HTML5 is currently being developed as the next major revision of HTML and it is still far away from W3C recommended release date (year 2022 or later). However with the release of Apple iPad, the topic is got extremely heated and almost every web designer are talking/reading/writing/blogging/twitting about it.

Moreover, many early adapters (web developers and geeks) started creating some cool stuffs wtih the cleaner HTML5/CSS3 codes. In case you wanted to be one of them but don’t know where to start, here are list of useful HTML5 tutorials to get you started. It’s been a long week searching and reading on these tutorials (hey, I’m new to this too!) – I hope you make good use of them. Also, if you are one of the authors of these tutorials – I couldn’t thank you guys enough! It’s been a great learning journey reading each of these; thank you very, very much.

1. HTML5 Getting Started Guide

Concise beginner guide in HTML5 – newbies should start reading from here.

Read HTML5 Getting Started

2. Preview of HTML5

This was an ‘overview’ on HTML5 published back in late 2007. Nevertheless, it is still a good learning source for those who are unfamiliar with the codes. Personally I like the ‘big picture’ this article offers.

Read HTML5 Preview

3. What Does It All Mean (Dive into HTML5)

‘Dive Into HTML5’ is a HTML guide book to be published by O’Reilly. The chapter ‘What Does It All Mean’ offers a clear explanation on the basics of HTML5 semantics/elements.

Read What Does It (HTML5 elemenets) All Mean

4. HTML5 Demos and Examples

It’s always easier to learn something new via examples. This site provides up to 20 examples of HTML5 experimentations and demos (with source code!).

HTML5 Demos

5. HTML5 Differences From HTML4

Detail comparison guide of HTML4 and HTML5 by the W3C (there is no better source than this!).

Read HTML5 differences from HTML4

6. HTML5 and CSS3: The Techniques You’ll Soon Be Using

This is a great tutorial that combines the application of HTML5 and CSS3 – must read for beginner/advance level of web developer and designer.

Read HTML5 & CSS3: The Techniques You’ll Soon Be Using

7. HTML5 localStorage()

One of the best things you can do with HTML5 is to establish a client side database (on user browser) with localStorage. To start using this awesome HTML5 function, the HTML5 localStorage() tutorial series (4 detail articles) published at PaperKilledRock.com comes very handy.

Read HTML5 localStorage()

8. HTML5 Canvas Cheat Sheet

The information provided is pretty much just a condensed copy of WHATWG specifications. However the .pdf file is definitely a must have on your notice board (especially when you are dealing with a HTML5 project that involves loads of canvas elements).

Get HTML5 Canvas Cheat Sheet

9. Designing A Blog With HTML5

This is a tutorial that every blog theme developer will need to read. (You should also read the author’s blog Bruce Lawson for more related updates.)

Read Designing a blog with HTML5

10. HTML5 Cheat Sheet

What can I say? Everyone loves a cheat sheet or two.

Get HTML5 Cheat Sheet

First thing first, as a smart shopper, you have to understand that…

There is no such thing as BEST CHEAP HOST!

(Huh? What the…)

I know this sounds like a joke but the truth is, we can never be 100% sure if a web host is the ‘best’ – especially when you are looking for ‘cheap’ and ‘best’ in the same time. And, even if we manage to get the *best* web host, we can never be sure that it will be the best for long.

What we can do, however, is to eliminate most of the bad cheap host and land on a cheap web host with good (or acceptable) quality of service.

Define “cheap” in today hosting world

Things change fast on the Internet. What seems cheap yesterday might not be a good bargain today. For example, this is how a cheap web hosting deal looks like 5 years ago:

Cheap Hosting Deal: $22.95/mo for 1.5GB disk space, 80GB data transfers

Ref: http://web.archive.org/web/20050213090646/http://www.lunarpages.com/

Looks cheap to you now? Certainly not! Therefore, it is necessary for us to define what is ‘cheap’ in the hosting world at this time of writing.

How cheap is *cheap*?

When I talk about ‘cheap web hosting’, I mean web hosting services cost below $5/mo for a maximum 24 months subscription.

When I talk about ‘good cheap web hosting’, I expect cheap web hosting with characteristics below:

• Unlimited* disk space, bandwidth, addon domain capacity (so that you can host as much websites as you can in one account).
• Support one-click installation for at least 35 to 60 common web applications; including all the major blog, forum, and cart software.
• Sufficient level of CPU resources to sustain moderate site traffics (roughly 3 – 5% CPU resources) and sudden traffic spikes (at least 10% CPU resources for 120 seconds).

These are the must-have features when you are searching for a cheap web host.

*Note: However, you have to understand that unlimited hosting is not unlimited (sorry for the pun).

Unreal statements about cheap web hosting

Unfortunately, the convenience of Internet also brings us noise and distractions. Some misunderstandings about cheap hosting must be corrected.

Myth 1: All cheap hosting services suck!

Truth is only a small minority cheap web hosts are blood suckers that tend to cheat your money with terrible service. Most low cost hosting companies I knew often over-deliver and provide excellent service for long term. Many webmasters misunderstood that cheap hosting services are normally bad because: 1. Negative reviews are easier to be accepted (and passed along) in forums and blogsphere; 2. Webmasters made unrealistic expectation (for example, I received Hostgator complaints because the web host does not provide real time web analytics data); 3. Problems with users’ websites are out of the host provider’s control (buggy codes, hacked site).

Myth 2: My site get 5,000 visits per day, a cheap shared hosting plan certainly cannot handle my site.

Believe it or not, WebHostingSecretRevealed.com gets about 10,000 unique visits quite frequently and guess what, I am still hosting this site on a ‘cheap’ shared hosting package.

Many webmasters and bloggers simply opt for VPS or dedicated hosting because they think it is ‘cooler’. What you need and what you want are two different things. Fact is you can do a lot of things with a cheap hosting deal nowadays and you are always recommended to start small with an affordable shared hosting plan. The challenges are 1. Can you utilize the resources smart enough? And 2. Can you upgrade your web host later (if necessary)? VPS and dedicated hosting are vital for sites that need high CPU resources; but in case you are just running a high-traffic blog, it’d be better if you can save those hosting money and buy me some beer.

How to find out if a cheap web host is good?

Sadly, as mentioned, you can never be 100% sure that a web host is good.

However, there are a few we can employ a few “check points” that will help eliminate most lousy hosts in the list.

Does the web host provide at least 30 days of trial period? The longer trial period the better – long trial period simply means that the web host is confident with their service quality.

Does the hosting deal come with a reasonable refund policy? Avoid those with outrages cancellation fees. Tips: Some fishy web hosts will charge their customers enormous setup fees upon refund so make sure you read the TOS clearly before purchase.

What is the average uptime record? Search for web host uptime reviews or use website uptime tracker tools (example: Pingdom, Uptime Auditor) to check your site’s uptime, anything below 99% is unacceptable.

Does the web host have clear and strict policy against spams? Serious hosting companies (yes, even for low cost hosting providers) will have very clear and strict policy against spammers.

How well does the web host support department handle your questions? Get in touch with the web host supports via live chat and see how your questions are answered. Ask technical and sensitive questions (where most web hosts don’t want you to know) like CPU cycles, cancellation fees, inodes, MySQL limits, and so on. What we want to know is how well-prepared are the support staffs and how much honesty we can get when it comes to h such sensitive issues. (side note: I prefer the support staffs to be honest and tell me the ugly truth, for example, admit that users get very low CPU cycles, instead of giving me unclear answers.)

My list of good cheap web hosting

It is very time consuming to answer readers’ emails one-by-one – although I’d love to get in touch with my readers as often as I can; but there is no point to keep interacting on the same topic. So for the ease of reference, I will keep (and update) this list of recommended cheap web hosts in this post from today onwards.

Web Host	Features	Price	Reviews
iPage	Bandwidth: Unlimited Disk Space: Unlimited Addon Domain: Unlimited	$3.50/mo	iPage Review
Fat Cow	Bandwidth: Unlimited Disk Space: Unlimited Addon Domain: Unlimited	$3.67/mo	FatCow Review
JustHost	Bandwidth: Unlimited Disk Space: Unlimited Addon Domain: Unlimited	$4.95/mo	JustHost Review
GreenGeeks	Bandwidth: Unlimited Disk Space: Unlimited Addon Domain: Unlimited	$4.95/mo*	GreenGeeks Review
BlueHost	Bandwidth: Unlimited Disk Space: Unlimited Addon Domain: Unlimited	$6.95/mo (slightly over $5)	BlueHost Review

*Note: GreenGeeks price is based on special coupon code (WHSR25).

I understand exactly how it feels to be stuck in an economy bad-turn and I know there are lots of countries have not crawl out from the mud of debt till now. It is absolutely important to save more and spend less in this difficult time. But let’s not sacrifice quality over cost in web hosting. I hope this post helps you in finding a reliable, honest, low cost hosting provider.

Many bloggers wish to host their blog but do not know how to pick the right blog hosting. While things might look a little complicated from outside at first, choosing a suitable web hosting for your blog is pretty easy when you are informed.

In case this is the first time you are starting a blog, high chances (99.9%!) that a shared hosting is what you need. Don’t bother looking into VPS or dedicated hosting as in most cases your blog will not need that much of resources for (at least) the next 6 to 12 months.

(I recently met a guy who wants a cloud hosting account for his not-eh-hem-so-popular blog and no matter how hard I explained, he still think going cloud is the right thing to do. Hopefully he could read this post and save the money for better purpose.)

How to judge a web host is right for my blog?

Anyway, back to our topic. Here are some of the common features to look into for a blog host.

Disk storage

Most shared hosting deals nowadays come with unlimited disk space but honestly, you don’t need that much. Unless you are storing piles of hi-res images, else 100MB of disk space should be good enough (with images hosted on Flickr, PhotoBucket); 500MB should be able to keep you going for at least two years.

