cannot use a greater portion of resources because there are other websites sharing it.

WordPress hosting allows sharing but there are comparatively fewer websites sharing and sometimes none. Therefore, you get to use a greater portion of resources for your website, which in turn reduces downtime. There are very fewer chances of your website going down and there will be maximum uptime.

3. Security

WordPress hosting gives more attention to individual security and they take security very seriously. And in case your website gets hacked, they have a great support team and helps. It takes security to a completely new level. On most WordPress hosting plans, there are increased security protocols, malware scans, and many features to solve all kinds of cyber threats.

Shared hosting has higher risks of being attacked by hackers and malware since there are many websites on one server. Shared hosting also takes security seriously but compared to WordPress hosting, security is less.

4. Backups

It is extremely important to make regular backups of your website. Many WordPress hosting plans have automated daily backup features and it also helps to quickly and easily restore your backups with one click.

In case of shared hosting, many of them do not offer automated backup features. It usually offers internal backups that have great risks of losing original files if the main data center goes down.

5. Up to date

The goals of WordPress hosting and shared hosting are different. WordPress hosting wants to keep you and your website happy whereas, shared hosting wants to keep everyone and all websites happy on one server. Therefore, WordPress hosting makes sure that your server is running the latest, secure and most stable software and the updates will cover from the operating system to PHP, MySQL, WordPress itself etc. whereas shared hosting will also take care of updates but not in a similar way. It will focus more on maintaining server needs and operating system and will not include WordPress.

6. Support system

Shared hosting customer support might be friendly and provide you with the best support, but they will not be WordPress experts. The level of WordPress hosting support is far better than shared hosting. They have experts who will be quick and will know which version of WordPress you are using and what plugins are installed. They will solve issues better which shared hosting support won’t be able to do.

You might have a better idea by now of the difference between shared hosting and WordPress hosting. If you are financially better and your business is performing better then it is the time that you move away from shared hosting. It does have its own advantages and it all depends on the kind of business you are running and also on your budget.

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Importance of Web hosting for Small Businesses

We all know the importance of web hosting nowadays in businesses. And do not get surprised, even small and medium scale businesses have realized the worth, importance and significance of web hosting solutions offered by various web hosting companies. It isn’t enough for them to have a functioning website in order to stay competitive. From the past few years, all trade transactions have been shifted online and small businesses have realised that it is crucial for the success of their company to choose the right web-hosting provider. There has been huge competition and demand for web hosting services, therefore web-hosting companies provide various packages and services at affordable rates.

Shared hosting servers are mostly used for small businesses and start-ups. Shared hosting is a very common type of web hosting where the service provider hosts lot more websites on one physical web server. Multiple sites are hosted on one server, and therefore it is less expensive and affordable for start-ups.

What actually makes web hosting so important for small businesses?

◈ Website downtime

The main reason why web hosting is important for small businesses is to avoid website downtime. This can cause loss of sales of your products and services and you can lose potential customers. If a website goes down due to web hosting maintenance or other problems, your users won’t be able to access your website and moreover it may affect the image of your company, resulting to bad reputation of your business. This is the most important factor to generate leads and build relationships with customers. If your website is always down, it forces your users to jump to another site and you lose a potential customer.

◈ Protection & Security

Web hosting comes with security and protection, which reliable web hosting providers give. Viruses, malware and hackers can access your data or delete all your customer data, sales data, and all the information that your business needs to operate. A good web-hosting plan can help prevent hackers and malware to access your data and provide good security services.

Hosting providers also protects the data you have in their servers. It provides server backups in case of any happenings. It is important for small businesses to protect their data and keep it secure so that they don’t have any problems in initial stages.

◈ 24x7 support

It is extremely crucial for small businesses to have support when it comes to web hosting. One of the best reason for web hosting is that the web providers are equipped with 24x7 customer support team that will solve your problems related to website anytime. Even though you have made efforts to make sure, that your website runs smoothly, you will come across problems that will affect the performance. The support will ensure that your problems are resolved quickly and efficiently.

