Agreed, it’s a pain in more places than one when you have to migrate from one web host to the other, but when your needs grow and your current host fails to keep up, it’s best to do the dumping as soon as possible. But before you sever all ties, you must protect what’s yours and make sure your site is up and running without a hitch at your new host. Here’s a list of 13 things you must do before you dump your web host:

   1. It’s obvious, but has to be said. Find a new web host and make sure that it meets all your needs.

   2. Check if you have enough storage space, enough bandwidth to prevent crashes and down times, support for the operating system and applications that run on your server, support for scripts and an adequate number of email accounts and auto responders.

   3. The next thing to do is back up everything on your server to a secure location. You don’t want to be left holding an empty tub looking like a fool when you realize you’ve thrown out both the baby and the bathwater. Make sure you get all your email, databases and website files.

   4. Upload all your files and databases to the new server and make sure you retain all the file permissions as they were on your old one so that you don’t end up with scripting errors.

   5. Get your new web host to test the scripts, contact pages, and databases your website before you make the necessary DNS change.

   6. Before you update your DNS to point browsers to the new location of your site, you need to plan for the downtime that results from this procedure. DNS updates take up to 48 hours to spread to all DNS servers on the Internet.

   7. Let your customers and website visitors know of this planned upgrade. Make the move when your servers are expected to be the least busy.

   8. To reduce down time as much as possible, make DNS changes before you move the domain. Before you do this though, check to see if your mail server is running on the new host so that you don’t lose any email messages.

   9. If your domain name was registered using a third party domain name registration company, you need to check if your domain name is a part of your old hosting plan. If it is, you must separate the two, since moving your site to a new web host means that your domain name company remains the same while your web host changes.

   10. If your site is dynamic, DNS update delays can cause havoc if you’re not careful. Some customers may see your old site while others have access to the new one. To minimize such occurrences, close down your old site with an alert so that it becomes static while the move to the new one is being made. You could also use a synchronization tool to get changes made on the old site mirrored on the new one.

   11. Check for incompatibility issues between applications on your old server and your new one.

   12. If you have more than one domain to migrate, make sure you start the process with enough time to spare for the DNS update delays.

   13. Make sure all the visitors to your old site are being redirected to your new site before cancelling your current web host. It’s best to keep both sites up and running in parallel for at least two weeks before saying goodbye to your old hosts.

This web hosting blog post is contributed by Sarah Scrafford, who regularly writes on the topic of web design schools. She invites your questions, comments and freelancing job inquiries at her email address: sarah.scrafford25@gmail.com.

Choosing between a dedicated servers and shared hosting brings up a lot of questions. Does your site need a dedicated server or is shared web hosting good enough? How can I tell? Should I save money or get a powerful server now? How much control will I have with each option? Today I will be answering these questions and hopefully helping to make the choice easy.

When Is The Decision Is Easy?
The decision is easy when you don’t have a choice… If your site is getting tons of visitors, if your current shared host says it is using too many resources, if you are running a lot of dynamic php mysql sites that demand a lot of memory and cpu, or if you can’t afford downtime because you are doing marketing on your sites that can’t be down. Any of these reasons make the decision to go with a dedicated server easy and the real question then becomes what type of dedicated server.

By The Numbers…
You should fit into one of these hypothetical situations… Just keep in mind these are very ruff and you should give your hosting company stats so they can decide.

1. I run WordPress or PHP/MySQL site and get over 500 unique visitors a day. Get a dedicated server. Under that number of visitors and you are probably fine on shared web hosting.

2. I run a static site and get under 500 visitors a day. Shared hosting is fine. Go dedicated or VPS if it grows a lot. Static is a lot easier on the server.

A lot of shared hosts will be fine with bigger sites but its borderline in most cases. I also tend to error on the side of caution. I’ve seen plenty of intensive forums with 3,000 visitors a day running on shared hosting for months and then one day something flukes to cause a spike and suddenly they have 10 days to upgrade.

By The Money
Shared hosting is around $10 a month while a dedicated server is at least $70. It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to make this choice. If money is a factor go with shared hosting.

I Want Control
If you want complete control of your hosting environment go with a dedicated server. Shared hosting will limit what you can do, what you can tweak, and what you can install. With a dedicated server you can do anything you want!

I work for UK2 and over the last ten years have helped a lot of people choose between the dedicated servers we offer versus our shared web hosting. It really just boils down to the above issues.

Yahoo reports that Online retailer Amazon.com’s Web site went down for more than two hours in the middle of the day Friday.

Around 10 a.m. PDT, the Web site shut down, giving an error code to anyone visiting it, according to Keynote Systems Inc., a California-based company that measures Internet activity.