Monthly data transfer (or, bandwidth)

With the help of social bookmark sites like Digg and StumbleUpon, it is very possible for a brand new blog to hit 10,000 – 15,000 unique visits in a day, which in other words, huge demand for bandwidth.

However, bandwidth shouldn’t be your main concern as (again) most shared hosting providers offer unlimited bandwidth these days. Moreover if you are getting that volume of traffics, the CPU load is more likely to be the bottleneck that will cause a temporary suspension on your account, not bandwidth. So in short, bandwidth is something you need to consider when choosing a blog host but it’s unnecessary to stress too much on bandwidth.

If you wish to learn more, check out my previous input: How much bandwidth do you need?

Server uptime

All servers will suffer some downtime. Hardware failure, programming bugs, human’s errors, server maintenance… there are unlimited ways to turn a web server down. Hence, it is impossible to get a web host with 100% uptime. In my opinion, any three to six months uptime record with more than 97.5% is a go; and, anything more than 99% with less than $5 hosting cost per month is a steal.

CPU Usage

The limitation on your account’s CPU usage is what makes unlimited hosting limited. Most web host will not give understandable value. Some will tell you can goes up to 5 – 10% CPU power but they never tell you what kind of CPU is in use. 5% of what, Pentium III 733 MHz? You’ll never know. The CPU usage is a grey area where most web host will not talk about it officially in the TOS.

From what I knew, some hosts will allow maximum CPU usage up to 5-10% (which is already very good). However, I believe 1-3% sounds more logical thus if it happens that you get a chance to ask about it before picking up a web host, you know what to expect. (my guesstimation: assuming 200 sites sharing the same server hence each get 1/200 CPU power; half of the registered sites will be in dormant mode so the max should be somewhere around 1/100 CPU power).

There’s another thing you need to keep in mind – blog or CMS software are often ‘heavy’ database users thus it is in fact part of your responsibility to keep the CPU usage low. If you are running a popular WordPress blog, installing WP Super Cache is highly recommended.

Pricing

Dedicated and VPS hosting prices vary a lot but for shared hosting, standard monthly cost range from $3.50/mo to $10/mo. Unless there is a special reason behind, else anything above $12/mo is a no go. Remember, you shouldn’t be spending too much on the hosting at start, especially if you are a part time blogger.

Bottom line: You just can’t judge a host from outside

Reality: It is impossible to know how good or how bad is a web host from outside. Reading TOS and checking on the hosting features will only help filter a few obvious bad apples. To further investigate on a web host, (honest) hosting reviews and users feedbacks are what you need.

And since judging from outside will never work well, why not test the web host yourself from the inside? After all, this is why we have free trial period. Just keep track on the service quality for the first 30 days and do not hesitate to ask for a refund if you find anything fishy (that’s how you leverage the trial period ! ).

If you have to develop websites or blog themes regularly then I am sure that you too have a list of web tools like me. It’s no secret that web developers seldom build things up from scratch nowadays. From web icons to graphical chart, CSS menu to random dummy texts, from web traffics analysis to financial bookkeeping – there’s a web tool for (almost) every web development related job.

In this blogpost, I am going to share a great list of useful online tool that will save you a lot of time when developing a website. Some of these tools are free of charge, some are not – either way, I hope you can find something new for your tool list.

1. GoingUp!

GoingUp! is a free web-based web analytic tool that comes with powerful SEO features. The web application tracks (almost) every activity on your website and presents data nicely with charts, heatmaps, flags (for countries), etc in an Ajaxed interface. Besides, the web app also comes with several free SEO features including keyword position tracking, Alexa Rank tracking, as well as keyword density tool. You need to signup before using some of these features but registration is completely free.

Visit GoingUp! online, click here.

2. Icon Finder

It’s no secret that web desginers nowadays do not create all icons from scratch. There are infinite amount of free icons available on Internet and it’s a waste not to leverage these free resources. But with billions of these free icons comes another problem – searching and sorting these tiny images become a time-consuming job. Luckily we have tool like Icon Finder – an icon search engine that helps collect and categorize various icons. At this time of writing, Icon Finder keeps more than 150,000 icons in their database – which is not a lot but I am sure the figures will keep growing.

Visit Icon Finder online, click here.

3. IE NetRender

IE NetRenderer allows you to check how a website is rendered by Internet Explorer 7, 6 or 5.5, as seen from a high speed datacenter located in Germany. Just type in a URL in the field above and you can check your webpage deisgn compatibility for free!

Visit IE NetRender online, click here.

4. Eric’s Color Blender

What Eric’s Color Blender does is exactly like the name refers – it blends two colors together in various proportions and creates up to ten different colors shades. I like the simplicity and efficiency of the tool and it’s definitely one of biggest time-saver for me.

Visit Eric’s Color Blender online, click here.

5. Google Chart Tools

Google is everywhere on the Internet nowadays and this include charting tool. The Google Chart Tools allows you dynamically generate charts with a URL string, where it can be embed in a web page. A chart gallery was recently included in the Google website and users who are interested with this tool should take a look.

Visit Google Chart Tools online, click here.

6. TraceWatch

Looking for free web statistic tool but don’t want Google Analytics? Well then you should check out TraceWatch. TraceWatch is a free website analytics tool that works in real-time. The application has everything for in-depth web stats analysis including real time details on Unique Visitors, New Visitors, Sessions, Page Views, Hourly and Weekday Distribution, Robot Page Views, Average Pview/Visitor, Average UVisitor/Day, Average PView/Day, Average UVisitor/Hour, Average PView/Hour, Robots Hits, Browser Types, Locations, etc etc.

Visit TraceWatch online, click here.

7. DIY Chart

DIY Chart is a simple but yet powerful online tool that helps create interactive charts and graphs. Some webmasters might be turned-off by the needs of registering an account but I believe the rich features of this web tool deserve every second you spend on filling up the registration form. At this time of writing, DIY Chart offers a wide range of chart types including Coulmn, Stacked Column, Bar, Stacked Bar, Area, Stacked Area, Pie, Doughnut, Pyramid, Funnel, Point, Bubble, Line, Range, Combination, CandleStick, Stock, Radar and Polar (isn’t that massive?).

Visit DIY Chart online, click here.

8. Feng Office

Feng Office (formerly known as OpenGoo) is a web office that helps manage, collaborate, and organize your web projects online. What’s special about it is that this web tool comes with its own email functionality and the GUI is very responsive. Unfortunately good things don’t come free – Feng Office is quite pricey but you can always sign up for a free trial.

Visit Feng Office online, click here.

9. FreshBooks

Most web developers are not good (or simply not interested) at managing business finances and tracking down payments. In fact, who likes boring book keeping jobs? Fortunately, there are plenty of online tools that can help. FreshBooks, for instance, is a very popular web application for book keeping (eg. invoicing, expenses tracking, quotations, etc). This tool is free for those who are managing less than 3 clients but anything above that will cost you $14 to $149 per month.

Visit FreshBooks online, click here.

10. Color Hunter

Color Hunter is a handy tool that helps find and make color palettes created from images (via URL or a simple search term).

Visit FreshBooks online, click here.

11. TYNT (Tracer)

TYNT (perviously known as Tracer) is a free web-based service that tracks what’s being copied from your website. Tracer is a cool tool to fight copycats and would recommend it if there’re a lot of competitors stealing your web content.

Visit TYNT online, click here.

12. BrowserShots

BrowserShots is a popular tool that allows you to preview your web page in more than 70 versions of browsers.

Visit BrowserShots online, click here.

13. FormSite

FormSite is one of the earliest HTML form builder online. The website was established in 1998 and there are over 100 pre-built forms intheir database. FormSite is quite generous to their free account users – you can create up to 5 forms with 50 items and 10 results in each of the forms for free.

Visit FormSite online, click here.

14. WuFoo

WuFoo is a HTML form builder helps you create contact forms, online surveys, and invitations so you can collect the data, registrations and online payments you need without writing a single line of code. WuFoo is a little pricey compare to the other two form builder tools listed here – The free account allows only one form, and the paid package starts at $14.95/mo.

Visit WuFoo online, click here.

15. Picnik

(Do you really need me to introduce Picknik? Well okay.) Picnik is a popular, easy to use, and powerful set of photo editing tools for editing, sharing and printing images. The free tool is integrated with a wide variety of websites like Picasa Web Albums, Facebook, Flickr, Yahoo! Mail and Photobucket. The website has just been acquired by Google recently (read official blogpost on March 1st, 2010).

Visit Picnik online, click here.

16. Variable Grid System

The variable grid system is a quick way to generate an underlying CSS grid (based on 960 Grid System) for your site.

Visit Variable Grid System online, click here.

17. FontStruct

Building or tweaking a font style is sometimes part of the web designing job. If you do not have a proper font-building software installed, it’s time for you to have a look at FontStruct. FontStruct is a free font-building tool that lets you quickly and easily create fonts constructed out of geometrical shapes, which are arranged in a grid pattern.

Visit FontStruct online, click here.

18. CSS Menu Builder

CSS Menu Builder helps build (well?) CSS Menu. The free tool comes with more than 1,000 pre-designed menu combinations and I believe anyone who wish to build a CSS menu instantly should check them out.

Visit CSS Menu Builder online, click here.

19. STC Font Browser

STC Font Browser is a free tool that enables you to preview font styles in your browser. The tool is simple to use and it’s very helpful when you need to choose a font style.

Visit STC Font Browser online, click here.

20. Form Style Web 2.0 Generator

Form Style Web 2.0 Generator is a easy to use, poweful, and yet completely free of chrage. It generates stylish CSS forms instantly and definitely belongs in your bookmark list. It’s such a shame that I missed out this tool in my previos post about web generators (30 Must See Web Generator For Lazy Webmasters).

