Popular searches

Network & Security Storage & Back Up Enterprise Email SSL Disaster Recovery Remote Hands Server Migration

Affordable Cloud Platforms

Key Considerations to Ensure Security in Shared Hosting Environment

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Struggling with webhosting security related issues can be an overwhelming task. Your problems regarding web security can further aggravate if you lack any information about factors that can lead to security breach. Websites are constantly threatened by spammers and cyber criminals who are working tirelessly to find vulnerabilities of servers, networking systems and websites.

If half knowledge is dangerous, then lack of knowledge about website security can be catastrophic. This is more applicable to ecommerce websites of blogs. These websites can be exposed to wide spectrum of threats including hacking attempts, malware attacks, virus attacks, and DDoS attacks among others.

The most vital step that you need to take is to choose a web host that attaches due importance to security of websites that are being hosted. By selecting a secured web hosting plan you are safeguarding your website and its digital assets.

As far as hosting plans are concerned, users can choose from a broad assortment of shared hosting, VPS hosting, or dedicated server hosting depending on budget and other factors including server controls, custom configuration or resource requirement.

If you are looking for web hosting package that provides economy, then a shared hosting plan can be the right fit for you. However, if you are concerned about privacy and security of hosting, then you need to go for VPS or dedicated server hosting.

While selecting a web host that implements stringent security measures, you can confirm whether following security features are being implemented by your host.

Virus and spam prevention

Virus and spam messages can cause immense harm to your digital assets. Virus and spam can enter your system and acquire your confidential data or can also steal your valuable information related with contacts and transactions and inflict serious damage to your online business. You must ensure that the host is implementing effective methods of anti-virus and anti-spam protection. If you are opting for a shared hosting plan, then you need to ensure that the package includes software for spam and virus prevention.

Protection of hardware

Hardware failure can lead to downtime and significant loss of revenue. By ensuring that your host has included feature of RAID protection in your shared hosting plan, you are preventing chances of any downtime due to hardware failure.

RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks and can be easily configured and installed. It is backed by a failsafe technology of virtualization and can be implemented in different levels. These levels are associated with various balances between speed and power of redundancy. Ideally, your host can provide you with required information about RAID protection.

Securing your emails

Protection of your emails is a significant aspect if you are accessing these from multiple devices. Ideally, your shared hosting environment should include secure IMAP protection that ensures email storage on email server. IMAP also facilitates data backup and data synchronization of your email messages by implementing encryption to store in remote servers.

SSL encryption for secured online transactions

Secured Sockets Layer is the most effective way to provide security to online transactions. SSL ensures encryption of online communications to prevent unauthorized intrusion or interception by hackers who are trying to steal information while the data is being exchanged via the medium of Internet. Confirm whether your host offers SSL encryption service on shared hosting plan to make sure that your website’s transactions are safe and secure.

Secured control panels

Control panels can play a significant role in implementation of various security measures including running of software configurations, performing multiple administrative tasks, in addition to billing and email management.

Depending on your operating system you can be allotted a control panel. Ideally, you need to confirm that you are getting cPanel for Linux and Plesk for your Windows operating system.

Secured WordPress hosting

It is always better to select a host that is optimized for WordPress if you are using WordPress CMS platform. You can look forward to avail wide array of security features including malware scans, redundant firewalls, DDoS protection and regular updates for WordPress plugins and themes.

The unique plugin from WordPress for firewall and security facilitates easy update for default URL in order to perform login. As such you can also access variety of WordPress plugins for securing login attempts from malicious IP addresses that try to flood a plethora of login attempts.

Regular maintenance of server

Updating and maintaining server on regular basis is one of the important functions of your web host. Therefore you ought to make sure that the server maintenance is performed as per schedules. Proven and established hosts provide a published protocol for security to confirm that server software and security patching is regularly updated.

In conclusion

If you are able to confirm availability of the above parameters, then you can be sure about efficiently and securely dealing with security threats, online spamming, malware and viruses just to name a few.

Choosing the right method- CMS, Blogging Software, Web Editor, or Online Site Builder

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

One can get confused due to subtle differences between specific terms used by people in the domain of IT and Internet. The classic example for this could be a site builder and Content Management System (CMS). The perplexity can be also due to the fact that individuals use these terms in various perspectives.

It should be understood that CMS, Web Editors, Online Site Builders, and Blogs are designed for building or making changes to websites. Let us understand how this is achieved individually by these tools. Difference

Text Editor or Web Editor

These programs are designed for editing texts or images on the website. Hence we have Text Editors as well as Image Editors. Text editing involves writing the articles on a physical computer by using ‘editor’ program and saving these as web pages. This follows transferring the files to web host for displaying the blog live on the Internet.

Examples of visual editor programs are KompoZer and Dreamweaver. Text Editor or Web Editor facilitates you to create a web page by running text or image editor on your own computer.

Standalone Site Builder

The programs that are referred earlier can also be called as site builders because these are simply used to build websites. It should be clearly understood that every program that is designed to create web pages on physical computer to be transferred to web server for publishing on the Internet is called as web/ text editor or site builder. These programs may follow the principles of word processing or desktop publishing. This minute distinction should be overlooked for the simple reason that the basic purpose remains the same in spite of dissimilarities. Hence any program that is mentioned as Site Builder is in essence a Web Editor.

Online Site Builder

This feature is offered by quite a few web hosts for the purpose of designing a website by using a web browser. This feature obviates running an individual program on your physical computer and helps you create web pages directly without need to transfer these to web host.

Online site builder offers pre-designed templates and supports you with a step by step wizard to select a design and enter your site’s information with practically no hassles. The site builder creates your web pages directly without you taking pains to upload these. The entire process may seem to be extremely intuitive but it deprives you of flexibility, control, and skills of transferability. These programs are not helping you create web-pages although they may create an illusion to that effect. Most important point to note that by using web host’s online site builder program you run a risk of getting locked in.