◈ Better SEO ranking

The rankings of your website plays an important role in search engines and helps drive organic traffic to your site. Web hosting providers which are reputed will improve the SEO of your website and help you to perform better. A website with poor performance and slow loading time will again have negative impact on your company and will rank lower in the Search Engine results Page (SERP). It is a proven fact that people bounce if a website takes more than 3 seconds to load. This is also related to speed and search engines love speed. Depending on the speed of your website, the user judges your business. Small businesses need rankings and they need to build reputation for their business, therefore it is essential to keep up the impression of a good website.

The importance of web hosting for small businesses have grown exponentially over the years and it will keep growing. Gone the days when only an operating website was enough for them. It is very crucial now to have a reliable web hosting provider to guide small businesses to the right path.

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How to Login Anonymously Using FTP

Anonymous FTP as the name suggests, allows a user to hide its identity to the server and access the files. Although the files which can be accessed should not be privately protected by the users. In other words, only the files that are publicly available can be transferred to the client system.

Anonymous FTP is used in much the same way other variants of FTP work but Anonymous FTP allows a user to access a remote directory without any username or password.

In order to get in the remote server directory, all you have to do is enter the word anonymous in the username and password can be anything, as it doesn’t check for the password. Most of the time, Anonymous FTP doesn’t even ask for username and password.

Now the real question is: Why is an FTP protocol that is unsecured?

The answer would be: Anonymous FTP allows us to publicly download a file from a server. So let us say that a person is required to download a file from a server that doesn’t necessarily needs protection, then we can log in as a guest in order to get that file.

It has found a usage in NASA, where anonymous FTP is setup in the Headquarters. It allows transferring files within or outside the headquarters.

There are various cross-platform anonymous FTP clients such as FileZilla and FireFTP. The client connects to the server. With all the facilities that Anonymous FTP provides, it may get the data in uncompressed format.

Dedicated software such as FileZilla for windows and fetch in Macintosh are used for this purpose. However, there are various web browsers that provide this functionally: -

1. Type ftp: in place of http:

2. Type user identifier in the name of host i.e. ftp://spqr1@hostname

3. Enter anything in the password [doesn’t matter]

One disadvantage of Anonymous FTP is that a client is not able to send data to the server. So it can only be used for downloading files without displaying information.

If at any moment, a user intends to upload the data to Anonymous FTP server, then it should be given written permission from the root access. There can be usually two ways of doing it: -

1. Creating the directory with the write permissions.

2. Change ownership of the file by chown

If we approach Anonymous FTP in technical jargon, it can be explained as a method through which archive sites allow access to some archives of information. A special account “Anonymous” is created, having limited access and restrictions in many other operations.

Furthermore, Anonymous FTP does not usually allow the user to transfer files to the sites that are archived.

Some of the archived sites, register the user by their email addresses and deny a login with the password ‘guest’.

As an end user, one needs to know its host to retrieve a particular file. Other than this, the path of the directory should also be known. There is enough documentation provided by IAFA working group that gives sufficient information about Anonymous FTP, including the methods and complications of it. Despite the name anonymous, a server can have a track record of the client’s IP address that logs in with the help of Anonymous FTP.

On a brighter side, Anonymous FTP gives a fast access to the files without relying on the webserver with multiple connections.

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Difference between Windows VPS hosting vs. Linux VPS hosting

You have crossed the first step of choosing VPS hosting for your business. As discussed earlier, VPS uses technology to split that effective server we simply discussed into multiple virtual servers. Consider it this way: it is a hardware that functions like a number of different servers. The word private means exactly what it implies. A virtual server is allocated for your website so you don’t need to share RAM, CPU and other resources with other websites. It is also known as cloud hosting, cloud computing.

Now is the time to choose the next VPS hosting decision: which operating system should you go for?

Well, there are two kinds of operating systems, Windows and Linux and hosting on both the operating systems is different. Linux hosting is an open source operating system that gives software availability to anyone and also allows them to use and modify for free. Whereas, Windows hosting runs on Windows operating system developed by Microsoft.

There are differences between the two operating system. Let us look at some points that differentiate the two.

1. Cost

The most obvious difference between the two is cost. Since Windows is a commercial system which is owned by Microsoft, and Linux is an open source type which requires no licensing cost, Windows is expensive than Linux. Windows licensing fees is taking into consideration and their VPS servers are subjected to specialized tasks which come with higher price. If you have a limited budget, Linux VPS server is the perfect choice. In general also, Linux VPS server is cheaper that Windows VPS server with same specifications.

