What Does a Host Do?
You are trying to get your website on the World Wide Web. You may have already gotten an domain name. But, all that is is a virtual address. The next thing you need is to put your website on a web server. What are Web Servers? According to Geekwise.com, web servers are computers on the Internet that host websites, serving pages to viewers upon request. According to Wikipedia, A web hosting company is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to make their own website accessible via the World Wide Web.
You need to contract with a website hosting company to get your website running. A website hosting company provides you with server storage space for your (X)html pages, bandwidth, databases, technical support, domain name registration, FTP to your storage plus other services. A website hosting company leases these services to you on a monthly basis. Sometimes setup fees are required.
What are the most important characteristics in selecting a website hosting company?
1) Domains. A web host will often allow you to register a domain name when you sign up. Some will allow you to bring your own domain name. Check to see how many domain names you are allowed to have. If you later choose to own another domain name, more flexible hosts will allow you to add it to an existing plan without having to pay addional charges.
2) Sub-domains A sub domain is what appears between the "http://www" and the domain name. For example say somesite.com has a sub domain "sub" then the address would be "http://www.sub.somesite.com". Sub domains do not impact the web server negatively, but many hosting plans will limit the number of sub domains allowed per account.
3) Databases Website components such as shopping carts and calendars make use of databases. Be sure that your host provides enough database tables and space for your database requirements. Check to see what databases are available to you.
4) PHP scripting - Make sure that the PHP scripting on the server is up to date, otherwise PHP scripts may not function properly. The latest version of PHP is 4.x and will soon be 5.x. This is assuming you will be using PHP scripting
3)Hot Link Protection - Hot Link Protection can be set to prevent other persons from linking directly to media files on your web server. If someone tries to link directly to your image it will deny the request and prevents them from chewing up your bandwidth. This is particularly useful for web sites that host a large quantity of media files. Visitors on your site will still be able to view the media as usual.
3)FTP Access - There are two basic types of FTP access to a web server. First is the password protected FTP and Anonymous FTP. Password protected FTP is common for webmasters to utilize for managing their web files. Some web hosts may provide a web interface to upload files that is alternative to using FTP, but having FTP is a better option.
Anonymous FTP is the other type of FTP access. files can be posted to a publicly accessible directory and users may directly connect to your server with anonymous FTP to access these files. A password is not required for this type of FTP access.
Note: File transfers using FTP may or may not count against your allotted monthly bandwidth. Check with your Hosting provider.
Most of the previous information was gleened from tizag.com.
Below is a table that contains information on a few hosting companies and their hosting plans.
iPage is a highly rated provider with an exceptionally low price for a feature-rich web hosting package. iPage is ranked number one in two of web hosting ranking sites that I viewed. Among other things, it is know for it excellent uptime and strong focus on security. iPage would be a good hosting provider to start with for a novice web master.