Standalone/ Offline Site Builder linked to a specific web host

Such a standalone or offline site builder facilitates you to edit and create your web pages right on your physical computer by downloading a site builder program offered by a web host. Although the program offers you freedom and flexibility of creating web-pages on your machine, it is not without any issues either. You are still running risk of getting locked-in because you will not be able to use such web pages with another web host, if you shift your site to another web host in future.

Content Management System

CMS or Content Management System is software program that is installed on computer of your web host and is a much better alternative to using online site builder offered by your host. CMS allows you to add or edit web-pages directly on your site and allows far greater flexibility and control than web host’s site builder without fear of getting locked in with a particular host. It lets you migrate the entire site to another host without any issues. There is no need to install any program on your local computer while using CMS. You only need to use your browser to log in to your site and start editing the same.

Most of the CMS software lack broad range of templates and are not easy to set up. The set-up involves transferring files to web host, creating a database, and then configuring CMS in accordance with your site. However, if you choose some of the more popular CMS software, you will be able to extend functionalities by adding different modules and will also have greater choice of templates.

Blogging software

These are almost like Content Management System software tools. The difference is in the range of features. Since blogging software is designed to cater to bloggers, it does not possess a wide range of features offered by Content Management System. You need to note that blogging software is entirely different than software offered by blogging web host.

Choosing the right method to create website

By understanding the basic differences between various methods of website creation, you must have come to know that there cannot be an all encompassing solution for building your website. All options mentioned above need to be critically examined before making a right choice. One of the most logical ways to decide which method should be followed is by understanding the purpose of your website. In the following discussion, we shall look into the different reasons to build websites.

To frequently and regularly add new web-pages

There is a difference between addition of entirely new pages and updating the existing ones. Uploading new articles regularly is considered as adding new pages. In contrast, if the website is designed to sell goods online and needs to be updated in terms of prices, offers, or new arrivals, then this will not amount to adding new pages. Such static websites can be managed by using a web editor due to its user friendly features in comparison with a full-fledged CMS solution. Web editors are not highly resource intensive and can be considered as preferred option for websites having a static nature. You need not use a CMS for adding new pages either, because a web editor can suffice the purpose.

To write a blog

The most logical option for writing blogs would be to use blogging software. It is may be possible to manually build all blog pages by using web editor, however it will deprive you of the unique and useful features that a blogging software can empower you with. If you need to find the easiest to use blogging software, then WordPress is the most trusted and time tested solution.

To work with single of multiple computers

For the bloggers on the go, it is preferable to use CMS software or even blogging software for that matter. These scripts are installed directly on web servers instead of local computers to unleash travelling bloggers from the shackles of a single physical computer. Such bloggers can start working by simply logging into their site from their browser. Although there may be certain security concerns to be addressed on account of using different computers, the CMS option holds lot of promise for travelling bloggers.

To gain control over website’s appearance

Unless you are proficient in coding in HTML, PHP, or CSS, you will find it difficult to use CMS to change appearance of your website. This issue has been thankfully and effectively addressed by some of the modern CMS solutions. In spite of this, the learning curve continues to be steep in case of CMS as far as modification of website’s appearance is concerned.

To manage website with several authors

Presence of multiple authors who are geographically dispersed and need to individually contribute different pages underlines need to go for a CMS solution.  These authors need to use separate browsers to update, edit, or add pages. CMS will certainly be able to handle the issue of coordination more effectively than all other methods.

To allow individual member pages for users

Many websites require users to login or sign up into their individual accounts in order to build web-pages on your site. This leaves you with no other option than to use a Content Management System.

You may create an impression that a website for forum may require a CMS by using the same logic. In fact, a forum site is run by using forum software and requires neither a web editor nor a CMS solution.

No method is more user friendly than the other

This is a hard fact of life. Website creation or development is an intricate process and is influenced by multiple factors. The interesting aspect of all the available options is that prima facie every other option seems to be easier to begin with. However, you need to develop familiarity to enhance the ease of working with these options and will certainly reap the advantages in the longer run.

Takeaway

In conclusion, a web editor presents the lowest level of difficulty and much less steeper learning curve than other available methods of creating website. While learning to use a web editor, users continue to gain more useful insights that would be beneficial to them whenever they would be managing CMS solutions.

Key Attributes of Open Source Applications CMS that Boost their Immense Popularity

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

There is a plethora of Content Management Systems designed for wide spectrum of uses and niche segments. Many Content Management Systems are developed as proprietary but a large number of these applications are available under open general license as well.

Features of Open Source applications

Open source CMS enables building of a large team of developers by offering an open code to the public at large. This also helps build a diverse user community that can contribute to the development of CMS application.
 
Large pool of dedicated developers is the most important strength of these open source CMS applications. The growing number of open source applications confirms viability of these projects in spite of few downsides.

Organizations are increasingly accessing these open source applications to cater to their needs of always updated and stable platforms for running their business operations. Open source CMS offer wide range of benefits to users:

  • Free license
  • Customizability
  • Collaborative
  • Redistributable
  • Shareable
  • Interoperable

WordPress – leading CMS offering in Open Source segment

As far as open source CMS applications are concerned, WordPress in the undisputed king that rules over half of the global website population. It does have very humble roots since it was developed from a small yet popular platform that was designed for blogging.

We can go on listing wide assortment of factors that have contributed to popularity of WordPress. It offers large volume of third party plugins, thanks to thriving online marketplaces and a bursting network of individuals and enterprises offering support for the WordPress platform. Users of the platform can also access tons of themes from established developers. Then there is always an option to select WordPress.com for more intense use cases.

There cannot be an iota of doubt about huge contribution of developers in the success of WordPress. These developers across the world have not only been tasting success with WordPress but also earning handsome income. Individual developers make money by way of plugin and theme development as well as managed hosting. Extensive adoption of WordPress platform has facilitated many companies make millions by supporting the platform.