2. Technical support

Windows VPS servers’ support .net technologies like ASP.NET, VB.NET, etc. If you develop your website in these technologies, you will want to dominate the powerful integration for these programming scripts. If you are going for open source options, you can use completely high technology, which Linux supports like Apache, MySQL or PHP. It also offers distribution options like Centos, Debian, Ubuntu, etc.

3. Control Panel

Windows VPS server and Linux VPS server use different control panels. cPanel works smoothly on Linux VPS, whereas this doesn’t work on Windows VPS. Web Host Manager (WHM) is also available on Linux server. For Windows server, Plesk is used which has a user-friendly interface.

4. Easy to Use

It depends if you are a technical savvy person or if you don’t understand technical things. Many with technical knowledge argue that Linux is easier to use because it had cPanel management tool, which also helps in managing FTP and SSH users. If you are not a technical kind of person then Windows VPS can be easier for you because it has a remote desktop with instinctive Graphic User Interface (GUI).

5. Security

Linux is based on UNIX operating system, which offers great security from malware, spyware and virus, environment, etc. compared to Windows. In Linux only the administrators have editing and security benefits and had independent control over everything, whereas, in Windows, users can hide a file from the administrator view.

6. Scalability

Scalability is the ability to handle workloads on the server. The uptime and downtime matters when it comes to hosting. Rapid and increased workloads should be handled well. In this case, Linux VPS server has 100% uptime guarantee, whereas Windows VPS server cannot grant 100% uptime guarantee.

If your applications run on PERL, Ruby or Python, then Linux VPS server is the best for you, whereas if you work on ASP.net pr PHP then Windows is the preferred choice. Selecting an operating system is a tough choice since each of them have their own pros and cons. Choose an operating system for your VPS hosting wisely based on your individual choices, budget and environment.

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Reasons why you should opt for Cloud Hosting

Just like other various hosting platforms, Cloud hosting has its own benefits and intrinsic features. It has been currently spread widely and almost all businesses are switching from other hosting platforms to cloud. However, there are several more reasons why you should shift from traditional hosting to cloud hosting, and before you shift, you need to be aware of the inherent characteristics and what exactly cloud hosting is.

Let us get into brief about what cloud hosting is, how different it is from traditional hosting and the advantages it offers.

Cloud hosting sites operate across many web servers that are interconnected. The data is provided from various servers. Whenever you perform a search on Google, instead of running the query on a single network, it runs on an enormous network of computers (cloud). Google does not have to worry about the load. It gives pliability of adding more servers to the network in order to handle the load. One can add other servers the in-network easily to tackle downtime.

The benefits of cloud hosting are:

1. Scalability

The key benefit of cloud hosting is the ease of scalability. The environment gives the freedom and power to make an optimal set of computing resources to provide extra capacity. It instantly allocates resources with needs of the website and adds or reduces resources like bandwidth, storage, RAM, etc. Whereas in traditional hosting you have limited resources and firm specifications so you cannot add resources immediately.

2. Affordable costs

You only pay for resources that you use! You do not have to worry about capital expenditure because you do not need to buy any infrastructure, house or maintain your own hardware and there is no wasted capacity remaining unused. Compared to traditional hosting, you have to pay a fixed amount for the services whether you use them or not.

3. Best performance

Cloud hosting means speed and great performance! It allows load balancing across multiple servers because it allows increased capacity leading to increased availability. Since cloud hosting provides additional network uptime and guarantees no single point of failure, it performs far better than traditional hosting servers do. Additionally, server uptime is equivalent to performance. Due to low-density servers, premium hardware, and multiple caching layers, it allows 2x faster load times.

4. Security & disaster recovery

One of the biggest concern related to hosting is security. If you are using multi-server application like Cloud, it makes security and disaster recovery much easier. In traditional hosting, you usually share resources, RAM, CPU needs, etc. with other websites on the same server, or you have to buy a dedicated server to secure information which costs too high. Other people cannot access or disrupt your data since Cloud hosting has an infrastructure with secures data at many levels-network, application, and physical security. It ensures that data is safe through encrypted solutions, firewalls, etc.

