The purchase of the first hosting service may result in numerous mistakes. Lack of awareness of what service parameters are important can lead to wrong decisions. Usually, we acquire knowledge related to hosting services with the time of its use. However, many things are worth knowing in advance.
What do you need to know about hosting?
Here is a list of things you should know about.
- Hosting is a shared account - server services are commonly called hosting. In practice, however, the basic service of this kind is simply a shared server. The user can use the limited resources allocated to him/her by the administrator. Why? Because the same server is at the disposal of even hundreds of other users. The client can have an entire server for himself, if he uses a dedicated server. However, this is already many times higher cost.
- No transfer restrictions with restrictions - the ability to use the hosting service without the imposed transfer restriction is a convenient solution, but we must be aware of the fact that in addition to the transfer we also have many other restrictions. Our shared account imposes limits on us in terms of CPU load, RAM, number of database queries and many more. This information should be included in the service management panel. There we can also verify how much we charge our account. Usually, if the limits are exceeded, the hosting companies send notifications.
- No area limit - although we can talk about the lack of transfer limits, it is difficult to understand how to imagine the lack of area limits. Such offers do exist, but they should be treated with a pinch of salt. Why? Drives are always limited in capacity, so it is hard to expect that the hosting provider will allow us to keep any amount of data on their servers. Probably when we start exaggerating, we will be asked to leave the service or use a more expensive package.
- Uptime cannot be 100%. - uptime indicates uninterrupted server operation time. In practice, however, it is difficult to imagine a server that would not have updated software or would not be reset. Although there are historically known servers that have not been reset for many years, they were constructed in such a way that even their selected parts could be replaced without resetting the system.
- Backups that you don't always run - the fact that every webmaster should take care of backups of their websites is a matter of course. The problem, however, is that on many hosts, running an automatic backup in the administration panel is limited to selected hours. If this can be done, e.g. between 10 p.m. and 9 a.m., there is no problem. But for many, it may be the start of copying only between midnight and 6 a.m. for example.
- Restrictions on files, emails, mailboxes and domains - hosting can impose numerous restrictions. They are usually different for each package offered by the service provider. As a rule, daily e-mail limits are expressed in hundreds, often in thousands. The server can also set a quantitative limit for files and e-mail boxes. You can also find a limited number of domains - you can find very cheap offers, where the maximum number of domains is only - 1.
Hosting services full of secrecy
The offer of hosting services is indeed full of secrets, but only for beginners. Although some things may be incomprehensible and unexpected at first, over time they become obvious. Only a thorough check of all the parameters will surely not disappoint us.