Cloud Hosting Uncovered

What is cloud hosting in reality? The term 'cloud' seems to be quite trendy in today's IT, Internet and web hosting parlance. Even so, just a select few actually know what cloud hosting is. Possibly it is a sensible idea to educate yourself about cloud hosting services. To make a very long tale concise, we will firstly describe to you what cloud hosting is not.

1. Cloud Hosting is Not Confined to a Remote Data Storage Exclusively.

1. Offering a remote data storage service, which comprises one file storage tool for all users, does not convert any specific web hosting distributor into an actual cloud hosting services provider.

The cPanel web hosting firms call the ability to distribute remote file storage solutions a cloud hosting solution. Up to now there is nothing bad about the cloud classification, but... we are talking about hosting solutions, not remote file storage solutions for private or business purposes. There's constantly one "but", isn't there? It's not enough to dub a shared web hosting solution, powered by a single-server web hosting environment, just like cPanel, a "cloud hosting" solution. That's because the other pieces of the entire hosting platform must be functioning in exactly the same manner - this does not relate only to the remote data storage. The other services entailed in the whole hosting procedure also must be remote, separated and "clouded". And that's very difficult. Very few hosting providers can actually do it.

2. It Involves Domain Names, E-mail Aliases, Databases, FTPs, Hosting CPs, etc.

Cloud hosting is not restricted to a remote disk storage only. We are talking about a web hosting solution, serving a lot of domains, web pages, electronic mail accounts, and so on, are we not?

To call a web hosting service a "cloud hosting" one needs a lot more than offering merely remote file storage mounts (or probably servers). The email server(s) need to be devoted solely to the electronic mail connected services. Doing nothing different than these given procedures. There might be only one or perhaps a whole bunch of email servers, depending on the overall load generated. To have a true cloud hosting service, the remote database servers should be operating as one, regardless of their real amount. Carrying out nothing else. The same is valid for the clients' web hosting Control Panels, the File Transfer Protocol, and so on.

3. There are Cloud Domain Servers (DNSs) too.

The DNSs (Domain Name Servers) of a true cloud hosting corporation will support numerous server farm locations on different continents.

Here's an example of a Domain Name Server of a real cloud hosting services provider:

dns1.www.liontivo.com

dns2.www.liontivo.com

If such a Domain Name Server is supplied by your hosting provider, it's not a sure thing that there is a cloud web hosting platform in use, but you can definitely be convinced when you see a Domain Name Server like the one below:

dns658.hostgator.com

dns659.hostgator.com

that there isn't any cloud web hosting platform. This kind of DNS merely indicates that the hosting platform in use is one-single-server based. Perhaps it's cPanel. cPanel is a one-single-server web hosting solution and has a market share of more than 98 percent. In cPanel's case, a single server deals with all hosting services (web, email, DNS, databases, FTP, Control Panel(s), website files, etc.).

Remote File Storage - The Perverted Explanation of Cloud Hosting.

So, a cloud hosting service is not restricted solely to a remote disk storage service, as many hosting companies wish it was. Sadly for them, if that was the case, most of the file web hosting suppliers would have been categorized as cloud hosting ones a long time back! They are not classified as such, since they simply offer file web hosting services, not cloud hosting solutions. The file web hosting platform appears indeed quite plain, in comparison with the web hosting platform. The remote data storage platform is not a cloud web hosting platform. It cannot be, since it's just one small fraction of the whole cloud hosting platform. There's a lot more to be encountered in the cloud hosting platform: the Control Panel cloud, the database clouds (MySQL, PostgreSQL), the DNS cloud, the FTP cloud, the email cloud and... in the upcoming future, perchance a number of new clouds we presently are not aware of will spring up out of nowhere.