Visit Form Style Web 2.0 Generator online, click here.

21. Make Text

Okay, Make Text is not a must-have but it’s definitely a fun tool to use. MakeText does only one thing – it generates random texts (where web designers will often use it to preview and test their designs).

Visit Make Text online, click here.

22. IceBrrg

Icebrrg helps make all kind of forms – contact forms, registration Forms, surveys, application forms and personal inventoriestracking forms. All you need to do is to signup, create a form using their wizards, and the tool will work everything out on the programming side. Cool isn’t? However note that the you need to pay if you wish to create 3 forms (price starting from $9/mo).

Visit IceBrrg online, click here.

23. CopyPaste Character

Lazy to code a special character in HTML code? Well, you should. Because with CopyPaste Character the only key that you need to type is “ctrl + c” and “ctrl + v”.

Visit CopyPaste Character online, click here.

In this article, I’m going to share with you a few frequent asked questions about domain names and I hope it will helps you to make better judgment.

Domain Name vs Web Hosting

A domain name is not a web hosting. Newbies often mix things up between domain names and hosting, these are two different things. A web hosting is where you get to store your data online; whereas a domain name is the ‘address’ of these data.

Domain Name vs Top Level Domain

All domain names end with a Top Level Domain (TLD), which consists of short set of letters. Take this website for example (WebHostingSecretRevealed.com), WebHostingSecretRevealed is the domain name whereas the ‘.com’ is the TLD. .net, .info, .org, .edu, and .biz are some of the common seen Top Level Domain.

Besides these generic TLDs, there is also another type of Top Level Domain that is normally known as the Country Code Top Level Domain (ccTLD). ccTLDs are meant to indicate a website’s location; for example website ends with .co.jp indicates that the site is based in Japan. Registration of ccTLDs is restricted for the citizens of the corresponding country; and the activities with such domains website are ruled by local regulations and cyber laws.

Subdomain vs Addon Domain

An addon domain refers to the additional domain name to be hosted in a hosting account; on the other hand, a subdomain refers to the secondary domain that is created on top of a ‘parent domain’.

Example: uk.yahoo.com, uk is the subdomain (with yahoo.com as the parent); if flickr.com and yahoo.com is hosted on the same hosting account, then flickr.com is the addon domain. Note that creating a subdomain is totally free of charge, while for addon domain you’ll need to pay just like when you are registering your primary domain.

How domain name works?

When the user requests a connection to your domain, Domain Name System (DNS) servers will ‘communicate’ with the corresponding registry for the requested domain; the registry then responds by informing which name servers (address of your web host) this domain is registered with; the request then goes to the name servers to obtain the actual IP address of the requested domain; the user then establishes connection (via web browser) with the said IP address.

Long story short, a domain name, with the help of DNS, tells the location of your website.

What is a domain name registrar?

A domain name registrar is the party that provides domain registration services to the public. A domain name registrar has to be accredited by ICANN; and when it is a matter of ccTLD, the registrar needs approval by the national ccTLD authority.

It is impossible for an end-user to register a domain name directly to ICANN – a designated registrar must be chosen. Each accredited registrar must pay a fixed fee of $4000 to ICANN as well as dividing a fee of $3.8 million among all registrars.

Should you own a domain name?

Some website owners (mostly bloggers) host their website or blog on a free platform and run it on a third level domain (like http://www.myblog.blogspot.com and http://www.myblog.wordpress.com). The question often raised is: Should you have your own domain name.

My answer is yes, absolutely.

Having your own domain name makes it easier to market your website. Furthermore there is less restriction with your own domain name (for example WordPress.com normally does not allow advertisements) and the cost of owning a domain is just $10/year.

How to choose a right domain name?

A good domain name plays a vital role in your web marketing effort.

Generally, you want something sticky (easy to remember), meaningful (related to your website content), and keyword-rich (not a must, but important if SEO is a major part of your web marketing strategy). Avoid long URLs and overuse of hyphens. Write your selected domain name on a piece of paper and check carefully if there’s any spelling mistake or unwanted pun. Remember the example of www.dicksonweb.com – a temperature instruments manufacturer’s website. The boss, Dickson, wasn’t aware that www.DicksonWeb.com can be read as www.DicksOnWeb.com. This created much PR tensions for the company and they had to change their site name to www.DicksonData.com (which doesn’t look very good too).

Do keep in mind that although your domain name is important, there are also another 99 things that make up a good website. It makes no sense to sweat too much in selecting the ‘best name’ for your website as eventually what users need is the quality of your web content or service.

Does a good domain name improve search engine rankings?

Some believe that search engine optimization (SEO) is nothing but stuffing keywords in the Meta tags and content. Well that’s the story for year 1998. Nowadays you need to do a lot more than that in order to win the search engine wars. Domain names, for instance, plays an important factor when it comes to SEO nowadays.

A domain name should be easy to memorize and related to the theme of the website. It is often highly recommend to have your primary targeted keywords included in your domain name as one, it tells your first time visitors what this site is about; and two, it allows search engines to group your website in the right category (and thus giving better opportunity to rank in related search result pages).

Does an aged domain helps in search engine rankings?

There are no clear-written guidelines or rules that an old domain will improve search engine rankings. As you can see from the video (April 2009) below, Matt Cutt (representing Google) did talk about the relationship between domain age, years of domain registration, and search engine rankings; and asked webmaster not to worry too much about site age.

HOWEVER, SEOs generally are convinced that search engines value older websites than the newer one. From my experience, search engines (namely Google) simply put more weight to an aged domain and tend to rank them better.

So to answer the question, yes, an aged-domain does help improve search engine rankings.

What else you need to know about domain names?

Basically, this article covers pretty much everything a normal webmaster needs to know about domain names. In case you think there are other points I had left out, feel free to ask questions or share your opinions in the comment section.

What is VPS hosting?

A Virtual Private Server (VPS) is like a server in a bigger server. I know the statment is a little confusing but please don’t get panic about it.

The actual concept behind VPS is very simple – basically what VPS hosting providers do is to split a server into multiple smaller size individual servers (using virtualization technology) and rent it out to different customers. Each of these virtual servers looks and feels the same like a dedicated server except for one thing – they share the same hardware with one another.

What’s good about VPS hosting?

From a customer’s perceptive, a VPS hosting is the perfect stepping stone between shared and dedicated web hosting. When shared web hosting is no longer sufficient and you are not ready to go with dedicated – VPS hosting is your answer.

Advantages of VPS over shared hosting

What’s best about VPS is the isolated hosting environment that secures your website’s performance and safety. As mentioned, a VPS-hosted website will operates independently like a dedicated server – you do not share disk space, RAM, processes, TCP/IP stacks, operating system, or whatsoever. What’s going on with your neighbors (other private servers that run on the same machine), either it’s overloaded with heavy traffics or severely hacked, will not affect your website’s performance.

Another pro of VPS compare to shared hosting is flexibility. With VPS hosting, you will get access to the system root. This means you are free to install any custom software or to tweak your system files in order to fulfill your website needs.

Advantage of VPS over dedicated hosting

When compare with dedicated hosting, VPS has only one advantage – it’s cheaper. In fact, it’s much, much cheaper. In many cases, while the features are more or less the same, a VPS hosting is 30-40% cheaper than a dedicated hosting deal.

For example, table above shows the price different between dedicated and VPS hosting.

What to look for when shopping for a VPS hosting?

Basically there are five main consideration points when choosing the right VPS hosting, namely – pricing, RAM allocation, customer supports, control panel, and hosting plan flexibility. I’ll get into the details one-by-one.

1. VPS Hosting Pricing

Money is always the main factor when we are purchasing something. When comparing the price of VPS hosting, do not aim for the cheapest deal, go with those with a reasonable price tag instead. The reason behind this is because we do not want our host to run on a thin profit margin. Yes I know it sounds crazy but it’s true. Think about it – we want stability when it comes to web hosting and shifting web host is certainly the last thing we want to do after settling down. A hosting company running on a thin profit margin is simply… instable (the risk of going out of business due to deficit accounts).

So again, if you are serious with your website, go for those with a reasonable pricing but not the cheapest.

2. Server Memory Capacity (RAM)

In my opinion, memory capacity (RAM) is the most important features in a VPS hosting. In fact, how well (or bad) your VPS hosting performs depends greatly on how much RAM you have on hand. The memory capacity simply influences everything in your virtual server – from server efficiency to speeds, and to power consumption. It’s so important that in many cases, RAM allocation actually serves as price determiner of the entire VPS hosting package.

Here’s rough idea on how much RAM you need. In brief, for a single website operation, you need at least 512 MB of RAM in order to run cPanel and Plesk on your VPS. Though cPanel states that it only needs 256 MB but as it is with other applications, 512 MB will ensure everything runs smooth. In case you are operating multiple websites on a single VPS, higher RAM is a must. Expect to go up to 2 GB if your websites are heavy trafficked.

Another term you should take heed of is the ‘Burstable RAM’, or in certain cases, the backup RAM. Burstable RAM is the temporary backup resources over your standard memory quota. Burstable RAM is extremely important to protect your website from sudden traffic-surge (for instance, a Digg- or Stumble-effect).

Generally for starter, a VPS plan with 512 MB RAM plus a burstable RAM of 1 GB should be more than enough.

3. Customer/Technical Supports

You should always communicate with the web host before making any purchase (especially when you are new). It’s not about checking which web host provides the fastest response; it’s about getting to know the people working inside the hosting company and check if you are comfortable to deal with the support staffs.

See, VPS hosting is unlike shared hosting where 90% of the operations are standard case. In VPS hosting, most of the things are ‘non-standard’ thus a technical support department that really care about their customers (and with the right knowledge) is extremely important.