Cloud hosting being a multi-server setup provides disaster recovery feature as data is backed up in the inter-connected server automatically. On traditional hosting, you only have one server where you can host your data, therefore, they do not offer disaster or backup recovery. You have to arrange it yourself.

5. Latest technology

Cloud hosting uses latest technologies. You can customize and make use of software applications as per your business needs and likes. These latest technologies and upgrades have made cloud hosting very popular. Latest versions of software and computer processing power are also included. Whereas, in traditional hosting, you cannot customize according to your needs and preferences.

Sites hosted in cloud environment perform anytime better than hosted on the traditional server. It is a great model where storage and computer solutions can be used by businesses. For businesses that require high loading page speed, immediate allocation of resources, environmental friendly server, disaster and backup recovery plans, etc. then cloud hosting the perfect option for you.

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Best Ways to Choose the Right Domain Name for your Business

You have a great plan for your website making and design. Now comes the time to host your website and choose a domain name. Before going to domain names you even have to select the type of hosting. Read our blogs to get an idea of the types of hosting and to understand each one of them.

Why do you think domain names are so important?

Domain name reflects the identity of your brand and it also affects SEO. The keywords in your domain name will have an effect on your SEO. Additionally, it is a sign of brand recognition.

Choosing a domain name might look easy but it is not. Many times we won’t get the domain name we need because someone else has taken or maybe because of its high price. Choosing a domain name is similar to choosing a business name because that is going to be your identity in the world of web. It needs though process and therefore today we are going to discuss the best ways to choose the right domain name for your business.

Before going through the domain name process let us see the structure of domain names.

For e.g. http://www.want2host.com/ is a domain name. Here, HTTP is a prefix, www is a sub-domain, want2host is second level domain and .com is the extension. There is various kind of extensions and they are used according to needs. The various kinds of extensions are .org, .cn, .uk, .social, etc. sometimes domain extensions are chosen according to the country located. For e.g. domain extensions with .uk might be a company based in the UK.

Now we’ll see the best ways to choose domain names.

1. Keyword usage

Using keywords in your domain name might give more sense to your customers about your brand. Keep in mind the keywords that people will type into their search engine. Additionally, keywords used in domain name helps the website to rank higher on search engines because it reflects what your brand is about.

It is really hard to find a keyword that can fit your domain name. You have to combine and find the perfect one.

2. Domain length short

It is always recommended to keep your domain name short. Short domain names make it easier for people to remember. Using keywords in the domain name is awesome but long tail keywords should be avoided. People forget long domain names and sometimes misspell the name. You may lose a lot of traffic because of this.

3. Targeted domain name

If you have a local business, you can add the name of your area in your domain name. This will make it easier for local customers to find your business.

4. Catchy and rememberable

A domain name that is catchy can influence people and also build brand recognition. Select a domain name that can be rememberable to people.

5. Avoid generic names

Generic names are stuffed with keywords and many businesses choose domain names that are generic. Make sure that your domain name has brand value and reflects your business without explaining the product or service you provide.

6. Avoid using numbers and hyphens

Using numbers and hyphens in domain names can end up creating confusion. Not even in your second thought think of using numbers. If your domain name contains number 1 then users might be confused if it is numerical 1 or one.

7. Be careful of trademarks

Once you have chosen your best options for your site name, ensure you are not disregarding anybody’s trademarks. It is constantly great to check now since this could slaughter an awesome site and business. Likewise, in the event that you will incorporate some enormous name item, for example, Twitter or Facebook, audit their terms and conditions. Most of them will not enable you to utilize their name in any piece of your area.

8. Marry your domain

Think long-term before selecting a domain name because you cannot keep changing domain names. A change is domain name will cost you and even hurt your SEO rankings. Therefore, make sure that you select a domain name that can be long-term and defines your brand.

9. Use domain generators

Domain generators can help you to turn your ideas into creative domain names. There are various free tools that can be used for generating original fresh domain names.

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SSH — Secure Shell. What is SSH? How to Implement SSH with FTP?