Distinct benefits of open source applications

Crowd sourcing is a distinct attribute of open source software. This feature is responsible for number of advantages offered by open source including accountability, freedom, flexibility, and cost efficiency to name a few. These advantages are not available with proprietary solutions. Secondly, open source software solutions are backed by cutting edge technology and have long term feasibility. The developers including individuals and organizations are encouraged by noble values of volunteerism and collaboration among others.

Since a significant proportion of open source applications are available for free distribution, cost efficiency has always been the most compelling benefit of open source applications. One however needs to understand the subtle difference between free as in kittens and free as in beer. Open source applications are free as in kittens and these must be maintained, supported, and updated on regular basis for assured performance.

Then comes the most sought after advantage of flexibility, which is absent in closed proprietary applications. Organizations need to be bothered about vendor lock-in while using open source solutions because any developer can modify, extend, or alter the application by acquiring familiarity with the source code. It also grants enterprises a long term capability. This is especially true in case of software applications that have been adopted extensively.

These open source applications are consistently being reviewed by development shops along with an extensive network of other developers. The resulting process of peer review provides guarantee of accountability as well as security since any security gaps are indentified and fixed instantly.

Development of open source software is backed by commonly shared values such as community participation, volunteerism, and collaboration. Developers are driven by passion to create quality applications that are free and can be easily accessed by organization and individuals.

Monetization in open source CMS

Among all sources of monetization, the commonest source is to provide support services. This can be understood by looking at some companies such as Umbraco that are engaged in offering support packages on monthly basis. This assures the users about availability of a robust support system for their products. It is found that the monthly support packages turn out to be more affordable than engaging an on premise support staff.

In the absence of sound support facilities, even the most useful applications face the prospects of being phased out. Joomla can be considered as a prime example of this phenomenon.

Last few years have witnessed proliferation of open source CMS applications in terms of adoptability and popularity. Many organizations have finally appreciated the immense value of globally dispersed developer communities. This kind of renewed interest in open source solutions is helping wide array of vendors who are growing phenomenally. However, in order to stay ahead of the competition, the vendors need to acquire flexibility as well agility.

Overview of Some Common Machine Learning Algorithms

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

It is important to have an understanding of machine learning algorithms to be able to take advantage of the most updated and advanced computing technologies. Some of these important algorithms are discussed below:

  • Supervised Learning: This algorithm will comprise of a target that must be predicted using given sets of predictors. These given predictors are independent variables and the targets are dependent variables. You can use the independent variables to generate a function which will map these inputs to give outputs. Some examples of supervised learning are Regressions, Random Forest, KNN, Decision Tree and Logistic Regression.
     
  • Unsupervised Learning: This algorithm will not have a target variable which you will need to predict. This algorithm is primarily used for grouping population and therefore used for categorizing customers in various groups. For examples. K-means and Apriori are types of unsupervised learning.
     
  • Reinforcement Learning: By using this third type of algorithm, the machine can make specific decisions. The machine then gets exposed to environments wherein it will self-train using a trial and error method. So, the machine can learn from past mistakes and uses the knowledge thus gained to make better and more accurate business decisions. For example, the Markov Decision Process.

Common Machine Learning Algorithms

1. Linear Regression:

This algorithm is used for calculating real values such as total sales or cost of houses which are based on continuous variables. You will need the best fit line here to create a relationship between the independent and the dependent variables. This best fit line has been termed as the regression line.

2. Logistic Regression: 

This algorithm is meant to calculate discrete values based upon given sets of independent variables. So, it will basically try to predict the probability of an event by fitting specific data to a logical function. This is why it is called logical regression algorithm.

3. Decision Tree: 

This is supervised learning algorithm used in classification problems. In this algorithm, the population gets divided into two or even more homogeneous sets. This spilled is carried out based upon important attributes to create distinct groups.

4. SVM (Support Vector Machine): 

This algorithm also deals with classification and here every data item is plotted as a point in an n-dimensional space. Here, “n” will stand for the number of features. Value of every feature will be the value of a specific coordinate. The coordinates are called the Support Vectors.

5. Naive Bayes:

This refers to a method for classification which is founded upon the Bayes Theorem. The classifier in Naïve Bayes assumes there is a feature in a class which is not related to the existence of any other feature. This model is easy to create and it is handy for very large datasets.

6. KNN (K- Nearest Neighbors): 

This algorithm is used for both regression and classification problems but mainly employed for classification problems. It is simple to use; it stores available cases and classifies the new ones by majority votes.

7. Random Forest: 

This refers to an assembly of decision tree where every tree will give a classification. So, the tree “votes” for a specific class and the forest will select the classification which has the maximum number of votes.

8. Dimensionality Reduction Algorithms: 

Data capturing has gone up dramatically in the recent years at every stage possible. So, research institutions and governmental agencies are developing new sources for capturing more detailed data. For instance, the e-commerce firms are trying to get additional details about their buyers from their web browsing history, what products they prefer or their purchase history.

9. Gradient Boosting Algorithms: 

Of these, the first type is GBM which is a type of boosting algorithm. This is used when you are handling a lot of data and you have to make predictions with very high prediction power. Boosting will involve a collection of learning algorithms. These combine predictions of various base estimators to increase robustness over one estimator. The second type of boosting algorithm is the XGBoost which has very high predictive power and can make the best choices for accuracy during events. It has both the tree learning algorithm and linear model algorithm which makes this much quicker than other gradient boosting techniques. The third type is the LightGBM which uses tree-based learning algorithm and can guarantee the better accuracy, faster speed, and efficiency, handling of large-scale data etc. Finally, there is the CatBoost algorithm which is very recent and open-source, machine learning algorithm. This is capable of integrating with other deep-learning frameworks such as Apple’s Core ML. it will not need a lot of training as compared to other machine learning models and it can run on different types of data formats.

