A White Paper On

CURRENT TRENDS IN
WEB HOSTING
ARENA

By: Mohammad Azad Shaikh

http://www.internetgeeks.org
Parul Institute of Engineering & Technology.
Introduction: starting to think there might be a future in
website hosting services.
Currently billion of websites are live
and everyone needs a web server to be alive. Later that year, the folks at CERN unleashed
Web Server technology had been changed a the World Wide Web (www) onto the world,
which incorporated Tim Berner-Lee’s new
lot in this decade. Apache the best open
HTML computer Language. HTML stands
source web server on planer is also the most for Hypertext Markup Language, and uses
widely used. Be it university, business, specifications for Uniform Resource Locator
government or any other organizations (URLs).
everyone needs some sort of web server to
host there website. There is lot of business Aside from giving the world a mouthful of
in this field and new solutions and new abbreviations to memorize, it also
became the universal standard for locating
technology keep on evolving.
website addresses.
In this white paper I am going to
The internet was no longer simply a
cover all the current web server
playground for universities and computer
technologies. What are the secrets behinds enthusiasts. With each new addition to its
any successful web servers. The best of format, it became easier to use and easier to
Apache and IIS. I will show you the explain. At the same time, it grew in
advantages and disadvantages of Apache complexity. The business world saw the
and IIS. potential of the medium and seized on their
chance.
In the ending I will show how you
can setup your web server and get into the Website hosting, once expensive and
complicated, is now cheap and only
hosting business. Get ready to explorer the
somewhat complicated. It began with large
wonderful and amazing arena of web companies renting out extra space on their
servers. servers and has now become big business in
itself. There are at least as many companies
that offer web hosting as there are
companies that provide internet service.
Welcome to the World Wide Web:
As computers continue to evolve, the
1991 was an important year in the internet itself evolves. And with each new
development of the internet. Already an change come new changes to the way the
entity in its own right, it was about to get a business of website hosting is packaged to
lot bigger. It started with the National potential customers.
Science Foundation (NSF) when they
decided it was time to lift commercial Some Web Hosting Fundamentals:
restrictions on the web. This in turn opened
the internet up to limitless commercial Disk Storage:
possibilities. Electronic commerce was born,
and with it came companies who were Disk storage is the space on the web
hosting company's servers (or computers)
that your web site's content is allowed to using these types of payment plans.
utilize. For example, on the computer you
are using now, it has a certain amount of
disk space on its hard drive. It may be Setup Fee:
anywhere from 150 GB to 500 GB. One of
your programs on that computer may take This is the fee web hosting companies
up 15 MB of storage space on your C drive. charge for setting up your account and
Web hosting companies' servers work the domain. Basically, it is a labor fee for the
same way. They allow each of their transfer or setup of your new account with
customers a certain amount of disk space to them. Some companies do not have setup
store their web site material on, such as fees, but they make up for this in other
images, HTML files, emails, etc. 125 MB is areas, such as raising their monthly rates or
a very large amount of space for a web site. by offering fewer features in a given plan.
Most web sites only take up 3 - 10 MB. But
you will want to have sufficient storage FTP Accounts (with 24hr FTP access):
space in the event that you need it, so it
never hurts to have more than enough. An FTP Account allows you to upload your
web site and content onto your web hosting
Data Transfer or Bandwidth: company's servers so that visitors can see
your site. FTP stands for File Transfer
This is the amount of data that your web Protocol which basically means that files are
hosting company's server has to load each time being transferred over the Internet. There are
someone visits your site, and/or each time you many free programs out there that allow you
upload images or files via FTP (File Transfer to do this with ease, such as WS_FTP,
Protocol). For example, every time someone FileZilla, Cute ftp and the Microsoft Web
visits affable.co.in, the servers that host Wizard which comes with just about every
affable.co.in have to load those pages for each of Windows computer. The 24 hour FTP
those persons visiting the page. It is actually the access means that you can upload files
'transfer' of the data that you see in front of you. and/or images to your web site at anytime of
Most web hosting companies offer unlimited the day or night.
data transfer because 97% of their clients do not
abuse their servers with outrageous data
Up-time: 99.9%
transfers anyway. But most of the sites that offer
unlimited data transfer also have rules in place
Up-time is the amount of time that a
that prevent customers from abusing their web site remains live or active and without
system. You must read the fine print in every problems loading pages, etc. A 99.9% up-
*unlimited* plan that you encounter to make time means that there is a .1% chance that
sure you do not break their rules. your site will go "down" in the event that
something happens to the server your site is
Monthly Fee: sitting on or something happens to the
connection along the way. A 99.9% up-time
This means that your monthly payments will is just about as good as it gets in web
amount to some rupees if you pay annually. hosting, which isn't bad at all. You should
It is more if you pay on a monthly basis. never settle for anything less than a 99.9%
You can save a chunk of money by paying up-time, even if it's 99.7% or 99.8%. All
annually. Many hosting companies are now
companies should be equipped with the tools of your web site. With web site statistics,
needed to keep your site up and running at you can see how many people visit your site
least 99.9% of the time. per day, month, or by the hour. You can see
where these visitors are coming from and
what web sites or search engines are
POP3 E-mail Boxes: referring them. You can see what pages are
the most popular pages within your site, and
POP3 Email Boxes are the 'actual' so much more. No web site should be
email accounts that you receive with your without statistics. This is also valuable
plan. 25 different people within your information to those that inquire about
organization or company can have their own advertising on your site.
email accounts with their own logins.