Introduction

SSH is an acronym for Secure Shell. Secure Shell is a network protocol which basically means a set of rules and guidelines that tells your computer how to send information from one place to another.

SSH as the name implies is Secured. Basically when you are sending data over something like FTP, you are sending it entirely without encryption, so if you type your private information at one end and look to send it to another place, it might become visible for someone in the middle and private information may not remain secure for long. Using SSH in situation like this makes the chances of your information getting lost much less.

What is SSH?

SSH(like FTP) can be used for transmitting data, commands from one place to another and for transmitting files. It can be used on a variety of computers and on various platforms.

The most visible application of the protocol is for access to shell accounts on Unix like operating systems but it sees some limited use on windows as well.

The encryption used by SSH is intended to provide confidentiality and security of data while transmitting private and confidential information blocking the interference caused otherwise midway.

Usage of SSH

SSH client program is typically used for establishing connections to an SSH daemon accepting remote connections. Most of the commonly present modern operating systems include OpenBSD, GNU/LINUX. Windows is one of the few modern server operating system that does not include SSH by default.

SSH is useful in cloud computing to solve connectivity problems, avoiding the security issues of exposing a cloud based virtual machine directly on the internet. An SSH tunnel can provide a secure path over internet through a firewall to a virtual machine.

It becomes handy in logging in to a remote machine and executing commands. Besides this it supports tunneling, forwarding TCP ports and X11 connections.

SSH Keys

An SSH key allows us to establish a secure connection between computer and server. They provide a more secure way of logging into a private server with SSH than using a password alone. The SSH keys offer high security as because it is nearly impossible to decipher them whereas a password on the other hand is more vulnerable.

Deploy keys

Deploy keys allow read-only access to multiple projects with a single SSH key.

This is really useful for cloning repositories to your Continuous Integration (CI) server. By using deploy keys, you don’t have to setup a dummy user account.

If you are a project master or owner, you can add a deploy key in the project settings under the section ‘Deploy Keys’. Press the ‘New Deploy Key’ button and upload a public SSH key. After this, the machine that uses the corresponding private key has read-only access to the project.

Generating a key pair provides you with two long string of characters.

◈ Public key
◈ Private key

Public key can be placed on any server and can then be unlocked by connecting it with the private key already present with the client.

By protecting the private key with a passphrase the security level can be considerably increased.

The entire process can be categorized into following steps:

◈ Create RSA key pair
◈ Store keys and passphrase
◈ Copy public key
◈ Disable password
◈ Enhancements

These are intended for performance enhancements of SSH products:

◈ SSH-over-SCTP: support for SCTP rather than TCP
◈ ECDSA: support for elliptic curve DSA rather than RSA
◈ ECDH: support for elliptic curve diffie-hellman rather than plain diffie-hellman
◈ UMAC: support for UMAC rather than HMAC for MAC.

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PHP hosting and its advantages

PHP is an acronym for Hypertext Pre-Processor, which is a very popular scripting language that is made to develop dynamic web pages and applications like shopping carts, login pages, etc. It is well known for its open source and developer friendliness.

The PHP code is inserted into the HTML source of a website and then it is run on the hosting server than on the browser. The websites which are created with PHP are fully compatible with mobile devices like iPhone, iPad, Android devices, etc. because PHP is a universal language. It enables web pages to be dynamic and it helps to make, websites look more interactive. Many popular websites like Wikipedia, Facebook, Yahoo, Flickr, WordPress, etc. are written in PHP.

PHP is interpreted on the web hosting server side, therefore, it needs to be hosted on a server that supports PHP. It is crucial to check with your web hosting provider if the hosting plan you choose has PHP processor module. The software of PHP is free to download and is released under PHP license, but again you have to make sure if your web hosting plan is PHP compatible.

Going back to history, PHP was developed by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1995 when he wrote many CGI (Common Gateway Interface) programs, which he used to maintain his personal homepage. Later on, he used it for web forms and to communicate with databases and named it as Personal Home Page/Forms Interpreter. This helped in building simple and flexible web applications.

Let us compare PHP with other scripting languages.

1. PHP vs. ColdFusion

ColdFusion is only available on Win32, Linus, Hp/UX and Solaris while PHP runs on every platform. ColdFusion has a very easy interface and it is meant for non-programmers, whereas PHP is meant for programmers. It is very easy on ColdFusion to get started, but on PHP, you will need some programming knowledge.

