What is web hosting & domain? published on 01.04.10 by J Corn
Web hosting is required to show your website online. It is the space where your website is stored so people can view your website. There are many companies out there providing hosting from as little as £10 a year to £50 a month. It all depends what you require. You will require web hosting in order to display your website on the Internet.
What is a domain address?
You will also require a domain which is an address for your website. This is the address to the location where your web site is stored (or hosted). This is unique to your website and can be anything you want (within reason). If it is a UK site it will end .co.uk or US site .com. You can have a .com site in the UK if you want but then people may not think your website is based in the UK. There are many different endings such as .org for organisations and each country has a unique ending to their address. Some hosting comes with a free domain so this is worth checking out.
How do I find out what I need?
The basics
Most people who are just starting out only require a minimum amount of web space. For a basic website all you need is about 500Mb to 1Gb of web space. You don’t need databases unless you want contact forms or some kind of functionality. Most basic web packages will cover this from £2.99 a month. Most of these enable you to have your own email address related to your website or a forwarding service, which sends emails to your current email address.
Contact form
If you want a contact form you will require an sql database. Make sure this is in your package. You will also require databases for certain functionalities.
Selling online
If you want to sell things online you will require an ecommerce site. There are features with hosting packages which will enable this, just look for ecommerce. These tend to be large sites so you may require more web space depending on the amount of information.
CMS
There are also Content Management Systems which enable users to add content to a website through an easy to use systems. No programming knowledge is required by the user and is useful for uploading new products. This is very useful if you have different users inputting data.
Web hosting is required to show your website online. It is the space where your website is stored so people can view your website. There are many companies out there providing hosting from as little as £10 a year to £50 a month. It all depends what you require. You will require web hosting in order to display your website on the Internet.
What is a domain address?
You will also require a domain which is an address for your website. This is the address to the location where your web site is stored (or hosted). This is unique to your website and can be anything you want (within reason). If it is a UK site it will end .co.uk or US site .com. You can have a .com site in the UK if you want but then people may not think your website is based in the UK. There are many different endings such as .org for organisations and each country has a unique ending to their address. Some hosting comes with a free domain so this is worth checking out.
How do I find out what I need?
The basics
Most people who are just starting out only require a minimum amount of web space. For a basic website all you need is about 500Mb to 1Gb of web space. You don’t need databases unless you want contact forms or some kind of functionality. Most basic web packages will cover this from £2.99 a month. Most of these enable you to have your own email address related to your website or a forwarding service, which sends emails to your current email address.
Contact form
If you want a contact form you will require an sql database. Make sure this is in your package. You will also require databases for certain functionalities.
Selling online
If you want to sell things online you will require an ecommerce site. There are features with hosting packages which will enable this, just look for ecommerce. These tend to be large sites so you may require more web space depending on the amount of information.
CMS
There are also Content Management Systems which enable users to add content to a website through an easy to use systems. No programming knowledge is required by the user and is useful for uploading new products. This is very useful if you have different users inputting data.
