What is web hosting?

A web host­ing ser­vice pro­vides a ser­vice that allows indi­vid­u­als and busi­ness­es to post web pages to the inter­net. A web host­ing ser­vice provider sells or for free (with adver­tise­ments on the web page) is a busi­ness that pro­vides the servers and tech­nolo­gies to view web-sites on the inter­net. Web host­ing ser­vices are ser­vices that cus­tomers can uti­lize after they have pur­chased month­ly dial up or broad­band ser­vices that allow them access to the inter­net. Web host­ing ser­vices use host­ing and client archi­tec­ture to load con­tent to the serv­er so web pages and infor­ma­tion can be viewed on the inter­net in its orig­i­nal HTML for­mat.

A web host­ing com­pa­ny will offer clients access to a serv­er that will pro­vide the clients’ con­tent to indi­vid­u­als on the World Wide Web after they make a URL or domain name request. To view pages on the web, you must have a web brows­er, such as Microsoft Inter­net Explor­er or Netscape Nav­i­ga­tor to request the web page from the serv­er after you have pur­chased inter­net access.

Web sites are pages that are stored on a com­put­er called a serv­er. The serv­er is a part of a net­work of com­put­ers on the inter­net or World Wide Web that allows users of the inter­net to reach your site any­where in the world at any­time. The inter­net is open 24 hours, sev­en days a week around the clock. Host com­put­ers are con­fig­ured so that when your URL or domain name is typed in, the address will use a point­er rou­tine (look for the address from ter­mi­nal to ter­mi­nal) until it reach­es the com­put­er that hosts your web-site. Then, if all is okay, your web site should dis­play itself on the users screen.

Host­ing com­pa­nies require that you buy your URL or domain name first before you pur­chase host­ing ser­vices. Most host­ing com­pa­nies have a pack­age that will allow you to buy the domain name and host­ing at the same time.