2. PHP vs. ASP

ASP is an acronym for Active Server Pages and it is said to be very slow and uses a heavy language compared to PHP which is very easy to understand. The resources on ASP are very limited and if you need advanced features, you have to buy additional components like interacting with FTP. The disadvantage of ASP is that its patent is only used on Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS).

3. PHP vs. Perl

PHP as said before is less confusing and more flexible and is easier to understand, whereas coding in Perl is very difficult and it loses flexibility which makes it hard for editing the code. PHP anytime is much better in all aspects and makes things less complicated than Perl is. Perl has been around since the eighties but now PHP is also coming up quickly.

Majority of websites are PHP bases because it is an open source and is very flexible, but this is not the only advantage of PHP hosting.

The following are advantages of PHP hosting:

• Cost-effective and scalable

PHP is very cost effective and yet scalable. Since it is an open source, it is free of cost. Upscaling and downscaling your website with PHP hosting is very easy and can handle traffic hike too. You can spin new servers when the traffic load increases and also pay for the time that you used them. It is like the pay-as-you-use business. Depends on the site you use, it can help scale your memory on your own and additionally there is no limit of memory storage and performance scalability. It will allow collaborative work and also give you full control of PHP environment.

• Supports all servers

PHP supports all the crucial web servers like Apache, Microsoft IIS, Nginx, MySQL, etc. it also supports personal web servers and Netscape. All you have to do is select your version and applications that you want because PHP is flexible and can interact with all the databases. The most popular combination is PHP with MySQL.

It also integrates with HTML and CSS without extra plugins or software. If your site runs on CMS (Content Management Systems) like Drupal, Joomla or WordPress then PHP is a must.

It also meshes with coding frameworks like Cake PHP, Zend Framework; open source programs like Mambo, SugarCRM; E-commerce frameworks like Magento, ZenCart, and Virtuemart.

• Management and support

The management of PHP is easily available on Cloudways. If you choose managed PHP, you will have constant support from cloud engineers that can manage and create custom cloud as per your needs. In case you are stuck anywhere, you do not have to worry because you will easily get support, as it is used by a huge number of people.

• Security

Managed PHP servers automatically handle security for your site, therefore you don’t have to worry about malware that may hit your site. Many hosting providers offer the best security which includes data integrity, privacy, and data protection.

• Speed

Your site’s performance will be really fast and during high loading times, it won’t put a strain, since PHP is very light on server resources. Your overall user experience decreases when your site consumes a lot of resources just to load a page, additionally, it will also increase hosting cost.

• Backup for data

PHP servers automatically backup your data every day. You do not have to worry about losing your data since it provides backup every 4 hours and also has an option where you can tell them when you want to backup your data.

These are only a few advantages of PHP hosting. PHP can run on both UNIX and Windows servers. For e-commerce websites, everything that matters is website load time and conversion rates, this is one of the biggest advantages of PHP that is decreased website loading times, which in turn improves conversion rates. It has a powerful output buffering that improves the output flow. If your site is built on PHP frameworks, then PHP web hosting is the best option for you. Moreover, it is free, secure, reliable, dynamic and flexible.

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Managed VPS vs. Unmanaged VPS

VPS hosting is a very common type of hosting among many customers. It basically takes a big server and makes partitions of many small servers. These small servers run its own operating system and neighbors cannot access it.

A virtual server is like a bridge between shared and dedicated hosting. There are several benefits of VPS hosting like being cost-effective, it is powered by highly advanced technologies, user-friendly base, etc. VPS is a perfect solution for businesses which are small and do not have the budget for dedicated servers. Once you have chosen VPS server for your business, the next step is to figure out how much control you would want over your VPS server. Therefore, for this, you have to decide between Managed and Unmanaged VPS plan.

Managed VPS

Managed VPS means when your hosting provider is looking after your server and monitoring its performance. Managed VPS is usually for people who are not technically savvy. This is the only solution when you have little or no experience of maintaining a server. The host sometimes pro-actively takes care of all the technical aspects of your website like installing software, server configuration, security, etc.