4. Server Control Panel

VPS providers will normally offer you several options of control panels where the normal ones are either Plesk or WHM/cPanel. These control panels offers similar functionality where they enable you to edit files in the server for a web interface rather than manually and both are equally good.

A user-friendly control panel as it makes day to day server management easier – tasks such as adding domains, debugging, and setting up email accounts.

5. Flexibility

Do not go with VPS provider that has limited sets of hosting plans. As mentioned, VPS hosting is unlike shared hosting – where most of the operations are similar. Before purchase, you should check if the web host allows you to customize your VPS hosting plans.

For example, if you need 500 MB disk space and 5 GB monthly data transfer (something relative small), and 512 fixed RAM – it really makes no sense to sign up for a 80 GB disk space, 1000 GB monthly data transfer, and 512 fixed RAM for $74.95/mo. I mean, why settle with high server specs that you will never use when all you need is some extra memory capacity?

Which VPS hosting you should go with?

In case you are looking for the right VPS hosting, Hostgator and VPSNext are two of the ‘must-see’.

What’s good about VPSNext?

• Reasonable Pricing From my research, VPSNext’s pricing is always slightly cheaper than other similiar VPS hosting services. If you are searching for some bargain deals, VPSNext is your answer.
• Reliable Network Custom firewall, DDoS protected network, daily backup policy… VPSNext has, in fact, one of the safest network.
• Powerful Reseller Capabilities VPSNext allows customers to rebrand and resell their hosting capacity. As a customer, you can allocate separate resources for each one of your users (or clients), run your own private name servers, and have the ability to completely rebrand your control panel so you’re promoting your own business and brand identity.
• Valuable Addons VPSNext offers a couple of addon features that you don’t get elsewhere online , namely – Free $50 Google Adwords credits, $50 Miva Search credits, eNom Domain Reseller Account, and Merchant Account.

To learn more: http://www.VPSNext.com/vps-hosting

What’s good about Hostgator VPS hosting?

• Topnotch hosting services Based on my extremely good experience with their other hosting services – shared and dedicated hosting (see my Hostgator review).
• High Flexibility Hostgator VPS hosting plans are very flexible – 9 pre-set plans, managed/unmanaged options, different pre-installed operating systems, optional IP addresses, wide in house software supports, etc etc.
• Stability Hostgator is one of the fastest growing companies in United States (Won Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Companies Awards for a couple times).
• Room to expand As you might already knew, Hostgator also provides reseller and dedicated hosting plans – this gives room to expand when your website grows.
• Eco-friendly Last but not least, Hostgator is green. This means all servers are powered with recyclable clean energy.

To learn more: http://www.Hostgator.com/vps-hosting/

Final words about VPS hosting

There, I have put down all the important points about VPS hosting and I hope it helps you to understand and to choose your right web hosting.

Before you move on, there is still one last thing you should know – Do you need a VPS hosting? This, question, unfortunately, can be only answered by you. You’ll have to justify if a VPS hosting is necessary (or sufficient) for your website. What’s your 12 months plan for the website? How busy do you estimate your website will be? What are the custom applications to be installed? These are some of the must-ask questions and prevent yourself from overspending.

With that, I’ll end this article and good luck if you are shopping for the new VPS hosting!

1. QuickRibbon

QuickRibbon helps generate custom site ribbon. Input your link details and styles selections; and the tool will take care of the necessary Javascript coding. This great tool is best for lazy webmasters who wish to attract users attention to some important update/message.

Make some ribbon today at www.QuickRibbon.com

2. TabsGenerator

Need some cool tabs in seconds? Well, then you need TabsGenerator. TabsGenerator is a convenient design tool that allows users to create highly-customizable tabs (tweak size, colors, corners and borders) in CSS.

Generate some cool tabs now!

3. Web 2.0 Bullshit Generator

Okay, I admit Bullshit Generator is not that useful; but, I am sure we have time for some web 2.0 humor. Let’s “integrate undefined synergies”, anyone?

Start bullshiting.

4. UNIQUE

Gender, face features, wearings, skin colors… UNIQUE is a free web tool that allows users to create highly-customizable, human-like, avatars. Mind you, this web tool is kinda addictive – I spent more than 30 minutes playing non-stop with the features while writing this post.

Create your unique avatar at Unique.RasterBoy.com.

5. Stripe Generator 2.0

Stripe Generator 2.0 is a free design tool supported by Pop Minds Web & New Techs Studio (long name huh?). It helps generate (almost) any kinds of stripe you want for web background.

Try generate some stripes now!

6. Web 2.0 Badges

Web 2.0 Badges is a very popular badge generator (mainly because of their beautiful pre-designed badges, I guess). Any webmaster who is too lazy to design their own badges should check them out.

Let’s put on some badges for Web 2.0!

7. FreshGenerator

FreshGenerator is a pretty cool web design tool which helps to create small design elements like boxes or tabbed menus of different sizes, styles and colors.

Visit www.FreshGenerator.com

8. Loader Generator

Equipped with a set of pre-designed loading icons, Loader Generator allows you to customize and generate your own loading ‘spinner’ in a fraction of second.

Visit www.LoadInfo.net

9. FavIcon Generator

DynamicDrive’s FavIcon Generator is perhaps the most popular favicon maker. This tool allows you to create various sizes of favicon (as well as icon) based on the your own image.

Try create your own Favicon now.

10. Button Maker

Button Maker is a free tool provided by Adam Kalsey that creates simple square-shaped site sticker. The sticker designs is pretty fixed; however the tool does allow users to tweak several design parameters (such as text margin, border color and background).

Visit: www.Kalsey.com/tools/buttonmaker.

11. AjaxLoad

Like Loader Generator, AjaxLoad is another free tool that generates cool loading icons. What’s good about AjaxLoad is that the tool comes with a huge set of indicators in different shapes and designs.

Check out AjaxLoad now!

12. RoundedCornr

RoundedCornr is another web design tool that auto-generates CSS codes for a box with rounded corners and a color gradient.

Click here to visit RoundedCornr.com.

13. 3D Pack

3D Package is a great tool for e-book and web templates sellers. It lets you instantly create 3d-box images online for free. Simply upload pictures (JPG, GIF, orPNG) for cover andyou’ll get a 3d-box in your favorite image format.

Check out 3D Pack, click here.

14. LogoCreator

Not good with logo designs? Try LogoCreator for some quick logo design works. This free web tool comes with 7 preset logo designs and allow users to customize various design parameters.

Care for some logos? Visit Creatr.cc.

15. CoolText

CoolText is another logo design tool that transforms texts to graphics. A point worth noting is that CoolText had been running online for a very long time – the free tool is online since year 1998 and it has rendered over 300 million of free images.

Check out this antique and make some ‘CoolText’.

16. FreeFooter

FreeFooter is an easy and fast tool that simplifies how you personalize your web site / blog page footer – definitely a great tool for lazy blog designers.

Visit FreeFooter.com.

17. ThemeRoller

Want some cool jQuery features on your site but not good with programming? Check out ThemeRoller – a free jQuery generator that allows you to create custom themes for jQuery components. Change font properties, colors, borders, hover variations, etc all very easily. It will show you a preview of what your settings would like like when applied to jQuery’s accordion, tabs, slider, date picker, and dialog box.

Find out how ThemeRoller works here.

18. jQuery Function Builder

jQuery Function Builder is a handy tool to quickly build up a collection of jQuery functions. While using this tool might need some basic knowledge in jQuery; it is, nevertheless, a great way to reduce programmers’ work time.

Build jQuery functions on the fly here!

19. TartanMaker

Fancy some Tartan-stripes background? Check out TartanMaker – a free design tool that helps create Tartan designs instantly.

Visit www.TartanMaker.com, click here.

20. ColorWizard – ver 3.0

Lack of good color? Use color wizard to do color-matching for you. The color wizard lets you submit your own base color, and it automatically returns matching colors for the one you selected. It returns a set of hue, saturation and tint/shade variations of your color, as well as suggests color schemets to you, based on your color’s complementary color, split complementary colors, analogous colors and other variations.

Check out ColorWizard.

21. Color Scheme Designer

The Color Scheme Designer is a brilliant color-matching tool for those who are selecting colors for their designs.

Try this design tool at ColorSchemeDesigner.com.

22. Post-It Note Generator

Fans of sticky note? Embbed it into your web design using Post-It Note Generator. Post-It Note Generator helps create eye-catching Post-It Note with customizable text designs, message color, and paper styles.

Make some Post-It note right away!

23. Genfavicon

Genfavicon is another favicon maker that helps generate favorite icon on the fly.

Visit www.GenFavIcon.com/

24. Gradient Texture Maker

Gradient Texture Maker is a free web tool that allows you to generate a graphics with gradient colors. This design tool is highly recommended for those who need to create website background with gradient color.

Check out Gradient Texture Maker.

25. Favicon CC

Favicon CC is not exactly a web generator tool. However, it enables you to draw and create favicon easily online – which I think most of y’all would be interested to look at.

Let’s draw some favicon at Favicon.cc.

26. SimWebSol Logo Generator

SimWebSol Logo Generator is another simple logo generator.

Visit online: www.SimWebSol.com/ImageTool/

27. Textorizer

Textorizer is a nice piece of web application that allows you to create cool graphics using text of your choice. The tool takes jpeg, png, gif, or xpm file less than 128K in length and produces an SVG file which reconstructs the original image using parts of the text scattered around.

Check out Textorizer.WhatFettle.com/

28. Buttonator

I used to spend hours working on Flash and Fireworks for web buttons. Well I wouldn’t do the same if I heard about Buttonator back then. Buttonator is a great button generator that helps create stylish buttons instantly – a great tool for lazy web designers and webmasters.

