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FTP (File Transfer Protocol) is the method that computers of all kinds use to send and receive files over the Internet. It was developed to enable a number of important functions by computer users, including the sharing of data and its transfer between and among computers, including web servers that host personal or business domains. It provides a standardized platform and procedure for storing files on different \\\"hosts\\\" and allows simple offsite backups, too.

Before you can talk about differences between clustering and load balancing, and there are more than a few, you’ve got to get the definitions straight. Clustering is often understood to mean the capability of some software to provide load balancing services, and load balancing is often used as a synonym for a hardware- or third-party-software-based solution.
In practice, clustering is usually used with application servers like IBM WebSphere, BEA WebLogic and Oracle AS (10g). Also being used in that environment are load balancing features found in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) like BIG-IP. (For simplicity, we will talk about clustering versus ADC approaches.)

Scalability, horizontally speaking
There are hardware load balancers, of course, but there we talk about pools or farms, the server groupings where application requests get distributed. It is in the software world that the term cluster is applied to that same group.

Clustering will typically convert one instance of an application server to a master controller, then process/distribute requests to multiple instances using such industry standard algorithms as round robin, weighted round robin or least connections. Clustering is similar to load balancing in that it has horizontal scalability, a nearly transparent way to add additional instances of application servers for increased capacity or response time performance. To ensure that an instance is actually available, clustering approaches typically use an ICMP ping check or, sometimes, HTTP or TCP connection checks.

Health and transparency
For load balancing, ADCs support the same industry algorithms, but have additional, complex number-crunching processes, and check such parameters as per-server CPU and memory utilization, fastest response times, etc. ADCs also support more robust health monitoring than the simple app server clustering solutions. This means they can verify content and do passive monitoring, dispensing with even the low impact of health checks on app server instances.

For applications that require the user to interact with the same server during a session, clustering uses server affinity to get the user there. This is most common during the execution of a process like order entry, where the session is used between pages (requests) to store data needed to close a transaction, like a shopping cart.

For the same situation, ADCs use persistence. Clustering solutions are usually somewhat limited as to the variables they can use, while ADCs can not only use traditional application variables but also get other information from the application or network-based data.

More than a few clustering solutions need node-agents deployed on each instance of an application server that is clustered by a controller. It may not be a burden as far as deploying and managing it, since it is often in place, but it is still means more processes running on the servers and consuming memory and CPU resources. Of course, it also adds another possible failure point to the data path. Since ADCs need no server-side components, they remain completely transparent.

Making the choice
Some would ask, Why do the extra work of building a distributed software system and cluster server setup when you can have multiple servers fulfilling specific roles such as separate database servers, web servers, mail servers, etc. whenever necessary?

So, how do you choose? That depends on the reasons you are considering this kind of solution in the first place, and (perhaps) whether or not you have to make an additional purchase to achieve clustering capabilities for the particular application server you have. There is also the broader question of whether or not you need (or want) to provide support for multiple application server brands. Clustering, of course, is proprietary to the application server, but ADCs can provide services for any and all applications or web servers.

Clustering checklist

Pros:
*Typically available with application server’s enterprise package
*Doesn\\\\\\\'t require the highest level of networking know-how
*Usually less costly than redundant ADC deployments

Cons:
*High availability not assured with clustering solutions
*Best practices deploy the cluster controller on separate hardware
*Node agents required on managed app server instances
*Clustering is \\\\\\\"proprietary\\\\\\\" (you can cluster only homogeneous servers)

ADC checklist

Pros:
*Provides high availability and load balancing in heterogeneous environments
*Added value of application optimization, security and acceleration
*No changes required to applications or servers where they’re deployed

Cons:
*An additional piece of infrastructure in the architecture
*Generally more costly than clustering solutions
*Could require new skill set to deploy/manage

Recommendations
Get more insight into performance, configurations and case studies by reading some testing-based articles on ADCs, and testing-based reviews of server clustering. Look for case studies that mirror your own situation, as closely as possible, and talk to people who are doing what you are planning (or thinking about). Unlike government going into the car business or taking over health care, do not do something quickly just to be seen doing something. Take care with this decision.

There are several key elements you must take care of before you can go into business as a web hosting reseller and expect to survive and prosper. In this article, we will touch on five basic steps that are required for reselling accounts that are provided by a web hosting firm. Although success for any business is based on the quality of products services, and the perseverance and diligence of owners and employees, you don\\\'t have to reinvent the wheel. And just because it is easy to list or understand these steps doesn\\\'t mean they will be easy to do well or easy to keep going.

