| Web Hosting Provider Components |
This article will focus on the Web hosting basics from the business perspective.
Simply put, Web hosting companies provides individuals, businesses and organizations the ability to house, maintain and present Web pages to the Internet. The hosting company is the entity that allows individuals and businesses to show content on the Internet. The actual mechanics of web hosting can get quite complicated.
These hosting companies are not the same as Internet service providers (ISPs). In order to access the Internet everyone needs an ISP. However, if you want to add content to the Internet then you'll require a web hosting company. Often times your ISP will provide a certain amount of free hosting where you can publish a personal Web site. If you're looking for something a little more in depth than a personal Web page then you'll want to check out a Web hosting company.
Web hosting is really not as easy as it sounds though. Web site hosting is a 24 hour a day, seven day a week operation that runs all year. Web sites always need to be up and running. This puts a tremendous strain on the equipment and people that work in the Web hosting industry.
A Web hosting company has a very high overhead. In order to store and serve Web sites these companies require high-end computers. These high-end computers, or Web servers, get very hot and use a lot of power. Additional power is then required to cool the Web servers off. They also require special facilities that are kept clean and cool. Often times, data centers will have several large air conditioning units specifically to pump cold air onto the servers. It's also a wise choice to have industrial size backup generators in case anything was to happen to the power.
Connecting to a backbone provider is also needed to provide adequate transfer speed. These backbone providers, or network service providers, give the hosting company direct access to the Internet trunk lines. This network access is sold by bandwidth. A Web host will buy a certain amount of bandwidth in order to sell to their customers. The definition of bandwidth is volume of information transmitted across a given communications line in a specific period of time.
The mechanics of Web hosting is quite complicated. In order to counter the large overhead hosting companies deal in volume. Thousands of sites can be hosted on one Web server. Adding everything up, there is a specific amount of money required to maintain a constantly running Web server. So each new site added to a server will decrease the overall cost per customer.
There is a cut off point though because hosting too many Web sites on one server will cause a decrease in server performance. Customers may then experience a general slow down with their Web sites and might start to get page errors. Between high operational costs and server performance, Web hosting companies must maintain a balance.
Additionally, the fact that Web hosting is a 24/7 business means that the human overhead costs are above a normal business. There must be staff on location at all times. This means that instead of one 8 hour shift there are three 8 shifts. A Web hosting company will also need to cover weekends. Generally though, non-business hour staff is for technical support only.
In conclusion, the Web hosting business has many components including hardware, software, network technologies and human hard work. This synergy of man and machine makes the Internet what it is today.
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Article Source: UnArchived Articles
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