E-Mail Aliases: Web Control Panel:

E-mail aliases are just the words that The web control panel allows you to
you place in front of @yourcompany.com to control your web site functions, such as
create unique email addresses. These aliases setting up email aliases and auto responders,
are then set up by you to forward to creating new email accounts, viewing your
whatever address you want them to forward disk storage, or reviewing your billing
to. For example, you can set up an alias at statements, and much, much more. You sign
your site called [email protected] (if into these Web Control Panels with your
you do not have an actual email account user ID and password.
under this name). Then you could set up this
alias to forward to 2 or 3 people in your
sales department with real POP3 email
accounts. You can put any word you want in The New Revolution in Web
front of your company to be an alias. The Hosting:
servers are set up to send all email that ends
in @yourcompany.com to your main default
Pop3 email account regardless of what that It's a safe bet that the Web hosting
word is. Even if you do not set up an alias to industry of the future will look very
be forwarded to specific addresses in your different from the one today's hosting
organization, the email will by default go to providers are used to, and that's certainly
the 'main' email account of your web site's cause enough for concern to those in the
plan. Note: Aliases are NOT actual email business. An even greater concern, though,
accounts; they are only addresses that point is the serious possibility that the future isn't
an email to an actual email account or as far away as some hosts might believe.
accounts.
Over the past year, plenty of signs have
emerged that indicate the face of Web
hosting is already starting to stretch and shift
Detailed Web Statistics (Web Trends):
in new directions. And it's not just all the
usual suspects of change - i.e., shutdowns,
Every web site should have access to
mergers, buyouts, etc. - although there have
their site's traffic and visitor statistics. This
been plenty of those. No, the new winds of
is very important in monitoring the success
change include acquisitions of companies
that deliver more than just additional hosting 6. Scalable to up-gradations:
customers, a fresh generation of startups that An operating system should be
look nothing like your father's Web hosting scalable to hardware and software
company, and experiments with innovative up-gradations.
ways to sell hosting to the next wave of
customers. The popular web server operating
systems:

