What Makes For A Good Host?I've had to change web hosts a number of times. In fact, I spent most of this week changing from one host to another. Believe me, it is a major pain, although I have made sure that my site is always ready to move if necessary.
One thing I've become is very aware of the difference between a good host and a bad host. To put it simply (and obviously) a good host makes it easy for you to create and maintain your web site. A bad host gets in the way and makes you angry, unhappy and gives you an ulcer.
The key point to remember when evaluating hosts is the most important quality is responsiveness - of your site and support people. Your site should be up virtually all of the time (unfortunately computer crashes do happen but they should be rare and far between) and it must be fast. In addition, all good hosts react in a timely manner to support issues and questions. You can tell when a host is going bad from the failure of these key areas - unresponsive technical support, slow servers or constant downtime.
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The Pros & Cons Of Hosting The Site YourselfDO-IT-YOURSELF You host the Web site yourself, relying purely on in-house resources except for the external connectivity. PROS: * No service costs to pay * You have total control over the application CONS: * Can be difficult and expensive to maintain the required expertise * You may not have an ideal physical environment * Coping with future increase in demand may be painful.
YANILLA CO-LOCATION Hosting company provides the physical space and associated environmental services, including building access security, for your Web server and the connectivity to the Internet. However, the server is yours and you manage everything else to do with it, including the hardware, operating system and application. PROS: * Far cheaper than full-blown dedicated hosting, while avoiding all the environmental and connectivity issues of in-house hosting CONS: * You stilt need the resources to manage the Web server itself including operating system and application.
CO-MANAGED This is a half-way house, in which you still look after the application, but now the hosting company owns and administers the server and the operating system, as well as providing all the basic co-location facilities. This represents a split in responsibility between the IT platform and the application running on it. PROS: * It off-loads all responsibility for hardware and operating system, allowing you to focus on the application * Cheaper than full dedicated hosting CONS: * Considerably more expensive than co-location * You still have to look after the application, which is often the main source of reliability problems.
DEDICATED HOSTING Here the hosting company looks after everything to do with the IT of your Web site, including the application and even processing-electronic payments. PROS: * It off-loads all responsibility for IT, allowing you to focus purely on products and customers CONS: * Very expensive * You will stilt deal with customers and products * You may stilt have to grapple with complex integration issues involving in-house systems.
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