What Does Cloud Web Hosting Represent?
What is cloud web hosting really? The word 'cloud' seems to be very fashionable in today's computing, Internet and web hosting phraseology. In spite of that, just a few really know what cloud hosting is. Maybe it is a smart idea to educate yourself about cloud web hosting services. To render a quite lengthy tale short, we will firstly disclose to you what cloud hosting is not.
1. Cloud Web Hosting is Not Restricted to a Remote File Storage Only.
1. Furnishing a remote data storage service, which involves one data storage appliance for all clients, does not transform any specific web hosting vendor into a genuine cloud web hosting distributor.
The cPanel web hosting suppliers call the ability to deliver remote file storage services a cloud web hosting service. So far there is nothing wrong with the cloud labeling, but... we are discussing website hosting services, not remote file storage solutions for individual or corporate needs. There's invariably one "but", isn't there? It's not sufficient to dub a shared hosting service, powered by a one-single-server hosting environment, just like cPanel, a "cloud web hosting" solution. This is so because the remaining components of the entire web hosting platform must be working in precisely the same manner - this does not relate only to the remote data storage. The remaining services involved in the entire hosting process also have to be remote, separated and "clouded". And that's quite difficult. Very few web hosting suppliers can really make it.
2. It Entails Domain Names, Email Box Accounts, Databases, FTPs, Web Hosting Control Panels, etc.
Cloud web hosting is not restricted to a remote data storage only. We are talking about a hosting solution, serving many domains, sites, e-mailbox accounts, etc., right?
To call a web hosting service a "cloud web hosting" one needs a lot more than offering plainly remote disk storage mounts (or maybe servers). The electronic mail server(s) need to be dedicated only to the electronic mail linked services. Carrying out nothing else than these particular procedures. There might be only one or maybe an entire cluster of mail servers, determined by the total load created. To have a true cloud web hosting solution, the remote database servers should be working as one, irrespective of their actual amount. Performing nothing else. The same is valid for the customers' Control Panels, the File Transfer Protocol, and so on.
3. There are Cloud Domain Servers (DNSs) as well.
The DNSs (Domain Name Servers) of an authentic cloud web hosting supplier will support multiple datacenter facility locations on multiple continents.
Here's an example of a DNS of a true cloud web hosting solutions provider:
dns1.gose-internet-services.net
dns2.gose-internet-services.net
If such a DNS is offered by your web hosting accounts provider, it's not a guarantee that there is a cloud web hosting environment in use, but you can absolutely be convinced when you discern a Domain Name Server like the one below:
dns658.hostgator.com
dns659.hostgator.com
that there isn't any cloud web hosting service. This sort of DNS simply exhibits that the web hosting platform in use is one-server based. Perhaps it's cPanel. cPanel is a one-single-server web hosting platform and holds a market share of more than ninety eight percent. In cPanel's case, a single physical machine copes with all web hosting services (web, e-mail, DNS, databases, FTP, web hosting Control Panel(s), files, and so on).
Remote File Storage - The Perverted Characterization of Cloud Web Hosting.
So, a cloud web hosting solution is not restricted just to a remote file storage solution, as plenty of web hosting distributors wish it was. Unluckily for them, if that was the case, most of the file web hosting providers would have been classified as cloud hosting ones long ago! They are not categorized as such, as they simply deliver file web hosting services, not cloud web hosting solutions. The file hosting platform appears really very simple, when compared to the hosting platform. The remote disk storage platform is not a cloud web hosting platform. It cannot be, because it's only one simple part of the whole cloud hosting platform. There's a lot more to be encountered in the cloud hosting platform: the web hosting CP cloud, the database clouds (MySQL, PostgreSQL), the Domain Name Server cloud, the File Transfer Protocol cloud, the email cloud and... in the not too distant future, probably several new clouds we currently are not aware of will come up out of nowhere.
| Starter | Soho Business | SMB Corporate | Conglomerate |
| Unlimited storage | Unlimited storage | Unlimited storage | Unlimited storage |
| Unlimited bandwidth | Unlimited bandwidth | Unlimited bandwidth | Unlimited bandwidth |
| 1 website hosted | 5 websites hosted | Unlimited websites hosted | Unlimited websites hosted |
| $3.42 / month | $4.58 / month | $9.17 / month | $14.50 / month |