Web server operating systems can be

Which operating system should be categorized as follows:
used for Web Servers?
• Windows web hosting servers
• Unix, Linux and FreeBSD web
Before we decide which operating system hosting servers
would be more suited to Web Servers, let • Macintosh web hosting servers
me list the important features in a web • Novell web hosting servers
server operating system.
The choice of the operating system for a
1. Stability: web server should not depend on the
The operating system should not operating system on your desktop. That is, if
crash under heavy load and, thus, you use Windows on your home/office
bring all web sites down. computer, it is not necessary to have the
2. Security: same operating system on your web
The operating system should not be server. Rather, your choice should depend
vulnerable to viruses and should not on how you create your web site and the
have security holes that can be kind of applications you want to run on your
exploited by hackers. web server.
3. Ease of administration:
Operating system administration Windows web hosting servers:
should be trouble-free with easy-to-
use administration tools. The Windows operating systems for
4. Features and Software: web servers can smoothly integrate
A good operating system should Microsoft applications including Access,
have all required features and MS SQL, and FrontPage etc. However, they
software to run a web hosting server. are known to be less stable under heavy web
If these are not in-built, are they traffic. They are also more vulnerable to
available from other sources? (Read attacks from viruses and hackers (though the
the next point). latter has more to do with how the server is
5. Third party application administered).
availability and integration:
Software for the operating system
that enhances the features of the web
UNIX, Linux and FreeBSD web hosting
server should be available from other
servers: 
vendors. Further, integration of these
should be smooth and trouble-free.
UNIX and Linux servers are famous
for their stability. They can provide more
than 99% uptime even under heavy web That means that it does not make sense to
traffic. By the way, if you are developing try to make independent comparison of
your web site in Microsoft FrontPage you Apache and IIS. You should think about the
are not restricted to the Windows Operating
end result you want to achieve by using any
system - Unix/Linux servers provide
FrontPage Extensions that help you web server, otherwise you will lose yourself
seamlessly integrate your application. in enormous amount of questions. For
example, if you go with IIS on Windows
machine, then you will be vulnerable against
If you are in doubt, clarify with your both IIS and Windows bugs and
web developer and come back to this page. vulnerabilities. If you go with Apache on
For example, if your developer is creating
Windows then it would be other
the web site using ASP technology, I would
definitely suggest a Microsoft Windows combination of issues and vulnerabilities.
operating server. While on the other hand, if And obviously if you go with Apache on
they are developing using PHP and MySQL, Linux then it is completely different set. As
I would recommend using Linux or an example, Linux never suffered from
FreeBSD. nasty worms viruses at all. That give
assurance ageist such issues, but it had
[FYI, One can run ASP scripts on
vulnerabilities in older versions of Opens’.
Linux system using software such as Sun
Java System Active Server Pages 4.0 or PHP Same thing applies to performance. Running
on Windows... it's just that PHP scripts run
IIS6 you would need a descent box to make
better on Unix/Linux and ASP on Windows]
Windows 2003 happy. If you run small to
medium web site that is overkill. Same
performance result (e.g. requests served per
Which Web Servers should be used second) could be achieved on Celeron/P-III
1GHz box running Bunt server and Apache.
(Apache Vs IIS)?
Also you do not need to pay for OS and
Apache vs. IIS is the most painful decision
other silences if you go for Apache and
that lots of people struggle to make. And
Linux that saves you quite a lot of money,
very often they regret about the decision
but what the downside of it?
made. This question is not simple
comparison of pros and cons of Apache and All these prove the point that it is not quite
IIS. It is lasso involves debates on simple to get the answer for Apache vs. IIS
methodology of testing and overall system question. Let do it either way around. Let
approach. For example, if you go for IIS answer the question "What I what to achieve
then you have to use Windows, while if you in the result?" and this will lead as to the
decided to go for Apache Web Server you tools we need to choose to meet the target.
have a right to choose between UNIX, Linux Actually, it is similar to making a decision
and even different versions Windows. on what tool you are going to you to plant a
tree: I need to plant a tree. So, I need to dig a
hole. The tree is very small, so the hole
should be relatively small. I can use scoop, HTTP / HTTPS
shovel, excavator, TNT or nuke. What requests efficiently.
should I use?" The answer is quite obvious, GUI consuming most
of system resources.
because you know benefits and
GUI in this case is a
disadvantages of these tools applied to the kind of overkill like
current task. Same thing applies to choose a TNT for doffing small
web server platform and application to do hole: it will do the
the job. job, but it is
excessive. Windows
Web server meant to serve HTTP and cannot run without
HTTPS requests. Main issues associated GUI, while Linux not
with such a task are: performance, stability only can. That is we
setup and maintenance costs. Let's take a having same piece of
hardware Linux (no
closer look on them.
GUI) + Apache
combination is much
• Performance: faster than Windows
(GUI) + IIS6 or
Performance depends on: Windows (GUI) +
Apache.
o web server application ƒ Windows and most of
performance Windows applications
are compiled to be
IIS 6 has approximately same compatible with any
performance as Apache 2. x86 32 bit Pentium
Differences are very minor. processors. Linux
This item might be excluded (including kernel) and
all applications
