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Choosing a Web Host Provider >>
Web Hosting Essentials
"For people who make websites" - A List Apart Magazine explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on web standards and best practices.
HTML Validator is a Mozilla extension that adds HTML validation inside Firefox and Mozilla. The number of errors of a HTML page is seen in the form of an icon in the status bar when browsing. The details of the errors are seen when looking the HTML source of the page.
The extension is based on Tidy and OpenSP. Both algorithms were originally developed by the Web Consortium W3C. Both algorithms are embedded inside Mozilla/Firefox and makes the validation locally on your machine, without sending HTML to a third party server.
The extension is based on Tidy and OpenSP. Both algorithms were originally developed by the Web Consortium W3C. Both algorithms are embedded inside Mozilla/Firefox and makes the validation locally on your machine, without sending HTML to a third party server.
This project aims to create an archive of user contributed clip art that can be freely used.
Starting at the beginning, this reference explains everything you need to know about using core JavaScript. It assumes you have the following basic background: a general understanding of the Internet and the World Wide Web and a good working knowledge of HTML. An excellent resource.
Edit your images on the fly online with Splashup, a web-based image editor that integrates with Flickr, Facebook, and Picasa. Splashup offers up a surprising array of image editing tools, far beyond the usual crop of resize and contrast-- you can also edit multiple images, play with filters and layers, use a variety of brushes, and more. Splashup is one of the best image editors in a long line of image editors; i.e., Picnik, Pixoh, and Resizr, to name just a few.[Lifehacker Annotation]
This website will let you:
- Create an XML sitemap format that can be submitted to Google to help them crawl your website better.
- Create a Text sitemap to submit to Yahoo.
- Create a ROR sitemap, which is an independant XML format for any search engine.
- Generate an HTML site map to allow human visitors to easily navigate on your site.
Clearspring's free Launchpad widget builder lets you easily turn your website's content into a widget which site visitors can use to place your content on all the major social media sites (MySpace, FaceBook, Google, hi5, Live, Yahoo, Wordpress, Blogger, etc.). The service also provides tracking and analysis.
This site features online text and html changing, modifying, converting tools designed to save you time making web pages or preparing text for web publication. If you've ever needed to capitalize sentences or convert line breaks to <p> or <br /> then this site can save you needless manual labor. There are other useful tools as well, like the one to uncompress html to make it readable and the ones to uppercase or lowercase text. Basically, the most common tasks that someone who works in an office or does freelance web development might encounter. Most of the tools have been created using javascript so you should be able to change large amounts of text as the processing is done on your computer instead of being limited by a server script.
The reliability of your host provider's servers should be a constant concern to you. After all, you rely on their reliability to keep your business running. How can you tell just how reliable their servers are? Read this article and find out for yourself.
A very active forum for discussions about web hosting (dedicated, managed, and reseller hosting, co-location, virtual private server, and much more).
Dan Lemnaru created this website to help you find a wide selection of independent reviews and comments to help you pick the right hosting company. This site will help you quickly find actual customer comments about specific hosting companies as well as reviews.
Useful Resources
View all resources
Editor Favorites
- A List Apart
- HTML Validator Firefox Plugin
- Open Clip Art Library
- Core JavaScript Guide: Version 1.5
- Splashup
- XML Sitemaps Generator
- Clearspring Launchpad
- Text Fixer
Other Resources
Links to Consider
You should use my checklist when shopping for a web host, but below is a list of what I think are "essential" services to have in a hosting account.
- Secure shell access (putty, telnet, etc.). Most lower-level hosting plans don't offer this, instead offering a control panel that can do many things you would use shell access to do. If you don't plan to offer any intermediate to advanced features, you may be able to do without shell access, but if you do this is a must.
- FTP access (almost always available). I haven't actually seen any plans that don't provide FTP access so...
- PHP. The key consideration with PHP is whether the installation is CGI or CLI (CLI is far better IMHO, especially if you want to do any scripts via cron). You will also be VERY happy if you can edit the php.ini file (usually you can with virtual server accounts, usually not with shared accounts). If you can't edit the php.ini file, make sure that you can use .htaccess files by directory (see below).
- .htaccess. An .htaccess file allows you to override default webserver software (i.e. Apache) settings to suit the unique needs of your scripts. Most often you are messing with a PHP setting (like global variables, addslashes, timeout, etc.), with redirects and/or passwords.
- MySQL . Along with MySQL is the must-have open source software phpMyAdmin. You can easily install this yourself, but some host providers have it installed automatically for you.
- CGI. It's a good idea to have CGI capability, preferably the kind that is supported in multiple directories. To be honest, though, this is quickly becoming a "nice-to-have" feature for me as the CGI scripts I have run in the past now usually have PHP equivalents.
- SSL. A must-have if you want to do e-commerce transactions otherwise you can probably do without it.
- Email. Pay attention to the number of POP accounts and aliases, IMAP access (a real must-have for email newsletter software like phpList), redirect to a script, and auto responders.
- DNS configuration. You want to make sure that your account is setup with SenderID, SPF, and/or DKIM. If not, make sure that getting it setup is within your control.
- Regular backups. You can do this yourself, but you won't so it's nice if the host does it for you.
- Responsive tech support. No matter how good your hosting provider is you will invariably need to contact tech support occasionally. You may even wish to do so when evaluating your "short list" of provider choices. Things to consider:
- Is there phone access and if so, how long does it take to get someone on the line?
- Is there a trouble ticketing system employed?
- Is there an escalation process in place for unsatisfactory service?
- Log Files. If your provider isn't providing access to raw log files you will be limited in your choices of web analytics software. Also, make sure your files are in extended log format or that you have that as an option at least.
- Dedicated IP Address. This is a good idea regardless, but especially if you plan to send any kind of email newsletters. And, make sure to ask your soon-to-be-host for it to be checked first in the RBL or Spamhaus Databases. Most hosts will re-use and re-issue IP addresses from former clients. You want to make sure that you aren't given an IP address that was blacklisted because of some bad behavior on the part of a previous owner/user. Finally, make sure that the IP you will be assigned isn't a bogon.
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