Niche Web Hosting: A Must for every SMB

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Millions of new age internet hosts have sprung up across the globe today. That is why web hosts try to position their company on the basis of a variety of parameters. One such parameter is the location of data centers. This makes a web hosting service provider stand out amidst its competitors. But what exactly makes the host a niche benefactor?

For the records, a nice hosting company caters to a specific industry only. They target a specific category of businesses such as travel and/or tourism, financial firms, etc.

Customized features:

Unlike traditional hosts offering general set of tools in the suite, niche providers deliver goal specific solutions. E.g. A small business owner prefers one click access to tools for CRM and invoice management. On the other hand, a SaaS business owner needs quick setup modules such as subscriber management and payment gateways. Niche web hosts inculcate advanced technologies to cater to these industry specific needs.

Conversant customer support:

A niche host employs highly skilled customer support professionals who are adept at handling technical and business questions of clients. This leads to a better customer experience and stronger loyalty.

Exceptional experience:

In the web hosting industry, price is the sole differentiator. Of course there are a huge number of low priced hosts, but they have polluted the internet ecosystem with slow speeds and sluggish bandwidth management. Contrastingly, niche hosts deliver custom services at a higher price. So customers enjoy a premium experience.

Therefore, choosing a good web host provider for your business website is important. Select a niche hosting company for top class presentation and marketing over the internet. Only then your products services and creative blogs will be visible to your target audience.

Likelihood of Over-spending while Choosing One of the Major Cloud Providers

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

The extensive spread of cloud adoption across all organizations should be attributed to the significant part of IT budgets being earmarked for procurement of cloud hosting services in 2017. It is projected that a whopping 34 percent of total IT budgets will be consumed by cloud computing and hosting. This is a 6 percent growth over last year.

Rise in cloud adoption

The rise in cloud spend can be understood by looking at growing number of enterprises appreciating value of cloud for streamlining their business processes. In addition to this, more and more enterprises are relying on third party resources for security solutions, application management, and infrastructure.

Contrary to the belief that cloud providers are essentially supporting enterprise IT with infrastructure solutions, it is reported that just about 30 percent of cloud services account for infrastructure and the remaining 70 percent is associated with cloud enablement, managed services, security solutions, and application services.

Cloud application services with 42 percent share are the highest contributory services in the entire gamut of cloud providers’ offerings. It should be noted that a significant portion of application, or managed and unmanaged infrastructure. As far as infrastructure and applications services are concerned, almost half of them are related to solutions that are integrated with additional security of managed services.

Changing trends of cloud requirements

Changing trends in cloud spending are indicative of the growing need for bundled services by enterprises. This can challenge the dominance of major providers in the domain of unmanaged SaaS and IaaS solutions while opening up new business avenues, Service providers can look forward to growing demand for a diverse set of cloud as well as hosting services including application and infrastructure hosting.

Cloud solutions are procured from wide spectrum of providers of hosting and cloud services and according to a recent survey, public cloud infrastructure services account for a major part of these services. Public cloud is adopted by almost 69 percent of all enterprises.

In terms of global spending in infrastructure and public cloud solutions, these are expected o register a healthy growth as mentioned earlier and as also confirmed by IDC report that confirms over 24 percent growth for these set of cloud services.

State of public cloud growth

The growth of public cloud between 2015 and 2020 is expected to reach more than 21 percent in terms of Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) to touch revenue of $203.4 as a total expenditure on cloud adoption. This is almost seven times more than the growth of overall expenditure in enterprise IT.

Among all types of cloud service models, SaaS (Software as a Service) will emerge as the most sought after cloud variant with an estimated share of almost 60 percent by 2020. Current year 2017 will be marked by major cloud adoption trends in banking and professional services across the globe. These sectors are in need of highly scalable and efficient solutions that are backed by cutting edge technologies.

Cloud expenditure will be dominated by large firms that employ more than thousand personnel as well as medium sized employers with employee strength of 100 to 500 approx. These firms will contribute to more than half of public cloud expenditure. Public cloud adoption will be driven by US, which will emerge as the largest place boasting of greater than 60 percent revenues. This will be followed by Western Europe as well as Asia Pacific except Japan.

Analysis of ten cloud service providers that include the four major players in the domain such as Azure, AWS, IBM SoftLayer and Google was carried out. The major providers have gained capability of persistent block storage, self-signup, and hourly billing modules. Ranking of different vendors was based on average performance of vCPU storage and memory. As against the benchmarked provider 1&1, all major player could not even cross halfway mark.

Performance of major players in terms of virtual machines was found to be dependable with RACKSPACE, OVH, and 1&1 scoring well on this parameter in case of block storage Rackspace did well along with most of the other providers.

If one studies all important IaaS providers, then the 2017 cloud landscape is a heady mix of stability, performance and price. It implies that there is a significant hazard of overspending by enterprise customers while selecting the appropriate cloud service provider.

Hurdles in selection of right service provider

In spite of the fact that the selection of a right web service provider is facilitated due to presence of only four major cloud providers that are highly dependable. However one needs to exercise extreme diligence while following this approach. This is because there is a plethora of small cloud providers that offer economical yet high performing infrastructure.

This is despite the fact that four major cloud players are commanding more than 50 percent market share. On must take into account that these major cloud providers throttle resources for maintaining a uniform user experience across the whole infrastructure resulting into performance mitigation on cloud hosting.

Leveraging Cloud Computing to Boost Business Prospects

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Thanks to a wide spectrum of its attributes, cloud adoption has immense potential to help your business achieve ambitious growth targets while streamlining a number of business processes. Your enterprise can establish a virtual office in a cloud environment that supports seamless accessibility via smart devices from any global location.

Leveraging Cloud Computing to Boost Business Prospects

Saves IT costs

You will no longer be required to operate and maintain resource intensive on-site IT infrastructure if you have successfully shifted your IT components to cloud. Modern cloud hosting services are capable of fulfilling all IT related tasks without reliance on hardware and staff in your IT establishment. 