Make some buttons with Buttonator now.

29. Idee’s Multicolr Search Lab

Searching for the right images on Flickr to match your web design or blogpost? Try Multicolr Search Lab, a free web tool that helps you to sort out Flickr creative common images based on color.

Try out Multicolr Search Lab now!

30. BgPatterns

BgPatterns helps create classy background (see image). There are dozens of cool patterns to choose from and it’s a must see tool for all web designers.

Visit BgPatterns.com.

Well that’s all for the list. If there is a web generator or tool that you think should be listed here, feel free to shout in the comment box.

JustHost are one of the very few web host offering anytime money-back guarantee, the one-and-only web host with free MySpace ad credits ($50), and their price are among the lowest in the industry ($4.95/mo for 24 months signup).

It’s also worth noting that JustHost is only in the business for merely two years but they are already topping dozens of best hosting charts including big host review sites like WebHostingGeeks, FindMyHosting, and HostLead. (More on JustHost reviews here.)

How did JustHost get started? What made JustHost’s success? What can we expect from JustHost in the future?

We are going to find out the answers directly from the source in this interview.

JustHost Interview – Q&A with Luke Kendall

Hello Luke, thanks for taking this interview with us. Before we start, allow me to congratulate JustHost for achieving such a huge success in such a short time. There were dozens of ‘Best Hosting Awards’ won and I am sure you guys have been working really, really, hard for that.

Thank you and it’s our pleasure to be here speaking with you, sites like WebHostingSecretRevealed.com are essential within the web hosting industry. They give consumers an unbiased review of the best web hosting providers on the internet today.

Alright, let’s kick start our interview with some introduction. Please tell us more about yourself and JustHost.

Well my name is Luke Kendall and I am product manager here at JustHost. This means it is my job to communicate with our customers and business partners in order to expand our services further and continue growing our brand. From Google ad credits to JustHost’s template monster partnership – we at JustHost are constantly working to give our customers more than any other web hosting provider can.

JustHost was originally set out as a business web hosting provider offering perhaps the most generous package in the industry. Demand for web hosting from individuals seeking web hosting as a hobby has soared recently so a year ago we optimized our services to cater for amateurs and experts alike.

The competition is fierce in hosting industry and (almost) the entire globe was facing economy downturn in past two years. But yet, business seems growing non-stop at JustHost, what is the secret of JustHost’s success?

Haha there’s no secrets here, literally everyone here puts in 110% and the results soon become apparent. We strive to provide the most competitive web hosting plan on the internet so we work hard to keep costs low without compromising on service. Did I mention we are the first and only web hosting providers to offer $50 free MySpace ad credits?

How JustHost’s ‘Anytime Money Back Guarantee’ works? How can a customer like me benefit from this policy?

When you sign up with a leading web hosting provider you will usually be offered some type of money back guarantee. This is great for individuals who don’t necessary know what to expect when they sign up, with a money back guarantee the customer’s purchase is risk free. For the majority of hosts this will be 30 days and some even 45 days but with JustHost you can claim a full or pro-rata refund when you cancel your account.

Wow, this makes me feel absolutely safe when spending money at JustHost. Wouldn’t such policy hurt the business? Are you guys seeing a lot of cancellation?

We certainly expected to see the refund rate increase which it did however in comparison with the increase in signups we actually come out better off. At the end of each year our renewal rate is through the roof since those who did not get what they needed from hosting left us months ago. The anytime money back guarantee should be adopted by more web hosting providers, it keeps them on their toes by allowing customers to leave whenever they choose.

JustPlan and JustPlan Premium are both shared hosting packages and I don’t see any other standard hosting packages offered from your website. What if existing JustHost customers need to upgrade to VPS or dedicated hosting? Is custom hosting plan an option at JustHost?

Here at JustHost we primarily work with shared servers, in fact that is all we offer on the website. If a customer out grows their shared servers and wants something more we will organize a dedicated server. This is not something that we wish to focus on yet however we do wish to expand sometime in the near future.

Let’s talk about the servers and data centers. What can we know more about the technology behind JustHost hosting?

JustHost’s data center currently houses over 2,000 servers, virtually all shared hosting.

Each server runs on cPanel plus we install the latest version of the Fantastico suite on each. This means our customers have access to the most up to date version of scripts like WordPress, Joomla and Oscommerce etc. Each servers is monitored around the clock by our in-house monitoring servers and the data center is manned 24/7 too so that we can respond to server issues any time of the day or night.

Overselling seems like a norm nowadays and I see unlimited hosting offers everywhere. JustHost users for example, get unlimited bandwidth, disk storage, and addon domain at just $3.95/mo. should shoppers be concerned with overselling?

Yes shoppers should be concerned and should make their web hosting choice carefully!

Some “hosts” offer web hosting for less than $2 each month, anything less than $3 and you have yourself an over seller! We are strictly against over-selling besides we have too much to risk by overselling our servers, with our anytime money back guarantee we soon wouldn’t have any customers left!

I read tons of positive reviews about JustHost but I do see some customers are unhappy with the lack of phone support at JustHost. How would you response to such complaints?

JustHost is currently employing 10 new technicians who are being trained specifically to take calls over the phone. If a customer requires a call all they need to do is ask and we will gladly assist.

That’s all for my questions, thanks again for being with us today. Before we end, is there anything you would like to add?

I would just like to thank you for making time to set up an interview with JustHost – We enjoy speaking with web hosting review sites and we hope this interview will provide a good read on Web Hosting Secrets Revealed!

Wrapping up our Q&A session with JustHost

Sound Bites

• JustHost offers “Anytime Money-Back Guarantee”, this means you can claim a full or pro-rata refund when you cancel your JustHost account.
• JustHost data center currently houses over 2,000 servers, virtually all shared hosting.
• JustHost is the first and only web hosting providers to offer $50 free MySpace ad credits
• JustHost is currently employing 10 new technicians who will be trained specifically to take calls over the phone.

Well that sums up our session with JustHost. In case you wish to learn more, make sure you don’t miss my JustHost review.

What is CPU Throttling?

Depends on what kind of CPU you are talking about – the term “CPU throttling” is used to describe the process of reducing CPU usage to avoid the computer processor getting overheated and damaged. Such technique is also used by Intel chips to optimize energy consumption.

CPU throttling in hosting

However the term has a different meaning when it comes to web hosting. When your website on a shared server is pulling “too much” CPU resources at one time, the CPU will freeze (or slash down) your account CPU usage. At this particular time, your website will respond extremely slow and your jailed website will only be released when the staffs think it is okay. Such hosting feature was not seen before until Matt Heaton spent thousands of hours (according to himself) developing the system and introduced this so called Hosting Nirvana (One might argue DreamHost has been doing this for some time – but technically, it’s not the same at all).

Who is implementing CPU throttling now?

So far from what I know, BlueHost and HostMonster (they are under same management).

Is CPU throttling a good thing?

Well, apparently the web host will tell you that this feature is “for the good of all shared hosting users”.

But don’t you think this is such a convenient excuse for the web hosts to push away their responsibility; and blame their users for not using the server “properly”? Would the president of BlueHost (with over 1.5 million websites hosted on it!) spent thousands of hours developing this new system just because he wants to “change the hosting world for good”?

(Sorry to be such a cynic but things just look too fishy and I can’t help but keep doubting their real intention of doing so.)

WebHostingSecretRevealed.com is affected! Website loading extremely slow occasionally.

At this time of writing, this little blog is throttled about 30 minutes daily. According to reader Troy of alterego-of-pwi.info, my blog took up to 45 seconds to load (it normally takes less than 3 seconds in normal time)!

What has been done so far to handle this problem

FYI, I am now in the mid of discussion with the HostMonster supports to solve the issue. They’ve been very friendly and helpful so far but they just can’t explain some of my questions. For example they told me that the throttle could be caused by buggy scripts or heavy MySQL errors – but from my observation, my site still get throttled on the day where no error was logged! Is the site throttled because HostMonster couldn’t handle the amount of traffics I’m getting? Why are my other sites (with bigger databases and a lot more web applications) are working perfectly with Hostgator and FatCow but things look so screwed up with HostMonster?

Sorry for the slow load time!

Apologizes if you experienced slow load time with my blog recently. Please bear with me for this – I’m trying as fast as I can to investigate the matter and come out with the right solution. I’ll keep things posted here.

Big thanks to Troy T. Hall

To Troy who wrote me long emails explaining the situation – million thanks! And, I wish things are working smoothly with your site right now.

How to check if your hosting account is throttled or not?

Login to your BlueHost or HostMonster cPanel account, scroll down to the ‘Log’ session and click the ‘CPU throttling’ icon (see figure).

Click in and you can check your site status from the popped up page.

Web host shopping can be a tedious job especially if you are doing it for the first time and don’t know what to look for.

To help you get started, here are ten things to look into when you are considering a web host.

1. Knowing your hosting needs

You can never get the right web host without knowing what you need.

What kind of website are you building? Do you need Windows application? Do you need an older (or newer) PHP version? Is RubyOnRails a must for your web apps? Do you need multiple databases for your website? Do you need cart software for your website? Are you planning to start a WordPress blog with your web host? How big (or small) can the web traffic volume go?

These are some of the basic questions to be answered. Have a plan with your website and try figure out what will happens next for the next 12 months.

Do yourself a favour – forget about top 10 hosting list and all the best hosting awards in this early stage. You need a web hosting that’s best for you;. What’s right for others might not be the best for you. Trust me; you don’t want to go with the best Linux hosting in the world when all you need is a Windows hosting that support ASP application.

The list of your hosting needs is your ultimate guide to your web host shopping (so make one now if you don’t have any).

2. User reviews

You should have a shortlist of reputable web host when you get step 1 done. Now it’s time to crunch in some user reviews. Go search for trustworthy reviews by real hosting users and read them as much as you can.

