2.1 Web Hosting Definitions

The main considerations when choosing a hosting package are web space and bandwidth, and things like email forwarding and web stats should come as standard.

Web Space

This is the physical amount of disk space the hosting account will allocate for storing your web pages on their server. For example if you had a site with 10 pages at an average of 50Kb per page you would need at least 500Kb (0.5Mb) of disk space. Most starter packages will offer at least 100Mb.

Bandwidth

Data is transferred from the host's server to a visitor's computer every time they visit your site. Bandwidth is the amount of data transfer the hosting account will allocate for your website per month. Using the example of a site with 10 pages at an average of 50Kb per page, and assuming 100 page views per day, you would need at least 100x50x30 = 150Mb of bandwidth. Most starter packages will offer at least 1.5Gb.

Email forwarding

This allows you to add a professional looking email address to your website (eg. support@yourdomain.com). Sometimes called pop3 boxes, several of these should come as standard with your hosting account, enabling you to have several emails for your site (support@, enquiries@, contact@, webmaster@ etc). These then forward any emails from visitors to your site to your own personal email address (e.g. JSmith@yahoo.com). Procedures vary slightly from company to company but generally there are 3 steps involved in setting this up:

  • Log into your web hosting account control panel (Cpanel) and click on "set up email forwarding". Enter the details for your desired website email address and the personal email address you wish those emails to be forwarded to.
  • Set up a new account in your email software package (e.g. Microsoft outlook) and enter the relevant details provided by your hosting company. These will typically be incoming mail server (e.g. pophost.123-reg.co.uk), outgoing mail server or smtp (e.g. smtp.tiscali.co.uk), a username and a password.
  • Send an email to the new email address to activate it.