While you are attending to these five steps, there are plenty of other things that need to be done, too. You should have a business plan, of course, and know where your operating funds are coming from until such time as your business is self-supporting. This means you will have to guess at some things until you have enough real-world experience to fill in the blanks. Follow those who have gone before you, and make use of their experience, especially in regards to what you should not do and what are must-dos.

1. Your name - The first step in a successful host reseller venture is getting a domain name that is catchy, out of the ordinary and at least somewhat descriptive. A domain name is, in fact, your business\'s personal ID. Your customers will need to have access to your products and services, and a good company name will help them remember where to find you on the Internet.

2. The equipment - Next you need to locate and set up a hosting reseller account. You could conceivably establish your own domain registration procedures, arrange for connectivity from one or more major bandwidth providers and fill a warehouse or two with powerful computers and racks of servers. Or you could get a reseller account from a firm that has all of those things going on already, an established supplier.

3. The software tools - Any good reseller hosting account will offer customers the tools, often combined in a web-accessed control panel,to manage website hosting, domains and customer accounts from a central location. That way, you can log in check billing, uptime figures, account status and everything else, all at once.

4. Look, feel and functions - You must look professional to make customers feel safe in signing up with you as their website host. That means your own website must be designed and implemented by a professional. Try not to save money by using cookie-cutter website templates, as they tend to say,We\'re cheap.One of the major benefits of using a professional designer is that you end up with a unique website, one that looks the way you want it to look and doesn\'t look like a copy of someone Else\'s. One way to save money is to hire a designer simply to tweak and personalize the look of a good, flexible template, an option you should investigate if your funds are limited.

5. Easy sign up - However you decide to design and implement the site, make sure that you make the sign up process easy and straightforward. Keep your order form as simple, uncluttered and easy to complete as you can. One way to do this, as well as steer the customer a bit, is to have some choices pre-selected (default). It is important to supply customers with a summary page of their orders so they can review all of the details before making the purchase.

6. Differentiate yourself - Try to present yourself as being different in some essential way from every other web hosting offer. You can create a special offer, run a contest or promotion featuring a prize, bundle services and tools that other companies don\'t offer - it matters less what is different about your hosting offer than that it seems and acts different.

7. Be a good driver - And that doesn\'t mean in a car, either. You have to learn how to drive a lot of qualified traffic to your website, as that is the only way to get customers. There are entire textbooks - make that shelves full of textbooks - on how to market a website, build traffic, qualify leads and convert visitors into paying customers. If you take just one lesson from this article on possible traffic-driving solutions, one that has a proven track record for thousands of small, online businesses, it would be Google\'s Ad Words program. Check it out, as well as the other million things you can do to get traffic to your site and get customers to sign up.

You never know what several or dozen different things might combine to create success for you and your web host reseller service. But one thing is certain. If you do not provide a high level of customer service, your new found customers won\'t stay around for long. It is true of customers in any kind of store, online or offline, high-tech or not. If you are not taking care of them, and treating them like their business (and they, personally) are important to you, they will move to another web hosting firm as soon as they can.

You will need good luck to succeed in reseller web hosting, like in any other endeavor. If you follow seven steps outlined above, and tend to the other million or so things that are required of a successful business, you could be well on your way. Stay focused, stay busy, stay attentive and stay positive, and you just might stay in business, too.

About the Author

Amy Armitage is the head of Business Development for Lunarpages. Lunarpages provides quality web hosting from their US-based hosting facility. They offer a wide-range of services from dedicated servers and managed solutions to shared and reseller hosting plans.

The reason we have a usable Internet at all is because there are companies called hosting providers that give websites their virtual"homes" in cyberspace. There are many kinds of hosting services and solutions, with enough flexibility among them for webmasters to customize approaches for their specific needs. Despite this wide range of capabilities, however, hosting providers still offer three common package types - shared hosting, virtual hosting and dedicated hosting - although today leading hosting firms will also offer more personalized packages, often referred to as managed and semi-managed plans.

Understanding the differences among these approaches is just as important as comparing security, service, expertise and cost among the various providers you will consider. Understanding the different types of web hosting packages, in fact, can help you narrow the field of companies from which you will eventually pick a winner. This article will educate you sufficiently (although more study is always better than less) to choose the right hosting package, and perhaps even the right company to implement it for you.

Shared hosting

Companies and individuals making their first foray into the World Wide Web often sign up for the least expensive groups of plans, which would be under the "shared" category. As the name clearly indicates, your website will be "sharing" disk space on a server with 20 or 200 other sites. Part of your agreement includes a commitment to stay within a certain, prescribed percentage of the server's CPU (Central Processing Unit) usage. For family sites, small companies and other limited "rollouts," this is usually not a problem.

