Hosting options
This chapter discusses various options for hosting a service on the world wide web and introduces the terminology used by service providers to describe the type of service they provide.
Table of contents
Introduction
Having one's own data centre for hosting a service on the world wide web is rare these days. Instead, most service providers and developers use cloud computing.
In this chapter I shall first go through the terminology used in the industry to describe the different cloud computing services.
Below,
you'll find links to some specific products. These are only provided
as examples of the class of service. I have only used a few of
these myself, and have not evaluated prices or performance,
so please do not regard the mentioning of these specific providers
as endorsements of the services they provide.
Cloud computing terminology
First, let us look at some of the jargon used when talking about cloud computing (and related) services. The higest level of service is Managed hosting. On the intermadiate level, there exists three different classes of cloud computing services, usually referred to by their initials (SaaS, PaaS, IaaS). Similar to PaaS, but different enough to merit a distinct name is Shared web hosting. Finally there is product called Colocation space.
There are three different billing models in use.
- Subscription: You pay per month (or year) according to the plan you subscribe to. Different plans provide different amounts of resources and/or services. You may change plan, but not very dynamically.
- Metered: The resources that are available (CPU, storage, bandwidth, man-hours, etc.) to you can be scaled up and down dynamically (often by the minute). You pay for what you request. Also known as “Pay as you go”.
- Rent: You pay per month (or year) for the physical space your hardware occupy (e.g. by rack slot, cabinet, cage or room). Some rental plans also meter bandwidth use and you are billed for excessive use of bandwidth.
Now, let us look at the different types of service.
Managed
A managed ICT services provides the most comprehensive outsourcing of information and communication technology functions, such as procurement, of hardware and software, maintenance, security and networking. Providers of managed ICT services will also handle repairs, replacements, integration, deployment, troubleshooting, backup and more. They will typically deal with multiple vendors for the underlying services. They will also provide custom designing for clients requesting it.
Billing model: Subscription and/or metered.
Example: Hannemyr Nye Medier AS.
SaaS
SaaS (Software as a Service) is like what initially was called the “thin-client model” of cloud computing. In this case the provider has set up a server where clients (these days, the client is usually a standard web browser), make use of software running on the server. SaaS is the most familiar form of cloud computing for consumers and for corporations who does not manage its own IT-services. SaaS moves the task of managing software and its deployment to third-party services.
Use of SaaS applications tends to reduce the cost of software ownership by removing the need for technical staff to manage install, manage, and upgrade software, as well as reduce the cost of licensing software.
Billing model: Subscription.
Examples: CRM-applications like Salesforce, productivity software suites like Office 365, storage solutions like Dropbox, and website builders like Squarespace.
PaaS
PaaS (Platform as a Service) provides services at lower level than SaaS. In this case, the service provider provides a ready to use platform on which software can be developed and deployed. The provider do manage the server hardware, the network infrastructure, and the required software. E.g the operating system, the LAMP (or other) stack, and the necesssary application software. This leaves the user free to focus on the business side of things, and the application development of their product or service.
PaaS are provided by some very large corporatios, but also by small “boutique” hosting providers that usually offer more personalized service.
PaaS is built on top of virtualization technology. Businesses can requisition resources as they need them, scaling as demand grows, rather than investing in hardware with redundant resources.
Billing model: Subscription and/or metered.
Examples: Acquia Cloud, Google App Engine, and Red Hat OpenShift.
IaaS
Iaas (Infrastructure as a Service) are an even lower level service. The user gets access to a bare bones virtual machine (VM). The VM will typically have been set up with an operating system (based on some well-know distribution, such as Ubuntu 22.04 LTS), but nothing else. The user must set up the other software required for the application (e.g. a LAMP stack for running a WCMS application). The user is also responsible for keeping the configuration up to date, migration, load balancing, backups, and so on. However, in some instances the service provider will assist you with basic network configuration (DNS records, IP addresses, some router/firewall-level protections as well as automated backups.
IaaS is is built on top of virtualization technology and provides highly automated and scalable compute resources, complemented by cloud storage and network capability which can be self-provisioned via a dashboard or an API.
IaaS users have direct CLI access to their servers and storage, just as they would with traditional servers. However, compared to a traditional server, an IaaS user have access to a higher order of scalability. Users of IaaS can build a “virtual data centre” in the cloud and have access to many of the same technologies and resource capabilities of a traditional data centre without having to invest in capacity planning or the physical maintenance and management of it.
This is the most flexible cloud computing service and allows for automated deployment of servers, processing power, storage, and networking. giving IaaS users full control over their infrastructure. The main uses of IaaS include the actual development and deployment of PaaS, SaaS, and a WCMS.
Billing model: Metered.
Examples: IaaS are Amazon EC2, DigitalOcean Droplets, Microsoft Azure.
Shared web hosting
Shared web hosting (also called a “web hotel”) is a service that allows the user to make a website accessible to the world by putting it up as a virtual host (vhost) on a web server set up by a web hosting company. Like PaaS, the web server is set up and managed by the hosting company, and there is usually only a limited set of configuration options available. Unlike PaaS, the user will share the web host with many other websites.
Some providers of shared web hosting does not even allow users to use the CLI to access to the host. Instead, access is via some control panel (e.g. Plesk or cPanel) that provides a menu driven interface to upload files and perform some common administrative tasks (e.g. backup), but that also impose limitations on what the user can do.Billing model: Subscription.
Examples: GoDaddy Economy, BlueHost Basic..
Colocation space
A colocation is a data centre facility in which a business can rent physical space for web servers and other computing hardware.
The term colocation space is what you rent at a colocation.
Typically, a colocation provides the building, cooling, power, bandwidth and physical security while the customer provides servers and storage.
Unlike the three other options, for performance to be scaled up or down, a colocation host needs to be replaced.
Billing model: Rent.
Examples: Rackspace. HostGator.
Final word
There also exists some free web hosting services. These usually entails that the service provider is allowed to place ads on your site. These free services are not discussed here as they are always too crippled to be worthy of consideration.
Last update: 2022-04-25 [gh].