Elimination of operating costs can be attributed to reduction of manpower that is required to look after on-premise facilities and savings on electricity bills to run in-house IT infrastructure. 

Simplified resource provisioning

There are a number of business processes that will be benefitted due to higher levels of efficiency in a cloud environment. Employees can have a faster access to cutting edge apps in addition to faster deployment of resources with availability of IaaS and PaaS. In-house IT facilities will require a longer time and significantly higher investments to establish the required infrastructure for operating new set-up or software. 

In a cloud setup, one can instantly setup the required infrastructure by simply mirroring any similar setup on the server. Secondly the new setup can be discarded as soon as you have accomplished the task. Businesses can look forward to a significantly leaner infrastructure as cloud helps optimization of resources. Since a cloud provider offers pay-as-you-go method for purchasing the resources, there is an enhanced predictability of IT expenditure. 

Promise of business continuity

Every business must focus on business continuity by adopting measures to safeguard systems and data that have critical role to play in maintenance of seamless business availability. Cloud is designed to secure your business critical data at remotely located data centers so that it continues to be available in spite of any unplanned outage that may affect the main business location. Moreover, the cloud environment also provides uninterrupted and instant accessibility to the digital resources of the organization from any location. 

Since cloud storage needs of any organization are bound to vary in response to business fluctuations or variations in volumes of visitor traffic, a cloud data storage facility is designed to be scalable. The instant and on-demand provisioning or de-commissioning of resources by cloud service providers not only promises guaranteed availability of resources but also reduces chances of over-provisioning or shortage of vital resources. 

Ease of collaboration and flexibility

In order to achieve sound communication across organization in terms of various departments, branches, and employees, you can safely rely on attributes of collaboration of cloud services. It also supports easy sharing of information, documents, and records for enhancement of efficiency among all departments. 

Cloud adoption also facilitates seamless access to data even if you are working off-site or are on the move.  

Routine or scheduled system updates are provided by reputed cloud hosting service providers to keep your mission critical business applications running without any hassles. If your business is capable of implementing collaboration among teams, then you can ensure faster results irrespective of locations of employees. Cloud service providers also help you share business records with consultants for instant advice. 

Cloud environment allows workforce to follow flexible working hours. They can also continue to work from their home or any offsite location. All you need is an internet enabled device to access data in cloud. Adoption of cloud in businesses also helps critical systems to perform to their highest efficiency due to automated updates. 

Enhanced performance of IT workforce

With majority of routine IT related tasks being shifted to cloud, your IT workforce can be utilized in a better way for focusing on business critical tasks such as application developments or new product innovations. Every aspect of your business is stringently monitored by your cloud host so that you are free to pursue your business objectives more efficiently. 

Cloud computing is one of the fastest evolving technologies and reputed cloud service providers make sure that benefits of the latest developments are instantly passed on to their customers. Hence you need not be concerned about procuring the most advanced software or applications to boost your business growth. 

Assurance of disaster recovery 

Traditional disaster recovery solutions can prove to be cost intensive over the period of time since one is required to establish off-site data centers for seamless business continuity even during or after disasters. Cloud hosting facilitates automated and scheduled back-ups for assured accessibility to the most recent versions of your mission critical data records. 

Moreover, since this information is securely stored in cloud environment, you can achieve excellent immunity against any disaster striking your business premises by efficiently leveraging cloud computing services. Cloud disaster recovery is the most cost effective way of maintaining business availability since you can avert costly downtime event. 

Linux or windows server – what to choose?

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Decision to host a website is followed by several complex considerations and one of the most overwhelmingly difficult decisions is what operating system to choose for running a web server.

Highlighting differences between Linux and Windows servers

In order to arrive at an informed decision, it is better to understand differences between these two most popular operating systems. Windows and Linux are the most commonly used operating systems by hosting service providers. However, it is worth noting that Linux operating system is present in more than 70 percent servers across the globe. Even the most powerful super computers use Linux operating systems. 

Linux operating system offers ease of installation and relatively more economical than Windows operating system. One of the most significant features of operating system is the ease of accessing backend of websites. 

If you are using Linux operating system, you will have the convenience of using the most popular control i.e. cPanel. Linux as well as Windows servers are known to support Web Host Manager. In case of Windows servers one has to use Plesk control panel.

Transferring files to the servers is an important task and both the operating systems allow FTP access. If you want to use telnet and SSH access in addition to FTP, then the same is possible with Linux operating system. 

Similarly you can access ASP, PHP, Perl, and CGI from both the operating systems. It is observed that these are more prevalent in Linux operating systems. 

If you are comparing these two operating systems on the parameter of security, then it would be advisable not to pay attention to claims that try to establish Linux operating system as more secure OS. One should understand that both Linux and Windows equally suffer from the probabilities of virus attacks. As such, the issue of security is more concerned with server hosting administration rather than operating system. 

MySQL is the most popular database access system used for running dynamic websites. Linux operating systems are preferred for running MySQL and you will have to use MS Access to run MySQL on Windows operating systems.

There are some not so important differences in terms of how the pages are written in these two operating systems. Linux writes pages as *.html while Windows use *.htm and both the operating systems can support Java Script as well as HTML. 

An equally less important difference between these two operating systems is the case sensitivity of Linux Operating System. If name of one of the files is CloudHosting.html and also name another file in the directory as cloudhosting.html, then you will practically have two entirely different pages. 

In case, any visitor misses the upper cases, then the result will be 404 error. Windows servers do not have such issues of case sensitivity of file and directory names. 

Understanding such minute differences can certainly arm you with better knowledge of Windows and Linux operating systems to make an informed decision. Let us also browse through some of the pros and cons of the two operating systems for better understanding 

Pros and cons of Linux operating system

Linux is an open source operating system and hence a highly economical alternative. Users need not pay periodic licensing charges and enjoys seamless compatibility with PHP and many more open source applications. 