User review is important as it tells you the real picture behind the web host. There’s no need to freak out for one or two negative comments; but if you are seeing three full pages of Google results condemning a web host, then you know something is just not right.

3. Web server reliability

No one wants to host their website with a faulty web host. Go search for uptime record and experts’ comment on the shortlisted web hosts. There are various free services available online for this purpose and BestHostRating.com for example, runs a huge database of web host uptime record.

A quick view on some of the web host I’m currently tracking.

InMotion	Hostgator	FatCow
Bluehost	WebHostingPad	PowWeb

Click to visit web host’s official website (links open in a new window).

4. Future growth potential with the web host

I knew it’s hard to estimate but if you are planning big for your website, you better look for a web host that allow you to grow. By saying the word growth, I meant upgrading your web host – from shared hosting to VPS to dedicated server – more processing power, memory capacity, disk storage, and better security features.

For example, FatCow and Bluehost are two of my top rated hosting services; but I wouldn’t recommend them to you if you are planning to launch a gigantic e-commerce website.  This is because although these web hosts are great, they only provide shared hosting and you’ll need to switch host (which will cause quite some hassles, especially if you are running a huge database with heavy web traffics!) if you wish to upgrade to dedicated server in the future.

5. Technical support

I do think that the importance of the technical support department is often over-valued (as I don’t contact them that much personally). However to be safe, it’s always recommended to stick with web host providers that provide excellent technical support.

One good way to test the support is by asking technical; (but not presale) questions. Ask about inodes usage, SSH access, server technical specifications – just to test if the support staff is knowledgeable.

6. Pricing

Price is always an issue. Some want it cheap, some want it reasonable, and some don’t mind paying extra. The best thing to do is always go with a web host that is suitable for you and in the same time, affordable. Don’t go with cheap hosting just because it’s cheap. Sometimes cheap just isn’t the best (and good things don’t come cheap that often).

Web host charging more than others are sometimes doing it for a good reason – maybe it’s about their no-overselling policy, or higher server specs, or better customer services. Take InMotion Hosting for example, the hosting provider looks relative expensive when compare to other hosting services but they are offering premium class hosting with loads of advance features that you can’t get else where.

Anyway in case you are looking for the cheapest hosting, read this summary about cheap unlimited hosting services.

7. Commitment period

Do not be surprise to discover some web hosts force their customers to take up long period of commitment contract. Lunarpages, for example, changed their pricing structure recently and customers can only enjoy the low rates hosting by taking up a 5-year hosting plan.

So here’s another money issue besides pricing: Can you afford to pay long term hosting fees in advance? Would you be comfortable commit to a web host for long term? My suggestion to you is never signup web host with more than 2 years upfront unless they provide clear pro-rated refund policy after the trial period.

8. E-mail features

Most (but not all) web hosts support POP3 e-mail features along with auto responder, mail forwarding, and webmail access.

If any one of these features is important to your daily website operations, be very sure that your shortlisted hosting service has them.

9. Capacity for addon domain

Are you planning to host multiple domain names on a same hosting account? The smart way to host multiple websites is go with web host that allows unlimited addon domain – save you both money and time.

10. Backup policy

Last but not least, check with the web host’s backup policy before purchase. Not all web hosts provide daily backup services and even if they do, they might not keep the backup data for a long period. This is the time to test the technical support – ask about their backup policy (questions like how often they do backup, do they stop backup after your account goes more than certain inodes usage, what backupmethod they are using… etc).

I was first skeptical about their green policy (in fact, I acted sort of rude and asked for certification and proofs before publishing them in my list of Green Hosting). However truth is, the hosting company had just purchased over 2.3 million MW of renewable energy in March 2009 and websites hosted at Green Geeks are 300% clean powered

Sound interesting? Well then you gotta check out the man behind all these – Trey Gardner. Trey Gardner is no-stranger to most experienced webmaster as he had been working for over a decade with some of the big names in hostingindustry. His experience in web hosting and web development is valuable and I’m glad to see important people like Gardner is picking up their responsibility in protecting our environment.

Without any further delay, here’s my online interview with Trey Gardner of GreenGeeks and TigerSites.

Q&A with GreenGeeks CEO, Trey Gardner

Hello Trey, thanks for your time with us. To get things started, let’s go with the intro. What can we know more about ‘Trey Gardner’? Can you brief us more about your background in the industry?

Thank you for allowing me to introduce myself.

I have been in the web hosting business for over ten years and another 2 years in the web site design and online marketing business in addition to my years in web hosting*. I have held positions with a number of large web hosting companies including; General Manager, Director of Marketing, Reseller Program Director, Sales Director and Quality Assurance Director. I have built; reseller programs, quality assurance protocols, support teams, marketing initiatives, sales teams and I have held management positions in all but server administration areas within a web hosting company.

Some fun quick questions about yourself: Do you have a dog? Are you a PC, or MAC guy? IE or FireFox?

I do have a dog, a 115 pound chocolate lab named Guinness, I use a PC, I prefer Firefox over IE. I grew up in a beach town so I surf and play volleyball and I love to go skiing in the wintertime.

Okay, back to business. Both TigerSites and GreenGeeks are new names in the hosting industry. Can you tell us more about them?

Green Geeks was my vision a few years back, I had been working for another web hosting company and saw that the industry was just starting to move to become more eco friendly. I read some horrifying news about just how much of a carbon polluter our industry was and I wanted to make a difference. The web host I was the general manager of at the time saw this as a good marketing scheme but nothing more and they decided to do the minimal they could to become green so that they could come out as a “Green” web host.

At that time I was ready to branch off on my own and I decided to build my own web hosting company. I knew plenty of top talent in the industry and I wanted to really have the focus toward pushing our industry to become more eco friendly and Greener. I decided on the Brand Green Geeks.

After a year of fairly steady growth but still underachieving in some of the areas that I wanted to push into like our reseller program I partnered with an old colleague who owned the TigerSites brand. We formed a partnership earlier this year and it has been great. He and I balance our skill sets very well and the partnership has allowed us to push into the reseller area of web hosting as well as dedicated servers. We have more plans for additional offerings down the line as well.

What can we know about the web servers? Where does your data center located at?

Our datacenter is located in Chicago, IL and is one of the Greenest data facilities in North America. This state of the art facility is equipped with raised floors, climate control, fire suppression systems, 24/7 security, UPS & generators and water detection systems, to ensure that our customers data is safe and secure.

We buy state of the art high quality fuel efficient Intel Quad core processors with RAID 10 storage arrays, 4 GB DDR2/DDR3 Memory and 100Mpbs connection to the Switches. Multi-gig connectivity to our network’s edge routers. Unlike some other web hosts we also do not overload customers onto our servers, we like things to run efficiently here and my past experiences has shown me when you overload your servers bad things happen, like multiple downtimes. We make sure that our environment is living up to our 99.9% uptime.

You are doing a great job at GreenGeeks and I don’t see any green hosting companies come close in term of “Green Factor”*. How do you achieve that? Does the green policy damage the company’s balance sheet?

When I decided to start out on my own I knew it would not be enough to be part of a pack of emerging eco friendly web hosts, I wanted to be the best (I am competitive by nature) and to be the best you have to lead and let others follow.

I hoped others would follow in fact as I state on my mission statement that by being the most eco friendly web host and by aggressive marketing we hoped more companies would take notice and decide to go green for themselves.

As far as our Green policy affecting our balance sheets – it does, it is an added expense that we are deciding to add to our balance sheet but we believe it is necessary and we’re willing to take a little less per customer in order to better our industry and our environment.

* Note: GreenGeeks replace 3x of every power consumed with wind power.

Although TigerSites and GreenGeeks are new, I read quite some good words about your customer services. What kind of supports should we expect from the companies?

Support here at Green Geeks and TigerSites is fundamental to our business. If we cannot support our clients they will go elsewhere as I have seen in other web hosting companies. I wanted to make sure that we had the best support available. Having terrific support depends on 3 factors, reliability, communication and the right employees.

We purchase quality hardware and software at a world class facility and we don’t cut corners anywhere for the most reliable web hosting service we can create. We have made sure to have multiple communication lines for support which includes our emails, phones and chats as well as our extensive knowledgebase. We hire only highly skilled and friendly support personnel and we extensively train those support personnel on all areas of our service and make sure that they are all available through the multiple lines of communication.

Shared hosting plans nowadays are like dedicated hosting plans back in year 2000 – in fact, there are more and more companies offering unlimited hosting services. This includes TigerSites and GreenGeeks. Should your customers be concerned with overselling?

The industry went to unlimited plans about 3 years ago and I saw that as a mistake then but it is no longer overselling. The reality is that technology and servers nowadays are so far superior to where they were just a few years ago that they can handle the unlimited aspects of these offerings. Like all the other unlimited hosts we stipulate that this is for web site files only for the disk space and not file storage. The largest web sites might use a Gig or two of space for site files and most are well below that and with the limits we place on the amount of customers we place on a server it has never been a problem.

In respects to bandwidth, bandwidth has become so cheap we do not really have to look at that as a problem with regards to the unlimited offerings we have.

Your experience in the hosting industry is valuable. In your opinion, what are the important elements to look for when shopping for a web host?

I would say that the most important aspect that consumers can look for are webmasters and real users’ reviews, like the ones found on your site. You have to be confident in your web host. This is not a Coke vs Pepsi decision, in many cases this is a Coke vs Dish Water decision. If you see massive amounts of bad reviews about downtime and lousy support think to your self how much it would cost you to just have a little downtime with your hosting service and do your due diligence to try to find the best web host for you. Features are always important but it is the reliability and customer support which is going to keep you at the host you choose or force you to make a move elsewhere.