One digg.com user asks:

Amazon’s down!!! What’s going on? Asks one Digg.com user.

Error message is: Http/1.1 Service Unavailable. Major update? Technical difficulties? What’s the deal?

Maybe they didn’t pay their 6.95 for shared cPanel hosting?

We are fortunate enough to have have UK web host blogger, Ben Bolin, share some thoughts about country specific hosting. Ben is blogging at the moment from Egypt. Thanks for being a guest blogger at Web Hosting Finds!

Why Country Specific Hosting Is Important for Marketing and E-commerce

Something not many people know when choosing a web host is the importance of choosing a host that will aid your marketing and your website’s niche. This can be very important if you are running an online store depending on the geographic region you are focusing on. So first let’s start with an explanation of why this all depends on who your site’s visitors will be.

Most internet connections are very fast but it still matters where the physical server is hosted in terms of speed. If I was starting an online store focusing on customers in Texas the site is going to server faster to people from Texas if it is in Texas. Similarly if you are building a site aimed at United Kingdom residents you don’t want the server to be in the United States or even Europe in some cases. By hosting in a location near your customer base you are speeding up their access time to the server. This might not seem like a big deal but in a number of studies the importance of a quick loading page can mean a big difference in the number of conversions. Or if you are hosting a game server ping time will obviously matter when you are shooting your next zombie.

In terms of marketing it is also important in the eyes of Google and other search engines. One of the many factors for knowing whether they should rank you in a country specific search engine such as Google.co.uk or Google.com is dependent on your IP’s location as well as your domain name ending. By using a host in the country your site is serving you are sending one more indication to Google of where you should be ranked.

We have had plenty of customers at UK2 who came to us from USA based hosting and after they started using our servers which are in the United Kingdom they found that conversions increased and they had lower shopping cart abandonment rates. Which when you are running an online store are two very key factors. This is also why we offer our customers dedicated server hosting in both the United Kingdom and USA, we want to be able to give them the best of both worlds.

Thinking of registering a domain with the hot keywords “web hosting?” Sure you are. I can read your mind. Well, I was bored today and thought I’d search and see what web hosting domains were available. So, to start my quest, I visited Godaddy and typed in webhosting .com into the search…

Looks like I’m about 15 years too late on that one. Some clever soul reserved webhosting.com back in January 1993 when I was in the fetal stages of Internet growth. Can’t say I’m surprised. If you are, I’ve got some .info’s over in Iceland that I’d like to sell you:). Have you noticed that just about any occurence of the word webhosting + any valuable keyword has been registered by domainers, SEO’s or individual businesses?

But what I really wanted to see was what results the Godaddy domain suggestion tool would offer as alternatives. Here’s what came up:

Is this sad or what?

Some of the premium domain names aren’t that bad but look how expensive they are!

The additional domains, those at regular prices, are the worst of the crop, wouldn’t you say? I mean, who wants to start a web site called “Web Hosting Store” or “Net Life Hosting.” Also, maybe it’s just me, but doesn’t it seem strange to have the word online and hosting together in the same domain name?

So what’s a web hosting sitebuilder to do? I know you’re out there so please speak up and liberate us from the prospect of buying a bad domain.

What Websites are Hosted on this IP?

This is one of the best reverse ip tools I have ever seen. Most reverse ip tools do not show you nearly all the sites hosted on a server and sometimes there users are even charged for a premium service to use the full tool. At first, I thought it was capable of actually displaying all domains hosted on a server. However, it doesn’t because I checked one of my servers and it got only 3 out of 7 domains on ip address. But, in other cases it seems to list a long list of domains hosted on a server. Over at digg.com, users are having fun poking around on government and scientology sites to see what domains are hosted.

Using the You Get Signal “Reverse IP Domain Check,” you can see all of the other sites hosted on the same web server as a particular domain name. Try it.

Here’s more from YouGetSignal.com… and story at Digg.

I got started doing graphics editing with JASC Paint Shop Pro way back. I haven’t used the program since it was purchased by Corel. Now I use Photoshop and have recently begun toying around with the open source GIMP graphic editor.

This is a neat tutorial will show you how to create Web Host company header using photoshop and the free stock photo above.

What Graphics Editor do you use?

Opinion by Weber Hostetler

Why do so many website builders use Linux web hosting? My guess for this preference in operating systems would be: stability. Linux is perhaps the most stable operating system in the world.