from consideration. On the
(including Apache)
same piece of hardware could compiled to
standard installation of utilize all features of
Windows and Linux with particular processor
GUI (X-server) are overall installed in the box.
default system performance This also significantly
is also relatively same, unless increases the
performance.
you start tweaking the
ƒ Apache Software
system. This is when the Foundation is not
difference comes. supporting 64 bit
technology on
o overall system performance Windows. So you
ƒ The web server does cannot use
not need GUI Windows64 + Apache
(Graphical User combination. On 64-
Interface) to serve bits systems the
 chaise is between o Windows and IIS6 have
Windows + IIS6 or proprietary code. That means
Linux + Apache. that in case of any
Please, note that there vulnerability found a user has
is no 64 bit version of to wait and live with
PHP4 and PHP5. In vulnerable system until
order to run PHP Microsoft will fix the issue
under IIS6 on 64 bit and realest a fix. There is no
platform you have to one else in the world that
play a lot with 32-bit might help. And as practice
emulation of IIS6 and shows it is long lasting thing.
making sure that all For example IIS6 still has a
pup exertions are vulnerability that has no
loaded and executed patch issued. Linux and
in 32-bit mode. Apache are open source
• Stability: products. This means that
everyone has access to the
System considered being stable if it does not source code and as soon as
have any outages or unexpected slowdowns. vulnerability has been found
Both platforms (Windows and Linux) and everyone who has
products (IIS6 and Apache) are mature appropriate level of
enough and do not have any slowdowns if knowledge can fix it. It
properly configured. That leaves us only results in very short fixing
with outages. Outages might accrue by: time. It is also true that the
fix would be reviewed by
• system failure thousands and thousands of
Linux users in the world
Both system and products are stable instead of small group of
unless systems are shared and in use people in Microsoft Q.A.
by other applications that might team.
result in instability. In this case o In the worth case scenario of
Linux has an advantage, because all hacking web server
Windows application is effectively application it is still possible
kernel extensions. This means, that to get full system access with
doggy application might kill the the highest privileges by
whole system. In Linux applications hacking IIS6. At the end of
are separate from kernel and it is the days IIS6 has to run as
very unlikely that the doggy process under Local User
application will have any effect on account. And no one can do
the kernel as such. anything about it. However,
in the case of right system
• security brakeage setup hacking Apache on
Linux would result in access
This is a long and arguable story. to the system very limited
Here are some facts: account that cannot do
 anything accept running Costs could be divided into 3 major
Apache. categories:
o Apache 2 had more
vulnerabilities then ISS6. o setup costs:
However, IIS6 has more
critical vulnerabilities that Windows setup costs include:
might result of service failure
or giving admin access to the ƒ more powerful
hacker. hardware to run GUI
o Failure do Apache service on and antivirus software
Linux won't affect system. ƒ Windows and IIS6
All that is required to fix it is license for the server
a small monitoring script that
should restart Apache if it is Linux setup costs include:
not there. At the same ISS6
faultier might crash the ƒHardware only. It also
kernel and kill the system. So should not be as
monitoring script will not powerful as one for
cover all the crashes, because Windows to server
it would die with the system same amount of
and there is nothing to put it requests.
back. ƒ Optional Linux
o Is the case of sharing server installation if you are
resources with other looking for Red Hat
applications you should think or Sues. But it is
that there are enormous cheaper anyway and it
amounts of viruses written is required only if you
for Windows. That means have some very
you have to run antivirus specific requirements
software. This is an extra to go for commercial
application that does not Linux release.
work to achieve the target to o maintenance costs
serve HTTP / HTTPS
requests, but sit in the system Windows maintenance costs
for unnecessary stability include:
reinforcement significantly
consuming CPU and disk ƒ Windows and IIS6
resources. Linux does not license for every
have any kind of system developer and Q.A.
viruses and does not require engineer box
any antivirus software. In fact
there is no any system Linux maintenance costs
antivirus software at all, include:
because there are no viruses
to search for. ƒ Optional commercial
• Costs: Linux support if you
 do not have in-home knowledge than hire another
specialist. In this case one.
you might
significantly cut down As you see there are lot so pros and cons.
or eliminate human And it really depends on your situation and
resources costs budget.
o human resources costs

This applies to your system

administrator salary or
payments. Both systems able
to download and install
system and web server paths
(except Windows + Apache
combination). So, once it is
up and running it is unlikely
requires any human
intervention unless
circumstances change (load
increase, attacks or hardware
Source:
failure). It is easier and
• http://www.askwebhosting.com/artic
cheaper to find some
Windows administrator with le/23/The-History-of-Web-
little experience, but it is not Hosting.html
recommended. Lack of • http://webhosting.resourceindex.com
experience in server • http://www.webdevelopersnotes.com
administration usually results
• http://www.google.com
in extra costs and charges
(e.g. support calls, ling • http://www.wikipidea.com
downtimes, slowdown) or in
the worth case you might lose
the system (successful attack
or inability to recover service
after failure).

Experienced system  
administrator costs
approximately the same for
both platforms. That means
that both systems have same
human resources costs.
However, if you already have
an administrator with
experience for some system it
might be much cheaper to
choose the system that fits his