In fact, shared hosting schemes were originally designed around certain assumptions about site owners' behavior, many of which turned out to be right on the money. One of the many assumptions that has since become fact is that customers simply do not use all the bandwidth (storage) that they've been allotted in their paid plan. The fact is, many people and firms run small websites whose traffic volume only requires a small fraction of that bandwidth. Every so often, a small site will experience a sudden surge of traffic and data transfers, pushing the website use over the set limit. You will want to plan ahead for this kind of eventuality, as most agreement will give your hosting provider the right to "freeze or seize" the website, at least temporarily.

Virtual private hosting

As opposed to the shared hosting plans, a Virtual Private Server (VPS) will set you up with a Virtual Dedicated Server (VDS). You will still share server space with other sites, but will have your own environment, or partition, on that server. Individual servers are often divided into multiple, discrete (separate) partitions that run their own OS (Operating System) and can be booted up individually. These can be very important features for many firms. Of course, you will still share space on a single physical server, be restricted to a certain proportion of the CPU usage and have a limited amount of disk space and bandwidth because of the other VPS users.

Dedicated hosting

Dedicated hosting is a specialized service that offers the customer such important benefits such as secure, high-quality infrastructure and high-speed connectivity. These costlier hosting packages can be tailored to the unique needs of a customer for bandwidth, storage space and memory, and "renting" an entire server that you do not have to share enables you to run CPU-intensive programs. Your website performance will neither affect other sites nor be disrupted by what others do.

This type of dedicated hosting plan truly is the ideal one for companies with large, complex, media-rich and/or high-traffic sites. The "discrete server" model provides them complete control over the structure, contents and operations of the hosting environment. Not every individual or company needs dedicated hosting, but the ones that do could not make it with lesser hosting packages. Past a certain point of bandwidth, there is no reason to have any other kind of hosting plan.

Managed hosting services

Larger and busier firms often need a more advanced kind of dedicated hosting plan, one that can give them additional technical support and state-of-the-art equipment. These plans will also customize services in such a way as to transfer many important responsibilities to the hosting company. However, IT expertise is still required by the customer, who retains control of the operating system(s), applications and hosting environment. Managed hosting also involves a rather more significant investment of time, effort, expertise, finances and human resources than other hosting plans.

If you opt for managed hosting, you would typically lease dedicated, pre-configured equipment and connectivity from a provider. As the owner of the data center, the provider will maintain the server, the network and any other devices, and is responsible for deploying, monitoring, managing and maintaining the hardware. With contractually defined, shared responsibilities, managed hosting far exceeds basic dedicated hosting in levels of performance, security, scalability and up-time.

Semi-managed and reseller hosting

Another name for semi-managed hosting is root server hosting, a kind of dedicated hosting that lets you control the server through access to the root. This approach produces a variety of benefits, such as improved security, more reliable infrastructure and more proactive hardware maintenance. As it is a semi-managed hosting plan, a hosting provider will maintain and manage the installation and the hardware, while you (the client) will manage the other aspects (backups, software upgrades, etc.). With root access and administrator status, you can do virtually anything on your assigned server.

Reseller hosting is a way for businesses to host sites on behalf of their own customers. If you are reselling hosting services it means that you are making a contract with a hosting provider to sell their services under your own name or brand. There is ample incentive for web hosting firms to do this as it enables them to sell more dedicated hosting space. There are as many different contracts, agreements and ways of doing this as there are hosting companies, and it is certainly not something to be undertaken without planning. However, for some companies it is a powerful addition to the business plan.

The right plan for you

Depending on your needs, you may choose any of the foregoing hosting plans. Or, as many companies do, you may start small and grow into the costlier but more powerful packages. When you know how the hosting plans work, you can do a better job comparing services and costs when you are ready to set up (or expand) your site.

An interview with Rob Malda by Amy Armitage

When Reece from PingZine handed me this assignment and told me I was interviewing Rob Malda I pretended to be excited and nodded my head knowingly while he educated me on Rob’s background.

Honestly, I had no clue who Rob was. I guess that’s because I live in my own little Web Hosting and Reality TV world…but then I heard the magic word: SLASHDOT!

Oh…
My…
Gawd…

Slashdot? Are you kiddin’ me? They are like the GEEKSTAPO of the internet. The holy source for all things techy! (Slashdot never publish my submissions btw…pfft)

Just like Lois Lane I was determined to get to the guts of this story to find out something nobody knows about Rob Malda. There has to be some edge, something I can bring to this story that will have people gasping at my ingenious and crafty interviewing techniques…

I know!! I’ll lure him into a relaxed and welcoming environment and then when he least expects it, I’ll hammer him with a question so volatile, the LP attorneys will question if it is even worth publishing my exploze (yes, that’s right, ex-plo-ze: exploding exposé).