Here are some benefits of Managed VPS hosting

• The speed of Managed VPS is highly vigorous, therefore with managed VPS, you can guarantee little or no downtime.

• Technical support is always available 24x7. If any problem persists, you can call the support team and can get things solved easily.

• You can invest more time in your business rather than maintaining your server maintenance, security, configuration, software update, etc. because it is all managed by the hosting provider.

• There is no worry about security since it is ensured by monitored firewalls, investigations of distrustful traffic and vulnerability frauds.

• Without shutting down or rebooting you can change the size of your hard drive or even create a new one for that matter.

• You can have unlimited resources such as RAM or CPU to run really fast and level of scalability is really high.

• Backup is very easy as in case of any hardware failures

Unmanaged VPS

Unmanaged VPS means when you will have less support from your server. You have to take care of your server and monitor the performance. Unmanaged VPS is usually for people who are really good at technical things. If you choose Unmanaged VPS you may need to know about software updates, DNS configurations, control panel set up, server backup, etc.

Advantages of Unmanaged VPS are:

• They are generally cheaper than Managed VPS because the hosting provider gives less support and you have to manage your own website. Therefore, they charge lesser compared to Managed VPS.

• You have full remote access to your server and self-management rights.

• Your information is safe since no one can access it except you.

• You can use resources according to your needs.

Managed vs. Unmanaged

Comparatively, both the plans are good and have their own advantages. Unmanaged is financially economical than managed VPS and you have full control over your server, whereas, in managed VPS the hosting provider helps you with technical things. Before choosing between the two ask yourself questions like, do you have enough budget? Do you have the technical knowledge to manage your server? If you get the answers to these two questions, then your answer should be clear enough to decide which to choose. Well, it all depends on your business requirements and what you need.

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Top 10 Best Web Hosting Providers in India of June 2018

Web hosting is a service that allows organizations and individuals to post a website or web page onto the Internet. A web host, or web hosting service provider, is a business that provides the technologies and services needed for the website or webpage to be viewed in the Internet. Websites are hosted, or stored, on special computers called servers.

When Internet users want to view your website, all they need to do is type your website address or domain into their browser. Their computer will then connect to your server and your webpages will be delivered to them through the browser.

Most hosting companies require that you own your domain in order to host with them. If you do not have a domain, the hosting companies will help you purchase one.

1. A2Hosting

This is one of the best web hosting company which aided many people to get a particular recognition for their website. this is the reason this company is named as A2.The company proved it’s existence in the market since decades and still is on top with great high speed load time,uptime and the best performance overall.....View Plans

2. IPage Hosting

iPage web hosting company is well known for its cheap shared hosting plans. They even enable a lot of free marketing coupons that help in promoting the websites. The 1$/months is an amazing plan offered by iPage . Another best thing about iPage is their 24×7 chat support that helps in fixing any issues that arise for the users...View Plans

3. DomainRacer

DomainRacer is one of the Fastest, affordable price & quality service with plenty room to grow exponentially. Primarily offer SSD Storage, LiteSpeed Technology, Free SSL Certificate, Security, WHMCS billing tool and many more. Guaranteed 16x faster speed and high performance system surety...View Plans

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5. Inmotion Hosting

Inmotion entered the hosting market in 2001 and the great reason to prefer Inmotion is because of its help of support. The control panel options and security are assets of Inmotion. The features and support provided by the company is the main reason for it to become the best in the field...View Plans

6. Big rock Hosting

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7. Youstable Hosting

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8. BlueHost Hosting

BlueHost is an independent hosting service which was commenced in 2013. The 24×7 customer support, three anti-spam tools, 30 days money back guarantee makes it the best web hosting service provider in India...View Plans

9. Hostmonster

Host monster is one of the leading web hosting service provider in India which provides both dedicated and VPS services. THe business plus package of host monster provides SSL certificate including two Anti-Spam protectors...View Plans

10. Touchstone Hosting

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What is a DNS Lookup?

DNS stands for domain name system, which is the database responsible for storing all of the information pertaining to IP addresses and domain names online. DNS servers are used to carry and transmit this data from one computer to another. All of this data is stored on a network that is backed up by thousands of separate DNS servers and stored on single root DNS servers in the United States, Japan, London and Sweden.