You can have access to wide range of options including Ubuntu, CentOS, and Debian, just to name a few. If you are comfortable with use of cPanel, then you must think of going for Linux. You can expect to mitigate server load with help of SSH access and it scores over Windows in terms of controls. 

Linux server has to be controlled with help of SSH and users should have advanced technical skills to manage the same.

Pros and cons of Windows operating system

Management of Windows VPS Server is relatively more user friendly as compared to Linux servers. The user friendly GUI enjoys excellent familiarity. Microsoft Windows facilitates ease of integration and offers seamless support for development of ASP.NET as well as ASP.

Microsoft Corp. empowers Windows servers by providing regular updates for efficient server operations. 

Speaking about cons, Windows servers are relatively costlier that their Linux counterparts. These depend on Plesk control panels and do not support cPanel. It is sold commercially by Microsoft and users need to pay license fees. Windows lacks support of programming languages that are open source products. 

We can conclude that if your web project is designed to run by using software and applications developed by Microsoft, then a Windows operating system would be a right pick for you. Whereas, a Linux server can be right for web developers who love to work in an open source environment and are concerned about budgetary provisions. 

Linux and Windows operating systems are identical to each other in several aspects. They are designed to cater to similar objectives including efficient data storage, running web applications, and sustain your website availability by ease of resource scaling.

The above mentioned differences, pros, and cons are highlighted with an intention of making you aware about the intricacies of these fascinating operating systems. Use this knowledge to arrive at the appropriate decision.

Key Trends that will Expand Horizons of Cloud Computing in 2017

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Enterprises are rapidly acquiring cloud capabilities to stay ahead of competition and provide enhanced customer experience. Cloud computing has been in the forefront of modern technologies that have been able to transform a multitude of organizations over the past five years.

It is now established that adoption of cloud services is not driven by cost considerations alone. Enterprises are getting ready to enter into the new digital era with help of cloud based solutions.

Considering these factors, the entire market of cloud computing is set to accelerate further in 2017. The major growth drivers of cloud computing are going to be complex workloads, large enterprises and big data centers that are convinced about cloud’s ability to run core business applications.

Cloud adoption is witnessing encouraging signs with an extensive acceptance of different cloud delivery models including, private cloud, public cloud, and hybrid cloud. Predictions for cloud in 2017 are described here.

Mega cloud providers to play important role

The current compound annual cloud growth rate of 22 percent is mainly attributed to the major cloud providers including IBM, Google, and Microsoft. These mega cloud providers are rapidly acquiring huge capabilities by opening new data centers, inking deals to meet cloud requirements of different countries, and so forth.

There will be a considerable void created due the fact that the mega cloud hosting providers will find it difficult to reach grass roots for meeting individual needs of enterprises. This will open up new business avenues for regional players in cloud market to analyze cloud adoption. According to Bartoletti, enterprises need to be open to access cloud services from multiple providers.

Managing cloud costs

According a common understanding, public cloud helps reduce cloud investment. Although it may be true to some extent, in reality organizations have invested in complex cloud capabilities and the option of public availing cloud for cost saving does not hold water.

Cost containment through cloud consumption monitoring will have to be undertaken by executives in 2017. This will help keep costs under control with further support from cost management tools such as Cloudyn, AWS, or Cloudability.  

Lift and shift migration of apps

There is need to leverage services to migrate refactor apps instead of dumping for running in public cloud environment. You can exploit cloud’s elasticity by choosing the optimum option to move an application by rewriting, in spite of the costs involved in lift and shift migration.

There will be a greater acceleration of lift and shift migration for boosting rate of cloud adoption. The costs can also be controlled due to the economies of scale.

Promising development of Hyperconverged Infrastructure

Many CIOs are averse to accept hazards of entrusting their sensitive data and customers to public cloud providers. It is well accepted fact that similar to public cloud, private cloud services need resource monitoring, private service access, automation, standardization, and advanced virtualization. It is overwhelming to combine these capabilities to build an integrated system of public and private cloud.

This brings us to Hyperconverged Infrastructure that holds lot of promise by providing pre-integrated storage as well as compute power to accelerate implementation of cloud services of enterprises. Hyperconverged Infrastructure acts as a robust foundation for demanding and new workloads that require automated scalability.  This can make HCI as a default platform for building private component of hybrid cloud infrastructure.

Emergence of containers

Cloud apps development can be remarkably supported by containers for software code management. In the early phase of 2017, we can witness extensive availability of Linux containers in public as well as private platforms. These will power micro-services development as the developers will access these for direct consumption to build their own stacks.  

This will result in new challenges in terms of new security protocols, and new issues in terms of monitoring, networking, and storage. It is expected that companies will have to acquire on-premise private SaaS as well as managed public cloud development platform.

Entry of enterprise apps in public cloud

It is observed that many organizations are increasingly adopting public cloud for hosting enterprise applications. This is certainly a good sign since it implies that enterprises are coming to terms with abilities and security aspects of public cloud.

This trend is going to consolidate further in 2017 as more and more organizations start accessing public cloud to run critical software including SAP, ERP, and many more in public cloud. In terms of speed of development and insights, cloud can offer excellent support to development initiatives of organizations.

Cloud hosting solutions can be relied upon to transform amazing ideas into software applications faster than traditional methods. This will result in faster and more extensive use of public as well as private cloud with immense backing from Hyperconverged Infrastructure.

Takeaway

Having witnessed transformation of organizations with help of cloud solutions, we are on the verge of second wave of cloud adoption, which is going to boost public as well as private cloud solutions that are built and hosted in enterprise data centers.

Latest Trends To Watch In VPN Industry

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

Recently the U.S. House of Representatives voted to retract privacy rules created by the FCC or the Federal Communications Commission.

