Web hosting is a service which allocates space for customers to showcase their websites on computer servers that are connected to the Internet 24/7.
Servers are powerful computers that have extremely large hard drives, or an array of hard drives. Space is then rented to those who want a "website presence" on the Internet.
Every server on the Internet has a unique numerical IP (Internet Protocol) address. You can think of servers as apartment buildings with unique addresses. Each apartment unit within each building is equivocal to space rented out for individual websites. And like real apartment buildings, each unit also has an address based on "the building" in which it is located.
When you rent a space on a server then, you're setting up house on the Internet. You can be reached by a unique address (the website address), which is based on the server's address.
There are many different types of web hosting. Most packages come with certain capabilities for users. Examples are scripts that allow interactive functions, forms, bulletin boards, guest books, etc. For professional purposes there are also Web hosting services that offer commercial packages that bundle business tools, like point of sales packages and credit card processing.
Prices for Web hosting vary from free to hundreds of dollars a year, depending on your needs. Web hosting for personal websites that don't require any special tools and have low traffic (not a high number of viewings) can be found easily for free.
Free Web hosting is convenient but has its drawbacks. Usually it will be required that you allow the server to run advertisements on your website. The advertisements are normally banner ads -- a banner at the top of the page for example -- and sometimes pop-up ads as well. Most free hosting services offer an alternative pay-plan to have the advertisements removed.
Another consideration is that free services normally allocate your website address as an extension of the server's address. For example: www.thewebhost.com/yourwebsite. If you want an address like: www.yourwebsite.com, you will have to pay to register your own domain name.
There are other considerations when looking for a Web host aside from price. Some hosting services have policies that restrict certain content, scripting languages, functions or uses. You should also read the privacy policy of any hosting service that you are considering, to see how they will use the personal information you provide to them in setting up your account.
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