These servers carry tremendous volumes of data, and every day, the network is growing. Fortunately, there is a way to conduct a DNS lookup to obtain some of this data for whatever reason you see fit. The following information outlines the process of conducting a DNS lookup and some of the reasons why people usually use DNS lookup services.

WHOIS Database

The database previously mentioned that stores all of the DNS records of the world is called the WHOis database and can be searched through several different web sites. The main site for WHOIS lookups is Network Solutions, Inc.'s site (a company that is partially responsible for maintaining the records). Whois.net is also commonly used to obtain domain registration details and DNS records.

Unfortunately, there is no way to verify whether the information you find in the WHOis database is accurate or truthful, as there are no requirements for providing authentication of data when registering a domain name. In other words, anyone can register practically any site they would like in any name, with any address, with the exception of government or military sites.

Nonetheless, many times, the WHOis database will return enough information to proceed with your investigation.

Preventing Spam

One of the reasons why people use the WHOis database to look up information is to prevent spam attacks from a particular web server or IP address. When your site is attacked by spam repeatedly, it is possible to obtain the IP address(es) of the attackers and then use a reverse DNS lookup tool to obtain site registration information of that IP address (if there is any).

It is important to note that these reverse lookup tools differ from the conventional WHOis searches because you are obtaining information based on the IP address, instead of an actual domain name. It may be very difficult to obtain the identity of the spammer, but it is possible to contact their web host and have them shut down if the right information is obtained from the reverse lookup service.

Maintaining Site Security

Even more violent than spam is the dreaded DDoS attack , which is basically a security attack on your web site from dozens or even hundreds of IP address simultaneously. The DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack in particular is geared towards causing your server to crash due to an overload of fake traffic in a short period of time.  However, some hackers will use the same method to guess your site's passwords by repeatedly sending requests until the correct password is retrieved.

If you notice an unusual amount of traffic suddenly, then you may want to conduct a reverse DNS lookup and get to the root of it before it becomes a problem, especially if the traffic is originating from a group of similar IP addresses. 

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The Difference Between DNS and Name Servers

The DNS (Domain Name System) is a massive network of servers that comprises the largest digital database on the planet. This database is maintained, managed and regulated by several internet authorities, including the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) and ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers).

Many people confuse the various terms associated with the DNS and mistakenly refer to them as either the same thing or completely separate entities. In truth, they are neither separate nor are they the same thing; rather, they are integral pieces to the puzzle that is the world wide web.

If you're interested in learning the difference between a DNS and a name server, then you may want to consider the following information.

What is the DNS?

Contrary to a seemingly popular misconception, DNS does not stand for Domain Name Server or Domain Name Software. DNS is an abbreviation for the aforementioned system that catalogs every domain and IP address on the internet, including registration information, as well as their relation to other domains and web hosts. The DNS is the central database of the internet, and without it, the internet would cease to exist as we know it.

Before the domain name system was devised, computers would connect to each other via IP addresses, which are strings of segmented numbers separated by dots. An example of an IP address would be 127.0.0.1 (a common IP address for a local router). The domain name system attaches a name to this number so that site visitors can easily remember and return to web addresses.

What is DNS Software?

DNS software is a program that is installed on a web server and used to facilitate the transference of data related to the domain name system. Technically, any web server can have DNS software installed on it, making the server a name server; however, some web hosts will not allow you to install or configure software within your hosting control panel, especially in shared hosting plans.

If you’re interested in installing DNS software on a web server to create a custom nameserver, you'll either need a VPS or dedicated hosting plan, unless you'd like to invest several thousand dollars in a private web server.

What is a Name Server?

A name server is a web server that has DNS software installed on it, particularly a server that is managed by a web host that is specifically designated for managing the domain names that are associated with all of the hosting provider's accounts.

Name servers are often called DSN servers as well, and this is likely the origin of all of the confusion associated with name servers and the DNS.

Every web site has two name servers to which it is pointed, and this process must be done by the webmaster upon purchasing a domain and a hosting account. If you have more questions about domain name pointing and your web hosting name servers, it is recommended that you contact your web hosting provider.

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