Where to start with my website - Part 1

I get asked this question from clients and friends so first things first you need somewhere to put your website.

There are a few options;

1 – hiy (host it yourself) is now possible for nearly everyone as we  all (most of us) have a broadband internet connection, those of you who are lucky enough to have a static IP address (you will have to ask your ISP about this) can host from home, all you will need is a simple firewall to point the web traffic coming in to your house to the right PC (this doesn’t have to be a big grunty server, that would be ideal for a big company but not necessary for the average personal site).

2 – Co-lo (Co Location) you pay someone else to host your site they deal with all the errors/support/management etc, and palce your site on a server in their building alongside other peoples sites. You access your site via the web.

3 – Own Hosted server, like a Co-lo and hiy, you are the only person on your particular server in someone else building.

 

I would advise for ease of starting to go for the 2^nd option, its really cheap (approx £30 a year, can be cheaper just email me).

The first can be done (thinking businesses) but you will need static IP and hardware (watchguard firewall £200-300, entry level HP server £400 2^nd hand 60 and up), and knowledge of how to fix it when it breaks (it will, they always do – murphys law).

The latter option is really for sites with big traffic of if you need to host something that will use up a lot of bandwidth (data transfer) ie a music video site, you tube etc)

 

In Part 2 html the basics…..