There are two of essential foods: peanut butter and jelly, two major political parties: democrat and republican, and two kinds of web hosting which make up practically all web hosting on the planet: Windows based web hosting and Linux web hosting. The Windows operating system’s proprietary API (application programming interface) which is complicated and which is not entirely open for developers to know the ins and outs of. As a result, computers which run Windows as their primary operating system are suspected of being more prone to crashes.

Why is Linux stable? Servers running Linux web hosting just might be more stable because Linux is an open source operating system. The code is open to the public so that anyone can read it and suggest improvements or point out bugs. Over the years, Linux has been developed in various flavors such as Red Hat and Debian. Thousands and thousands of people have contributed their time and effort to making Linux web hosting run faster and to provide simpler, more efficient and bug free code. With an open programming environment, improvements are made on a continual basis and problems are seen relatively quickly and solved with a minimum of difficulty.

When you are starting a web site, one of your chief concerns is stability. Any time that the web site spends offline as a result of technical problems is time that your customers are unable to use your site, and this is bad for your bottom line. Businesses tend to want the most stable operating system for their web sites to minimize the dreaded server crash.

Another issue the webmasters have to consider when setting up a new online site is whether the operating system they are using will be able to use the full range of software and scripts that they require. Again, Linux web hosting is a winner in this regard. Lots of major web hosting companies offer Linux web hosting and with so many people using it around the world anything that you can do with Windows hosting can also be done with Linux web hosting. Many of the most popular script packages on the web today are available in both Windows and Linux web hosting versions, with the Linux web hosting version generally being more stable and having all of the same features as their Windows cousins. This is of course my opinion and I am sure that there are some who may disagree.

Linux web hosting is typically available at the same price as Windows web hosting. So consider that for the same price you can get an operating system for your site on the world wide web which is:

• stable
• runs popular script packages
• considered the best operating system in the world in terms of these criteria by many of the internet’s most well respected independent sources of judgement.

When you ruminate on all of the arguments for Linux web hosting over Windows hosting (there are more as I don’t even mention the whole Apache stuff), the decision would seem to me to be a no brainer: Linux web hosting wins hands down as the operating system that you should choose if you want to have a stable, reliable and full featured site that takes advantage of the latest in web technologies.

Getting your web server with the Linux operating system is particular important for companies which need to set up eCommerce sites. When customers rely on your site for sending in their orders, you need to make sure that you web site is running twenty four hours a day. Linux web hosting with live support might not be a bad idea for mission critical sites. Some Linux web hosts reviewed at Webhostingfinds.com include:

• BlueHost
• HostGator

Agree or disagree?

Could this be a new hacker tool?

Do you remember the power mishap in July that brought down 365 Main, the San Francisco datacenter? A similar incident took place at Rackspace, a Dallas, Texas Web host which serves several local companies.

I doubt that I will ever get around to building my own datacenter, but if I do, it will not be close to a highway. Yep, the security implications that this event brings to the surface are disturbing.

Now what?

How about a new cPanel feature: Truck Redirect

Valleywag | Techcrunch | Digg

Will Google Buy GoDaddy?

There has been a bit of buzz about the possiblity of accredited registrar, Google (oh and search engine giant too), buying Godaddy. Could this be possible? Looks Like Google might be lining up to Buy GoDaddy Inc the worlds largest domain registrar, a move that some speculate might help Google remove spam from search engine results. GoDaddy has applied for several patents in the past months. GoDaddy may be trying to attract Google as a buyer.

Read about it here and Here | via digg

I was surpised to see that Google has indexed nearly 200 million documents with the keyword phrase: web host reviews.

Seems like a lot to me.

Been here before, but here are a few important items to look for in a host from GreatResponder.com. Web hosting is a major part in the success of your online business. By choosing the right web hosting company for your web site, your success will be one step nearer.

After finishing the first stage of preparing your web site online which is designing the your website in a way that knock out all the competition, the second step in creating your online presence is to decide on the way of choosing the best web hosting company that will fit your needs.

This decision needs many different factors that can make your final decision a success. We will summarize here the most important factors that effect your decision and you must look for when choosing a web hosting company.

read more at GreatResponder.com or at Digg

Now why didn’t I think of this? Maybe I did. There’s a Digg like site for every niche these days. Why not web hosting? I haven’t fully checked this out this Digg-like web host rating site, Hostigg, but it looks interesting. Like Digg – but hosting!

Many months ago I was tagged by Mitch of the Web Hosting Show to reveal 5 things you don’t know about me. Who am I? I am still trying to figure that one out, but I’ll be glad to share what I know. However, I will still try and preserve the mystique around the true identity of the Web Hosting Finds Guy Behind the Scenes. Don’t worry, I’m not famous, but hey, let’s create some suspense!