What’re your future plans with TigerSites and GreenGeeks? Where do you see them in 3 to 5 years time? Any chances for us to see VPS or dedicated hosting plans at any one of the company?

Actually we have already added dedicated servers this Summer, the pages announcing them will be going live on our sites in a week or so and we believe we have a great competitive offer in dedicated servers. In 3-5 years time we’ll still be here and we hope that by that time we will be even better known across the web hosting industry. This is a long term business plan for myself and all of here at the company and we look to even greater successes in the future.

That will be all for my questions, thanks again for your time! Is there anything you would like to add?

Yes, first thank you for allowing us the opportunity to better introduce ourselves, our company and our mission. I have a personal plea for all of those folks out there who are environmentally conscious as we are and that is the same thing that we state on our web site, if you decide to not choose Green Geeks or TigerSites for your web hosting (both are 300% Green) then please choose some other certified environmentally friendly web host.

Thank you and peace be with you!
Trey Gardner, CEO of GreenGeeks/TigerSites

Interviewer’s sidenote: What I think about GreenGeeks?

Given the fact that web hosting industry is producing more than 630kg of CO2 annually and growing to be as polluting as airline industry, isn’t time for us to rethink about our options in web hosting? Instead of picking up the cheapest or the one with most features, shouldn’t we consider the ‘green-est’ web hosting as well?

I still yet to run a through check on GreenGeeks hosting services but I’m extremely happy with their way of doing business so far – how the company execute their green policy, how their staff (TJ Williams especially) responded efficiently to my requests, and how the CEO response to my questions… everything is nothing but smooth and pleasure. If you care a lot about our environment and are looking for the right green hosting – GreenGeeks is a must-see. Learn more about the green hosting company at my GreenGeeks review; or, visit GreenGeeks online by clicking here (open in new window).

“Cheap web hosting, $1.99/mo for unlimited hosting!”

“$3.95/mo – Get unlimited hosting plus free domain for life!”

But hey, don’t get hooked instantly! Even if these cheap hosts guarantee 99.99% uptime, there’s still one thing that you need to look at before purchasing – the commitment period.

Believe me, when you look in-depth, most cheap hosting deals are not as good as they look like on the first sight. Example: Lunarpages hosting plan cost $4.95/mo but patrons need to pay 60 months in advance; JustHost, on the other hand, charge $5.95/mo (which is a little higher) but you can subscribe on year-on-year basis.

Assuming both hosting plans has the same features and performances, which hosting plan should you go with? The answer is the latter.

When cheap isn’t the best

“But why? Lunarpages is cheaper – isn’t the cheaper the better? ” I heard some mumbling.

Even if you are extremely happy with the hosting company, placing your money 5 years upfront in such a fast moving business sounds pretty foolish to me. What if their hosting services turn bad in year 3? What if the company run out of money and went bankruptcy in year 3? There is no way you can turn back time and get your hard-earned money back with a 60-month commitment period.

Moreover, you are actually paying $297 (cash!) in bulk for the “cheap deal”. Financially speaking, this isn’t very wise – you would have make good use of that cash and spend it on better place (for example, in your web marketing plan).

Moral of the story, remember to check on the subscription period when you wish to get some really cheap hosting deals. Cheap hosting offers with extremely long subscription period are not good bargains.

Compare web hosting price and commitment period

For easy reference, compare sharedhosting prices and subscription periods in table below.

*Note: Click in each link to visit web host’s official website (links open in a new window).

I’m sure InMotion is no stranger to most of you guys. The company had been in the business for nearly a decade and they are still going very strong at this time of writing. In fact, InMotion received multiple hosting awards for many consecutive years and they are one of the very few (if not the only) business hosting that allows user to choose their server location!

How did InMotion remain their high service standard for years? How did InMotion thrive in hosting business for so long; while many other web hosts faded and went out of the business? Is InMotion hosting right for you? How can InMotion’s advance hosting features help in your web business? Learn all the answers first hand in my Q & A session with the company’s Executive Vice President, Sunil Saxena.

Interview with Sunil Saxena of InMotion Hosting

InMotion Hosting has been in the business for nearly 10 years. Can you please enlighten us how InMotion Hosting started and how it grew to what it is today.

InMotion Hosting was started in 2001. In our early years, we were a small hosting company that had limited resources and personnel. Our attention to customer satisfaction has allowed us to grown consistently over the past years. We have invested time and money to make sure that our technical support and reliability goes above and beyond for our customers. We feel that it is an ongoing goal to prove we have a customer experience better than our competitors.

InMotion hosting won series of “Best Business Hosting” Awards for years. What sets you apart from the competition in this market?

We are honored to be considered the best business host.

We are very fortunate to have established this reputation and make sure we do everything we can to uphold it. As business owners we know there are critical things that are needed to operate which include lightning fast email, SPAM filtration, excellent website uptime and competitive merchant account rates.

To make sure we are able to provide these services we run off of high end Dell 2950 severs, blending multiple bandwidth providers and having redundancy for all of our hosting accounts. Additionally, we also provide great scalability as well.

As we speak about business hosting, appreciate if you can provide more info to our business hosting shoppers. What is the most important element to look for as a business owner when searching for a web host, and why?

The most important element to look for when searching for a business host is the accessibility to qualified technicians. There are always going to be issues in running a business and as business owners, time is money. Our support staff is trained to answer customer questions quickly and effective, and when possible, to answer any anticipated follow up questions as well.

Please share more about the company’s data centers.

Our data centers are located on the East and West Coast of the United States giving our clients the choice of which data center they want to utilize. Data center locations reduce the delay time it takes for servers to communicate with each other and the outside world. By offering a data center in Los Angeles and in Washington D.C. we are able to keep data in a closer proximity to users, allowing them faster access and flexibility.

Further on the questions about data centers, can you please tell us more about InMotion’s Exclusive Max Speed Zones?

Virtually all of our competitors utilize a single data center. This means your website and email could be 3,000 miles or more away from you. With InMotion Hosting we offer multiple data center locations. If you are within our Exclusive Max Speed Zones, your email and website can run up to 6x faster.

*Note: InMotion’s Max Speed Zone options available to VPS and Business Class hosting clients only.

Let’s talk about customer support, what kind of support should InMotion customers expect? How many staffs do you have in the customer support department?

We are committed to have all of our support based in the United States.

Although we could recognize a cost savings by moving staff offshore, we feel that the intangible value of having a U.S. Based support team is unmatched. Currently we have over 50 employees in our offices in Virginia Beach, VA and Marina del Rey, CA.

Some of your customers are unhappy with the needs of phone verification on new hosting account registration. How would you response to such complaints?

Unfortunately, in our industry there is a high amount of fraud and identity theft that takes place on a daily basis. Although it may be burdensome for some to verfiy their account over the phone, it is in the customer’s best interest for security that we do this. Additionally, it gives us a chance to introduce ourselves and answer any questions that our new customer might have.

The company offers professional website designs besides web hosting; can you tell us more about the service?

We offer web site design targeted at the small to mid-size business who are looking for a professional design without having to incur a very high price tag. Additionally, we also offer basic search engine optimization and monthly web site updates in the price.

Where will InMotion be in the next 5 years?

Our goals are really very simple. Provide the best possible experience for our customers through top notch service, unparalleled uptime and software that makes lives easier for the business. In the future, we feel that this market will remain very competitive and there will be some market consolidation. Time in and time out, we have seen big business fall short at providing proper service to the web hosting customer. We feel that our blend of technical expertise along with attention to customer care will allow us to succeed in this industry.

Thank you for your time with us. Is there anything you wish to add for this interview?

We appreciate the opportunity you have given us to allow your customers to learn a little bit more about us.

Keynotes from Sunil Saxena

Important points from this interview:

• InMotion is operating from multiple datacenters – this  keep data in a closer proximity to users, allowing them faster access and flexibility.
• A qualified technicians is extremely important to a business website.
• InMotion are committed to have all of our support (staffs) based in the United States.

My personal comment on InMotion

I have to confess that I’m one of the happy InMotion’s users and I’m especially satisfied with the company’s customer support department.

I recently started a website at InMotion and was having some minor problem with the initial setup (something to do with the URL I assigned wrongly to my account). It was suppose to my mistake and I contacted InMotion support center, hoping that they can point out a solution to the problem. And, not only that they answered my questions, the support staffs also fixed my faulty setup without my request, in just 30 minutes time.

It made me “WOW! These guys are really good!” – and I recommend them to all shoppers who are searching for a web host with topnotch customer supports.

Click here to read further on my personal InMotion review.

A confession: I am a big fan of WordPress. I strongly believe WordPress is the best (and most popular) CMS/blogging platform for any beginners who wish to start a new website. And, except for the old websites I started since year 2002; I run all my websites in WordPress nowadays.

“How do I start a website?” – This is the most common question I get from my friends and relatives. Back in old times, in order to answer the question, I need to explain about HTML, FTP, database,  WYSISYG software like Dreamweaver, and so on.

Not now anymore.

Want to start a website? “Go with WordPress.” – That’s my standard short-and-sweet answer for all. 

This long article is meant for newbies who wish to start a new WordPress site or blog. In case you hate to read long articles from your computer screen, I prepared a printer-ready pdf version for this guide and you can download it here: Guide to your first WordPress website.

WordPress Explained

First thing first, what is WordPress? As described in developer’s own words:

“WordPress is publishing software with a focus on ease of use, speed and a great user experience. WordPress is blessed with an active community, which is the heart of open source software.”

“WordPress is a powerful personal publishing platform, and it comes with a great set of features designed to make your experience as a publisher on the Internet as easy, pleasant and appealing as possible. We are proud to offer you a freely distributed, standards-compliant, fast, light and free personal publishing platform, with sensible default settings and features, and an extremely customizable core. ”

In layman term, WordPress is an open-source web application that provides a convenient way to create, publish, and manage contents online. WordPress was mainly used as a blogging platform at first but as the software revolt; it is widely used in building and maintaining websites.