The public is now worried about their digital privacy. This could be one of the factors driving the need for VPN.

A Virtual Private Network enables people to safely transmit information using public networks via a group of networked computers and remote servers.

How do VPNs help?

It allows companies to conduct business over the internet confidentially on a VPN or virtual private network.

To make matters clear you can imagine VPN to be somewhat like an encrypted third party middleman located between you and the internet safeguarding your data from snooping eyes.

But bear in mind that to use a VPN you need an application and not all apps are created equally safe.

If you are newbie in digital terminologies, here is a refresher on how VPN works

But before you get to know about VPN, a basic understanding of the internet is a must.

When two or more devices interact with one another they do it via a worldwide network composed of several networks and devices worldwide.

When a user accesses a website, data is exchanged. This is not very secure because observers can know who is visiting a particular site and what he or she is doing.

A VPN on the other hand is secure, because a user will need authentication to access the network.  For example, if you want to access a company network you will need a username and password.

When you connect to a VPN, a “tunnel” is established. This is a secure mode because external viewers cannot see the data passing through your computer and the virtual private network.

For most businesses the best way to get on to a VPN is via a VPN provider.

The market is flooded with VPN providers offering various kinds of incentives.

If you as an entrepreneur are considering which VPN vendor to choose, then you must factor-in the following:

Cost – VPN services can be free of cost or very pricey.

Number of servers – More the number of servers the better it is for reliability

Server location – The wider the dispersal of a VPN service the less likely will it be impacted by outages due to natural disasters or any other reason.

Features – You would want it to have the features best suited to your business.

In practice, businesses use VPNs to connect remote points that can include data bases, offices and users to a company’s centralized network.

As one IT specialist pointed out, “We are finding VPN to be not only more cost effective than dedicated leased lines but also very functional and practicable”.

Yet, VPNs are not without challenges.

Privacy and security are key issues that bother organizations.

Traditionally encryption based VPNs use IPsec, short for Internet Protocol Security – a set of protocols for security at end points in a communication channel or for building tunnels across the internet.

But now SSL or Secure Sockets Layer gateways are making headway because the number of providers, platforms and functionalities are expanding manifold.

Moreover the exponential increase in web-based applications has strengthened the need of SSL as a VPN technology that can securely assist in data transfers across public and insecure networks.

The providers have responded positively by developing appropriate application-aware VPN gateways capable of sustaining access control and security regulations inside the VPN gateway itself.

Why is SSL preferred over IPSec?

  • Despite the fact that IPSec provides an extra layer of security it can be a financial burden for businesses to pay for the licenses of software. It is also a difficult task for the technical staff to install and configure the client software on all remote devices.
     
  • It is the above drawbacks that have compelled SSL to be a better VPN solution.

In the present scenario every computer on the globe is equipped with the appropriate software to connect to an SSL virtual private network.

The good news is VPN providers are continuing to develop methodologies that will expand the functionality of SSL VPN.

Going forward we can look to the following trends in VPN

Cloud services integration

The use of single service VPN access to the cloud is now thought to be very secure because it has the capability to greatly minimize susceptibility exposure to both the user and the server.

This kind of security assurance can drive businesses to the cloud services as they offer pay-as-you-use model plus the scalability benefits.

Growth of VPN service providers

According to an estimate the global market for VPN is expected to touch USD 106 billion by 2022. The driver for such growth is the need to address vulnerabilities in the current network infrastructure already burdened by advanced technological adoptions and an exponentially increasing number of connected devices.

SSL adoption

As mentioned earlier, SSL VPN or secure socket layer virtual private network is preferred for secure and private communication for all kinds of traffic between devices operating along public networks such as the internet.

Several studies are revealing that the market for VPN has excellent scope for growth because of the rising need for cyber security. 

Key Features that Qualify Cloud VPS as an Undisputed Hosting Option

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

In the overwhelmingly confusing domain of hosting alternatives, VPS stands out as a unique and reliable hosting resource. Cloud VPS hosting is being preferred by a large number of companies and blogs that are on the fast track of growth in terms of traffic.

Common VPS applications

Virtual Private Servers are supporting a large gamut of business-critical applications. It is often found that mass email operations cannot be supported by limited resources in a shared hosting environment.

Growing businesses depend on advanced email features such as sending out thousands of email communications without restrictions. Your VPS supported email application can reliably perform such tasks.

VPS hosting is also a dependable platform for installation and customization of software applications. All these benefits are available down to earth prices because of multi-tenant nature of VPS infrastructure. Competition among multiple hosting service providers has helped improve the affordability of VPS plans.

Need to upgrade to advanced VPS solution

Users of web hosting are commonly aware of VPS hosting and they are also familiar with most of its advantages. However, Cloud VPS is a comparatively new offering in the complex world of hosting services.

The vital difference between VPS and Cloud VPS is the number of servers that are made available for delivering hosting services. A Virtual Private Server is part of a single server and therefore it leverages resources to a limited extent as against a Cloud Server Hosting that is backed by a large array of servers.

In a Cloud VPS hosting arrangement, there are not only multiple servers to enable hosting but every single server in the network is positioned at remote locations to enhance scalability, redundancy, and security of server resources.

The VPS cloud infrastructure is created by installing several servers at various locations so that dedicated resources of every single server can be consumed by the website whenever the situation demands.

One of the biggest advantages of a cloud VPS system is it is on-demand scalability. Many users of VPS hosting India want to know other advantages of Cloud VPS over conventional hosting services provided by using a Virtual Private Server.

Backed by cloud infrastructure, a Cloud VPS is capable of enhancing the flexibility of hosting along with scalability. In this article, we will review some of the most interesting advantages of Cloud VPS hosting.

Redundant and scalable server resources

New businesses may not be concerned with resource scalability because their sites hardly experience traffic surges. Similarly, these sites do not experience a reduction in footfall due to slow page loading speeds.