First, my apologies Mitch, for taking so long. I have actually had this in my WordPress draft for many months. This year has been insane and I have finally gotten a handle on my work load (now we’ll find out if the boss actually reads these posts).

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Mitch Keeler, I’ll give you a quick summary. Mitch is the guy who makes the potentially boring web hosting industry interesting, funny and entertaining. Nuff said.

Okay here goes…

If you guys below haven’t already done this and want to continue the 5 things meme, please do:

Brian at The Code Cave
Harvey at RagePank
Jeff at Phraction
Kokul at Kokul’s World
Dave at Earthling

I am starting to see more web hosts advertising services as “environmentally friendly.” I am not sure whether this type of thing comes from west coast environmental consciousness or company marketing departments. Perhaps some of both.

Last year we reported on a solar-powered web hosting company, AISO.Net, has chosen data storage and virtualization software firm, Sirius Computer Solutions, to enhance its data center and reduce electricity usage by providing a high end, scalable infrastructure solution for its dedicated and shared web hosting clients. AISO.Net says that they are:

a reliable and responsible green web hosting company. We have made a strong commitment to help fight pollution and preserving our natural resources. Solar panels run our data center and office, not energy credits.

There is also wind powered hosting from sustainable.

Green Hosting claims they are Canada’s “first Internet hosting service powered 100% by green energy.”

When I was growing up in a small, rural, american farm town, we were just thankful to have electricity because it wasn’t all that long ago that folks were using candles. We didn’t obsess over the actual electrons consumed to power our electrical devices which were usually black and white televisions, radios that would pick up one station and shop tools out back. Not that I miss the cliches of “affordable” and “dependable,” but all this has me wondering if we are getting a little overfocused on the minutiae, major on the minors, you know. Do you think environmental web hosting is a waste of time or does it make sense?

More on the subject of green web hosting…

We’ve found that lots of web hosts, small and large, are eager to get the word out whenever they have news. A while back, I did some reorganizing and created a special page for those who want to tell the world about their new web hosting feature, product or what their company has been up to lately. The new Web Hosting Finds Submit area also lets you submit to our directory of web hosting resources. Check out the rules before submitting (don’t worry, they are not burdensome) and remember to be sure and submit something that you think all your friends and fellow readers here at the orange dog will be interested to hear about!

Uptime is one of the most important considerations in deciding upon one of the many hosts hawking themselves out there. But what about downtime? No Uptime web hosting loves to brag about their consistent downtime performance. Among other notable features they provide are “deleting files since 1994″ as the tagline states. Don’t you wish all hosts were that honest

Want to find a good web hosting company using Google search technology or do you need an answer to an age old mathematical question? I get bored sometimes and just instinctively type words into Google search (c’mon, I know you do to). I was hoping to see the Web Hosting Finds site come up on the first page for the phrase “1 and 1.” To my suprise, Google gave me the literal answer to my query: “2.” I had read about this function in Google search a long time ago but had never actually seen it appear naturally. Math was not my shining subject in school, but I do know that 1 and 1 = 2! I guess it all depends on how you spell 1 & 1.

I was surfing around on YouTube the other day and happened up on some gold nuggets when searching the keywords, “web hosting.” Who would have imagined it possible to illustrate the differences in the types of hosting accounts by using laundry room items? Leave it to the creative Web Hosting Show host, Mitch Keeler get the point across with a little color safe tongue-in-cheek humor. Mitch points out that most hosting is of the shared variety. Yet, understanding hosting types is truly an important part of any site building endeavor. The concept is not that too terribly difficult grasp, yet I have known people who overspent by paying too much for a dedicated server, when a shared hosting package would be fine. In other and more rare cases, some high traffic site owners are too cheap to face the reality that they need dedicated hosting for their project. Some web designers don’t realize reseller web hosting exists, so they open separate accounts for each customer. I wanted all the readers at Web Hosting Finds to catch this video if you haven’t seen it.

Calling any would be Ad Executives out there - This is your chance to make it big! The NFL is going to make the best Super Bowl commercial ever and you have a chance to be a part. You can propose your own Super Bowl ad idea for the best NFL Super Bowl commercial ever. The winning pitch may be produced, and you and your friends will be flown to watch the Super Bowl, of course. Check out the video pitch about the Super Bowl 41 TV Ad by ESPN’s Rich Eisen. Thanks to Harold for sending this along. Good luck ad execs.

Oh, and what does this have to do with web hosting, you ask? I seem to recall that a certain host gained some notoriety with a memorable Super Bowl ad once. Ah, yes, it was Godaddy :)

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