Following with my experiences As a web developer and the lessons I draw from them, we are going to talk about how to choose a hosting. Very difficult topic for novice users since there is no standardized offer that allows us to make comparisons.
One thing is for sure. It makes no sense to hire web hosting with Windows. Almost all vendors offer some variant of CentOS or some other Linux distribution, you can also get one that uses FreeBSD.
How to choose a hosting
In any case, there is no need to think (unless you decide) that you will have to spend hours writing in the terminal. Hosting plans usually include a graphical control panel that makes things easier.
I begin by admitting a prejudice. I don't like sites like Wix that offer you templates with which you can build your own site. It is true that they allow you the option of being able to emigrate to another accommodation if you wish. But, it seems to me that they are too general solutions to be effective.
Anyway (I'm not going to go into too much detail on the topic because it doesn't fit too much into the theme of Ubunlog) A website, no matter how similar it is to millions of other competing websites, is much more useful than none.
I know that as a merchant or businessman you have more urgent things to do, but By searching on Google you can find tutorials on how to make a simple page that you can upload to an inexpensive server. And, you will not be sharing your personal data or that of your clients with anyone.
Well, now that we know that the hosting has to be based on Linux (OR FreeBSD) let's look at the requirements:
- E-mail accounts: It may not be necessary for personal use. But if you are setting up the website for a business or non-governmental organization, not having an email account with your own domain is unacceptable. These accounts are usually easily configured with Thunderbird or another email client or viewed online. If you are going to use it for direct marketing, you should check with your hosting provider about the number of outgoing emails it allows.
- SSL certificate: This is a requirement that proves that the site is legitimate. If you do not have it, browsers will indicate that it is an unsecure website. Most web hosts usually offer a free solution and add paid ones. The free solution is usually sufficient for the most common web portals.
- PHP support: If you are going to include forms or some other data capture method, it is probably programmed in the PHP language, so your hosting will have to work with version 7.4 or higher.
- Database: Most content managers need a database to store information about the content and its representation. If you don't use them or don't save information on the server you can avoid it. Most hosting uses MySQL databases which are open source and PHPmyAdmin (Also open source) as administrator.
- ftp: This is like saying a car has to come with wheels. There has to be some way to upload the site to the server other than taking a pendrive to the offices remotely. FTP is a protocol that allows us to do it using a client like FileZilla (It is in the repositories)
It said earlier that the offer is too dispersed for a novice user to make a good decision. But, A good guide is to look at how much they are going to charge you the second year. Many providers charge a low price when you hire them (For example, they give you the domain or a premium SSL certificate and, when you have to renew them, you find higher costs than the competition.
In future articles we will go into more detail about the types of sites most suitable for each need, the type of hosting most suitable for them and the open source tools to create them.