What Actually is Cloud Web Hosting?

What is cloud hosting really? The word 'cloud' appears to be quite modish in today's computing, Internet and hosting lingo. Still, just a few really are aware of what cloud hosting is. Perhaps it is a good idea to inform yourself about cloud hosting services. To render a very lengthy story short, we will firstly reveal to you what cloud hosting is not.

1. Cloud Hosting is Not Restricted to a Remote Data Storage Solely.

1. Supplying a remote file storage service, which comprises one file storage tool for all customers, does not convert any specific hosting provider into an authentic cloud hosting supplier.

The cPanel hosting firms name the ability to offer remote disk storage services a cloud hosting service. Up till now there is nothing wrong with the cloud terminology, but... we are discussing hosting services, not remote data storage solutions for personal or corporate needs. There's always one "but", isn't there? It's not sufficient to name a shared hosting service, based on a single-server hosting platform, precisely like cPanel, a "cloud hosting" service. That's because the other components of the whole web hosting platform must be operating in precisely the same way - this does not refer only to the remote file storage. The other services entailed in the whole web hosting process also must be remote, isolated and "clouded". And that's very difficult. A very scanty number of web hosting corporations can truly achieve it.

2. It Includes Domain Names, Electronic Mail Aliases, Databases, FTPs, Control Panels, and so on.

Cloud hosting is not confined to a remote data storage only. We are talking about a hosting service, serving countless domain names, web pages, email addresses, and so on, are we not?

To dub a hosting service a "cloud hosting" one requires a lot more than delivering only remote file storage mounts (or possibly physical servers). The e-mail server(s) have to be dedicated only to the email associated services. Carrying out nothing different than these particular tasks. There might be just one single or perhaps an entire array of mail servers, depending on the total server load produced. To have a true cloud hosting solution, the remote database servers should be performing as one, irrespective of their real number. Executing nothing else. The same is valid for the clients' web hosting Control Panels, the File Transfer Protocol, etc.

3. There are Cloud Domain Servers (DNSs) as well.

The DNSs (Domain Name Servers) of an actual cloud hosting plans provider will support multiple server farm sites on multiple continents.

Here's an illustration of a Domain Name Server of an authentic cloud hosting accounts provider:

dns1.advantagehostingsolutions.com

dns2.advantagehostingsolutions.com

If such a Domain Name Server is supplied by your web hosting company, it's not a guarantee that there is a cloud web hosting environment in use, but you can absolutely be convinced when you observe a Domain Name Server like the one underneath:

dns658.hostgator.com

dns659.hostgator.com

that there isn't any cloud web hosting platform. This kind of Domain Name Server merely illustrates that the web hosting environment in use is one-server based. Perhaps it's cPanel. cPanel is a one-server web hosting platform and holds a market share of more than 98%. In cPanel's case, a single physical machine is responsible for all hosting services (web, electronic mail, DNS, databases, File Transfer Protocol, hosting Control Panel(s), web site files, and so on).

Remote File Storage - The Warped Definition of Cloud Hosting.

So, a cloud hosting service is not limited exclusively to a remote disk storage service, as a lot of web hosting service providers wish it was. Sadly for them, if that was the case, the majority of the file service providers would have been classified as cloud web hosting ones long ago! They are not referred to as such, because they plainly provide file hosting services, not cloud hosting solutions. The file hosting platform looks indeed very simple, when compared to the web hosting platform. The remote disk storage platform is not a cloud hosting platform. It cannot be, as it's just one simple fragment of the entire cloud hosting platform. There's a lot more to be discovered in the cloud hosting platform: the hosting Control Panel cloud, the database clouds (MySQL, PostgreSQL), the DNS cloud, the File Transfer Protocol cloud, the mail cloud and... in the upcoming future, perchance several brand new clouds we presently don't know about will show up unexpectedly.