If you are into history, read About WordPress.

Benefits of WordPress

WordPress is free, easy-to-use, features rich, SEO friendly, and most importantly, WordPress is widely supported. The system itself is supported by a huge group of talented volunteers; and there are hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of developers and web designers working 24/7 on WordPress plugins and templates.

I wrote a brief article about why WordPress is recommended but I don’t think it’s necessary for you to dig out the old stuffs.

What’s about WordPress template and plugin?

A WordPress template is the design codes (in css and php files) that decide the outlook of your website/blog; while WordPress plugins are functional codes that provide extra functions to your website/blog.

I’ll go into details for each of these at below.

WordPress.org vs WordPress.com

People always confused with WordPress.org and WordPress.com. WordPress.org is all about the software (where you can find supports, documentations and download links on the software); WordPress.com on the other hand, is where you can host a free blog online using the WordPress software. Blogs hosted on WordPress.com will have long URLs like http://www.myblog.wordpress.com – just like what you get from Blogspot.com.

WordPress Templates Explained

The beauty of WordPress is that the design of your blog/website is ‘seperated’ from the backend system.

The appearance of your WordPress blog/website is controlled by a series of files named template or theme. You can modify your blog/website designs easily by editing your files in the template folders (without touching the backend system). Once you get the stylesheets and template files configured, the design will be reflected thru out your blog/website and there’s no need to edit the designs on page-by-page basis.

Do I need to create WordPress templates myself?

Yes if you want to; but it’s not a must. As a matter of fact, most WordPress bloggers do not create their own blog/website templates. There are plenty of templates available (for free or for an affordable price) online. If this is your first WordPress blog, I would suggest you start by using templates built by others.

Where can I get those beautiful WordPress templates?

A simple search on Google should get you infinite WordPress templates. Alternatively, you can find beautiful templates from WordPress themes gallery sites as well as related blogs.
Some links to get you started:

Official WordPress Website

• Themes Directory 

Related Blogpost

• 25 beautiful WP themes in blogs, gallery, and magazine styles
• 100 excellent free high quality WordPress themes

WordPress Themes Galleries

• WP Themes 360
• Top WP Themes
• WP Theme Designer

Paid Themes Sites

• Elegant Themes

WordPress Plugins Explained

A WordPress plugin is like an extension on the basic system. Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine –polls, dynamic listing on related articles, on-site rating systems, images gallery, SEO features, auto-generate XML sitemap… etc.

Similar to WordPress template, you don’t have to create your own plugins. Benefit of WordPress – there are plenty of volunteers developing plugins and sharing the codes for free. There are almost infinite number of plugins available online that you can get just about any tasks done with these existing plugins.

More info? Visit plugin directory at WordPress official website.

Setting up your first WordPress site

You should be able to install WordPress in most hosting providers and personal computers on Unix/Linux system. The latest WordPress version requires PHP Version 4.3 or greater and MySQL Version 4.0 or greater.

Details of server requirements and recommended setup can be found here but I think 99.99% users should be fine without reading the specifications.

Installing WordPress on local computer

Before installing WordPress, you need a mini-server installed in your computer – something like WAMP should be good enough. When you are done with WAMP (or whatever system you are using on your computer), go download WordPress installation file and follow the ‘Famous 5-Minute Install’ guides.

Quoting from WordPress official website (http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress)

1. Download and unzip the WordPress package, if you haven’t already.
2. Create a database for WordPress on your web server, as well as a MySQL user who has all privileges for accessing and modifying it.
3. Rename the wp-config-sample.php file to wp-config.php.
4. Open wp-config.php in your favorite text editor and fill in your database details as explained in Editing wp-config.php to generate and use your secret key password.
5. Place the WordPress files in the desired location on your web server:
   – If you want to integrate WordPress into the root of your domain (e.g. http://example.com/), move or upload all contents of the unzipped WordPress directory (but excluding the directory itself) into the root directory of your web server.
   – If you want to have your WordPress installation in its own subdirectory on your web site (e.g. http://example.com/blog/), rename the directory wordpress to the name you’d like the subdirectory to have and move or upload it to your web server. For example if you want the WordPress installation in a subdirectory called "blog", you should rename the directory called "wordpress" to "blog" and upload it to the root directory of your web server.
6. Run the WordPress installation script by accessing wp-admin/install.php in your favorite web browser.
   – If you installed WordPress in the root directory, you should visit: http://example.com/wp-admin/install.php
   – If you installed WordPress in its own subdirectory called blog, for example, you should visit: http://example.com/blog/wp-admin/install.php

Installing WordPress on web host

If you are planning to run a WordPress website from the beginning, look for a web host that can auto-install WordPress for you. There are plenty (and I really mean P-L-E-N-T-Y) of good web host that supports such easy installation features – why sweat for all the hassles to install WordPress manually?

Listed below are some well-known web host that provides auto-installation features via Fantastico, SimpleScripts, or in house program.

Web Hosting Services	SimpleScripts	Fantastico	In House Program
Fat Cow
Hostgator
InMotion
BlueHost
LunarPages
Web Hosting Pad
HostMonster
Pow Web

: Recommended web host.

Example: Installing WordPress using SimpleScripts

Installing WordPress (or any other web applications) using auto-install features like Fantastico and SimpleScripts is easy. I’ll show a screen-to-screen example here.

Login to your Hostmonster account and go to SimpleScripts main page. Click ‘WordPress’ to proceed on the installation.

The WordPress installation page covers a brief intro on the web applications and reveals the latest version supported by the web host. In this case, the supported version is WordPress v2.8.b.2, which is released in late May 2009. Click ‘Install Now’ to begin setup.

On next screen, you’ll be required to input all the necessary information. What’s your desired WordPress version? What’s your desired site name and preferred tag lines? Do you need additional admin login? Click ‘Complete’ once everything is set and the auto-installation process will begins.

(Yes, after this everything will just goes auto pilot!)

And there you go, a fresh copy of WordPress installed in my Hostmonster account. Note that installation screen might be a little different for different web host (some use Fantastico, some use in house program) but the process is basically the same.
Upon completion, you will be given an URL to login to your WordPress administrator page. In most of the time, it looks something like this: http://www.exampleblog.com/wp-admin.

Go to this URL and login with your preset details – there, you are now in the backend of your WordPress site.

Getting started with WordPress

Here’s how WordPress dashboard looks like. Pretty cool isn’t?

Publishing a post or page is simple. Click on post, add new, and you’ll come to the post page. Write what you want to write for the content and title, select or create the category for the article, click publish to (well) publish, and click save draft if you wish to pause and continue your writing in future. Everything is common sense in WordPress – if you can use a Microsoft Words, I don’t see how you can have problem with WordPress. The basic features of WordPress are all included in the control panel sidebar.

See figure below, here are all the features you can work on your WordPress.

Wrapping things up: More WordPress related Resources

This is a pretty long post and gosh~ I can’t believe that I have already spent more than 6 hours in crafting this post. I hope this article helps and of course, there are a lot more to be learned. To wrap up this guide, here’s the list of further reading materials.

• WordPress official lessons
• WordPress template tags
• WordPress designs and layouts
• Getting-started guides for WordPress.com
• How to perform a manual WordPress installation
• WordPress beginner Guides and list of useful plugins
• Getting started with WordPress
• Using WordPress to manage your web content
• WordPress tutorials
• How to start/setup your own blog using WordPress
• Use WordPress as a CMS (with loads of handy plugins recommendation)
• How to use WordPress as a truly customized CMS
• 23 must see free blogging platform
• 43 ways to make your blog stands out from the rest
• 48 creative ways to use WordPress

Have fun and good luck!

A few words on choosing a cheap web host

It isn’t easy to pick up a reliable cheap web host – especially cheap web host that offers unlimited hosting.

In most of the time, cheap is related to ‘bad’ or ‘not-so-good’. A bad host will causes problems from all angles – slow website response rate, unstable server, bad neighbourhood, blacklisted IP… which I’m sure you don’t want to be any part of this.

Also, you should understand that unlimited web hosting is impossible in a real world with limited resources.

"Unlimited" is only possible because the web host are monitoring their web servers efficiently and avoid any significant shortage in hosting capacity.

It’s okay to go with a cheap web host, it’s okay to go with a web host that provides unlimited hosting; BUT you must make sure that you are dealing with a responsible host providers who care about their customer and you learn how to protect yourself from a bad host that tends to screw things up.

Checklist guides for cheap hosting shopping

A few questions to ask when you’re sorting out your options in cheap hosting:

• Does the hosting deal comes with reasonable refund policy and trial period? (You’ll need at least 30 days.)
• Do you like how the support department handles your questions? (Contact them before you purchase.)
• How is the web host server uptime record? (Anything below 99% is unacceptable.)
• How many MySQL databases does the web host offer? (Unlimited storage/bandwidth with 5 MySQL database limit is pointless.)
• Is there a cheaper host that’s as good as the one you are checking on? (In case you want to minimize your spendings.)
• Does the web host have strict policy against spams? (To avoid sharing the same host with bad neighbours.)

Cheap Host Recommendation

Personally, I like WebHostingPad (http://www.webhostingpad.com) and FatCow (http://www.fatcow.com) the best.

WebHostingPad is extermely cheap, their server uptime record is respectable, and the response rate in their customer support is acceptable. As for FatCow – it shouldn’t be in the cheap host category in normal situation (as they are charging $7.83/mo); however, I’m getting a special offer from the merchant (where my readers get 35-45% discount, thus cost $4.83/mo) – so yeah, FatCow is cheap and they are very much recommended!