As the time progresses and your new business begins to establish, your site’s resource requirement can multiply exponentially. In such situation, it would be impossible to upgrade or add server resources if you are operating in a conventional VPS hosting setup.

Every small business is destined to grow if the right business strategies are adopted to ensure the success of the business venture. It is therefore recommended to begin the website’s journey by empowering it with Cloud VPS hosting, which is designed for amazing redundancy and on the fly scalability.

Cloud VPS solution enables reduction or increase in overall resource availability due to its unrestricted scalability. Replication of servers can be performed within an instant to deliver additional support to the web venture.

Cloud computing is known to enable seamless and root level access to server resources as well as data files from any location. This lets you allow instant availability of web files to users or visitors. One can explore more business avenues and provide access to a higher number of potential visitors by relying on Cloud VPS hosting.

Power of Cloud VPS hosting is further enhanced by the use of remote management solutions in terms of greater control over the hosting environment including server reboots, reinstalls, resource consumption, and monitoring of backups.

Forget hardware issues and downtime

Cloud servers are designed to provide exclusive hardware resources that are independent of each server.

This provides seamless website performance without any downtime or failure issues as far as hardware resources are concerned.

Even if any single component is down, your website continues to deliver a flawless performance, thanks to the redundancy of backup servers.

Outstanding performance and speed

Cloud VPS hosting services can accelerate website speed and greatly enhance the performance of your website, thanks to the unique attributes of cloud computing. Cloud VPS leverages the superior availability of shared compute power and other vital resources to enable a large number of concurrent users to access your website as well as its applications without any hassles.

Cloud VPS is also able to eliminate the possibility of outages with excellent control over multiple Operating Systems made available for launching and running mission-critical applications. These are also backed up by reliable failover arrangements, which can be accessed as and when the need arises.

Key Web Hosting Terms that Need to be Understood by Beginners

Posted on by Manoj Yadav

The entire process of website hosting can be intimidating for the beginners if they are not well-versed with hosting or website jargon. In this article you will be introduced to the commonest and also the most confusing terms in web hosting lingo. This will certainly improve your understanding of different aspects of web hosting and help you choose the right hosting option for an informed decision. 

Server

A server or a web server is a powerful machine that is built to perform explicit task of hosting web applications or websites. Web hosting servers are designed to serve content through the medium of internet and therefore the content is also termed as web content. In order to make the machines leaner for the purpose of hosting, the unused hardware is usually removed such as keyboard, monitors, and video cards to name a few. 

Data center

A data center is a secured facility that has ability to house a multitude of servers with assured uptime

Bandwidth

This refers to the highest amount of data that is allowed to be transferred from and to your website at any given time. 

RAM

RAM is a short form for Random Access Memory and is associated with the space on a server that is used for storing short term information. This information is usually required to be accessed on a frequent basis. 

CPU

All vital functions that could be associated with running your website including I/O calculations, command execution, and decision making are performed by Central Processing Unit or CPU. 

Control panel

You can consider a control panel as the main command center of your web hosting account. Control panel facilitates adding new domains, new email addresses, and new applications. It enables an overall control of your website and its settings. 

Web hosting services

In order to help visitors access your website in the Internet medium, a web hosting service provider offers sufficient space on web servers to store website data and provides seamless connectivity with bandwidth availability. 

Shared hosting

If your website is allocated a part of the server along with other websites the entire server is called as a shared server and the hosting services that are available in this arrangement are known as shared hosting services. 

Virtual Private Server 

If a server is compartmentalized to offer isolated hosting services to host multiple websites by providing independent hosting environment to every individual website, then each partitioned server is termed as a Virtual Private Server and the hosting arrangement is called as VPS hosting. 

Dedicated hosting

As the name suggests, dedicated hosting arrangement facilitates use of an independent physical server for operating website. In dedicated hosting environment, there are no neighboring websites sharing resources of server which is exclusively designed for a single website.  

Cloud hosting

In order to provide redundancy to mission critical data, it is mirrored across remotely positioned storage facilities for easy access via internet. This facility is known as cloud hosting and is sought after for improved availability of data. 

Uptime

Uptime is the period for which a server can perform without any interruptions for seamless accessibility of a website. It is usually denoted as percentage value such as 99.99 percent. 

HTML

The markup language used for communicating with a browser to inform the way a web page must be displayed is called as Hyper Text Markup Language. 

HTTP

HTTP refers to Hyper Text Transfer Protocol since it is used for transferring files over internet. The protocol of HTTP is rightly referred to as the very foundation of internet. 

HTTPS

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure or HTTPS is the actual application of Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) over any secured connection. It is usually in association with TLS or Transport Layer Security. 

Blog

This refers to the frequently updated content that is served to visitors in the form of a web page. 

CDN

Content Delivery Network or CDN is a networked collection of geographically dispersed web servers to boost content distribution and content availability across desired regions. CDN helps faster page loading as the content is readily available at physically closer POP locations. 

Content Management System (CMS)

This intuitive software platform is the backbone of your web content. A CMS application resides inside a server and helps any user who may not have any exposure to coding languages create web content or manage entire website content as required. 

Domain name

Your website or a specific web page on the website is provided with a domain name such as go4hosting.com. It relates to the address of your website in the World Wide Web. 

Domain registrar

In order to manage and assign domain names to websites, the services of domain registrar are offered by certain organizations, which are approved with ICANN accreditation. 

DNS

A Domain Name System or DNS is a numerical representation of domain names in the form of IP addresses. 

Have questions?

Ask us.



    AWS Standard Consulting Partner

    • Go4hosting
    • Go4hosting

    Alibaba Cloud

    Go4hosting

    Go4hosting-NOW-NASSCOM-Member Drupal Reseller Hosting Partner

    Cyfuture Ltd.

    The Cricket Barn
    Tiverton
    Exeter
    EX16 8ND

    Ph:   1-888-795-2770
    E-mail:   [email protected]