What is Cloud Hosting?

What is cloud hosting in reality? The term 'cloud' seems to be very modish in today's IT, Internet and hosting parlance. Yet, just a few in fact are aware of what cloud hosting is. Perhaps it is a good idea to inform yourself about cloud hosting services. To render a quite long tale short, we will firstly notify you about what cloud hosting is not.

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

1. Furnishing a remote file storage service, which involves one single disk storage tool for all users, does not convert any particular hosting firm into an authentic cloud hosting distributor.

The cPanel hosting vendors call the ability to supply remote disk storage solutions a cloud hosting solution. Up until now there is nothing wrong with the cloud designation, but... we are discussing web hosting services, not remote file storage solutions for personal or corporate needs. There's invariably one "but", isn't there? It's not enough to call a shared web hosting solution, based on a single-server hosting environment, precisely like cPanel, a "cloud hosting" service. That's because the other parts of the whole web hosting platform must be functioning in exactly the same manner - this does not apply solely to the remote disk storage. The rest of the services entailed in the entire hosting process also must be remote, separated and "clouded". And that's extremely hard. Very few web hosting distributors can actually do it.

2. It Includes Domain Names, Email Mailboxes, Databases, File Transfer Protocols, CPs, etc.

Cloud hosting is not limited to a remote disk storage only. We are discussing a hosting service, serving a lot of domain names, web pages, e-mailboxes, etc., aren't we?

To dub a hosting service a "cloud hosting" one calls for a lot more than offering just remote disk storage mounts (or perchance physical servers). The mail server(s) need to be dedicated exclusively to the mail related services. Carrying out nothing else than these given procedures. There might be just one single or probably a whole bundle of email servers, depending on the overall server load created. To have an actual cloud hosting solution, the remote database servers should be functioning as one, regardless of their actual quantity. Performing nothing else. The same goes for the users' web hosting Control Panels, the FTP, etc.

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

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

Here's an illustration of a Domain Name Server of a real cloud hosting distributor:

dns1.burningrocks.com

dns2.burningrocks.com

If such a Domain Name Server is furnished 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 sure when you discern a Domain Name Server such as the one beneath:

dns658.hostgator.com

dns659.hostgator.com

that there isn't any cloud web hosting service. This kind of DNS only demonstrates that the 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 ninety eight percent. In cPanel's case, one single physical server deals with all web hosting services (web, email, DNS, databases, FTP, hosting Control Panel(s), website files, and so on).

Remote File Storage - The Perverted Description of Cloud Hosting.

So, a cloud hosting service is not limited solely to a remote file storage solution, as multiple hosting suppliers wish it was. Unfortunately for them, if that was the case, most of the file web hosting companies would have been classified as cloud hosting ones a long time back! They are not classified as such, because they simply furnish file web hosting solutions, not cloud hosting solutions. The file web hosting platform appears indeed quite plain, in comparison with the web hosting platform. The remote disk storage platform is not a cloud web hosting platform. It cannot be, because it's only one small part of the entire cloud web hosting platform. There's plenty more to be found in the cloud hosting platform: the web hosting Control Panel cloud, the database clouds (MySQL, PostgreSQL), the Domain Name Server cloud, the FTP cloud, the mail cloud and... in the upcoming future, possibly a bunch of brand new clouds we presently are not familiar with will come up out of the blue.