Web Hosting Glossary

These are server operating systems similar in function to Windows 2,000 Server and XP Server. FreeBSD is a UNIX-like operating system which runs on Intel hardware. We have found them to be much faster, more stable, more secure, easier to maintain and more efficient than Microsoft Windows systems. Since Windows is heavily marketed and these systems are not (they're free) many people believe that they are inferior. This is simply incorrect.

The programming man-years invested in these systems far exceeds what has been invested in Windows. In fact, portions of Windows 2,000 and XP were borrowed from FreeBSD to improve stability, a long standing problem.

Every computer needs to be taken off line occasionally for scheduled maintenance. This is very brief for high quality systems.

The total space taken up by all your content such as web pages, images, cgi programs and databases.

If your pages averaged 20K in size and you had 50,000 "hits" in a month, 200 Meg of data transfer would have occured for that month. For the typical web site 200 Meg is ample, but a heavily promoted site needs more.

Reputable hosting companies impose data transfer restrictions to control their bandwidth usage and ensure a high standard of service.

(1) Short for Domain Name System (or Service or Server), an Internet service that translates domain names into IP addresses. Because domain names are alphabetic, they're easier to remember. The Internet however, is really based on IP addresses. Every time you use a domain name, therefore, a DNS service must translate the name into the corresponding IP address. For example, the domain name www.example.com might translate to 198.105.232.4.

The DNS system is, in fact, its own network. If one DNS server doesn't know how to translate a particular domain name, it asks another one, and so on, until the correct IP address is returned.

We will be happy to solve any issues that may arise in connection with our services. We may not be able to solve certain problems, like debugging programs, but even then we will try to provide information which leads to a solution. We are very much committed to making your web site successful. After all, we want you to continue using our services and recommend us to others.

Mail to one address is accepted and then re-mailed to another address.

Automatically send a pre-set email when email is received at an address. When going on vacation, for example, the response might be something like: "I will be on vacation from .... to .... and will respond when I get back."

Mis-addressed mail may be re-sent to a defined address.

Example: "mail.YourDomain.com". A server which accepts and stores email. SMTP stands for "Simple Mail Transport Protocol". This allows you to use all the common email readers such as Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express and Eudora. Also called "POP3" or "Post Office Protocol, Version 3".

Discarding email which has been identified as unwanted bulk solicitations. Filtering reduces unwanted email and cuts down useless bandwidth consumption.

All your email will be scanned to remove identifiable viruses.

"FTP" stand for "File Transfer Protocol". There are programs you can use, such as "Cute FTP" and "WS FTP", which allow you to store and retrieve files on your site very quickly and easily.

Allowing unidentified people to download files from your site. You might use this to distribute programs, photos or music, but please check our terms of use

Programs located in a special directory are run by the web server and the output sent to the requester. Useful for things like guest books, hit counters, clocks and much more. "CGI" stands for "Common Gateway Interface", which means an interface between regular programs and remote web browsers.

"PHP" stands for "Hypertext [web page] Pre-Processor". It is relatively easy to use and very powerful.

With it you can do just about anything any program can do, but it is particularly useful to access databases and integrate the data they contain with web pages.

"SQL" stands for "Structured Query Language". MySQL is a server program which allows information to be stored and retrieved using SQL.

For the simple SQL statements that are typical of web based content mySQL is the fastest of the SQL servers.

Allows direct access to your database. You can use it to manage your database using point and click. It will also allow you to make queries, including inserts and deletes, and display the results.

A module for the Apache web server which allows the server to execute code written in the language "perl". This allows programs written in perl to run much faster.

"SSI" stands for "Server Side Includes". This is the ability to have the web server program read and interpret tagged portions of web pages and replace those portions with other content.

Webalizer is a program which will read web server logs and summarize their content graphically. It will show, for example, accesses by date, by time of day, by web page, by referring page and by browser type.

You can restrict access to certain web pages or other content by requiring a user name and password. The server will not send material in a protected directory without this authentication.

Web server logs consist of a single line for each time a page gets accessed. Useful for custom analysis, such as click thru paths.

SSH stands for "Secure Shell". It is a way of doing work directly on a remote server where all content in both directions is encrypted.

A part of the Control Panel which allows you to quickly make a copy of your site.

A sub domain called "Mountains.LandscapePhotos.com" would be a portion of the domain "LandscapePhotos.com". Note the extra dot after "Mountains". Sub domains might also be used for divisions of a company such as, "HumanResources.LandscapePhotos.com" or "Sales.LandscapePhotos.com" It's a way of grouping closely related content and also users. Our sub domains contain all the same features as domains. This includes an additional MySql database, seperate CGI directory, and the ability to create users who belong only to the sub domain.

Our hosting is normally based on your domain name. With a unique IP address, you gain some versatility. You need to have a unique IP address, for example, if you want to purchase and use your own SSL certificate. SSL certificates verify the identity of the owner of an Internet site and allow data to and from it to be encrypted.

Pointing at the same content with an additional domain name. For example, when a web surfer calls up the page, "JackGarage.com" or "FredGarage.com" his browser can be pointed at "Fred-JackGarage.com". In other words, you would register 2 or more domain names and point them at the same content.