[* innocent look]

Amy: So Rob, hi, how are ya? Nice weather we’re having huh? Love your shoes btw …

Rob: 85 Degrees and Humid as hell. Stupid October. Not going outside. And I’m not wearing shoes: Get a new prescription!

[*gasp]

Amy: I’ve been doing a bunch of reading about you and your achievements so I’m thinking we should track back to your teens where it all began..

[Gawd I sound like a therapist]

Were you a Star Wars fan?

Rob: Indeed. I still routinely record them when they air on TV and watch them if they air in high-def. In college my roommate and I watched the entire trilogy every weekend for an entire year.

Amy: You play Dungeons and Dragons? Ummm…why? Did you ever get into WOW or Everquest?

Rob: Yes. We have a bi-weekly D&D campaign. My current char’s name is Bonzer Xylophone, an undead ranger. It’s just an excuse to drink beer and eat cookies. Last week we had fondue. I played a fair bit of EQ and tons of WOW. I have 4 level 70s now actually, although I haven’t logged in for months. I just like games with XP. I like making the numbers go up, and the monsters go splat.

Amy: I was reading in your bio that as a child your mother’s favorite punishment was to take away your keyboard and lock it in her trunk. The story on how you got around that cracked me up (Rob added a keyboard error code check to his autoexec.bat file which launched a BBS making it possible to get the data from a friend’s house). It got me thinking about children online nowadays and the traps and filters we put in place to protect/monitor their online activities. Are we deluding ourselves thinking that by checking their history and adding some filters to Google, blocking MySpace etc we can stop them?

Rob: Absolutely delusional.

[Wow… did he just call me delusional?]

Rob: Kids are smart and every generation is more tech savvy than the last. The truth is that the higher the wall you build, the harder the kid will work to see what is on the other side. Better build a picket fence and just talk to the kid about what’s on the other side of it. Instead we just try to sue everyone who creates something that we might not want a kid to see. It’s sad.

Amy: You were a hyperactive kid. What other trouble did you get yourself into? Come on, spill it.

Rob: Once we started a fire under a bridge near the local high school. It got pretty big and I panicked and so we filled a cardboard box with water from a nearby creek and dragged it back to the burning fire. Most of the water leaked out of the cardboard (not the best vessel for water distribution mind you) and dumped it on the blazing inferno. The steam & smoke that billowed out from under the bridge stopped traffic for as far as the eye could see, right as school was letting out. It was awesome. I was probably 10.

Amy: Your first job was working as a PC tech guy and you mastered Windows and then the heavens opened and an angelic penguin whispered “Linux” in your ear. Tells us how that experience transitioned you into cyberspace.

Rob: Linux came into my life because I was a CS major who was required to do homework on SUN Sparcstations running UNIX. Linux let me work at home. Plus it made internet easy (even on a 14.4k modem) and really showed me why windows was the wrong way to work.

Amy: I happened to “drop” your name to some development guys I know and the conversation went something like this:

Dev Guy: “Sup Ames? You look very beautiful and glamorous today as usual”
Amy: “Oooooh nothing much really, just writing up some questions for ROB MALDA THE CREATOR OF SLASHDOT”
Dev Guy: “Omg omg omg omg! Like totally no way!” (Valley Girl style)

And, after they stopped squealing like chicks they asked me to ask you if you use any open source software on Slashdot and how is it setup?

Rob: Pretty much everything on Slashdot is open source. MySQL. Perl. Apache. Even our own code is all open source and available at www.slashcode.com. It’s set up like software usually is: on hard drives inside computers. We plug those into various plugs on walls, some give us electricity and others give us packets. And all is well.

Amy: Also.. What are some tips & tricks for managing a high-traffic site?

Rob: Cache. Cache. Cache. If you can make it in advance, do it. Most people don’t need any customization, so make the page once and give the next 10,000 people the same page.

Amy: Oh and ASL?

Rob: I don’t know American sign language. I barely speak English.

[Pffft ya newbie]

Amy: You created SlashDot and yes, I wish I had the same idea. Are you uber rich now? Did you sell the site to some massive conglomerate and retire at the age of 21 to your own island?

Rob: I am not uber rich, but I did get to buy my first house at like 23. Still haven’t paid of the mortgage though. And while we did sell to corporate overlords, I’m 31 and still nowhere near retirement or an island.

Amy: Any regrets on selling?

Rob: Like anything, it’s a mixed bag. I like having health insurance and a 401k. But running a media company inside a publicly traded corporation is a unique set of challenges.

Amy: SlashTips – I mentioned earlier nothing I have ever written was published on SlashDot (I guess they don’t appreciate my unique style and humor). What do you look for when approving Slash-missions?

Rob: Maybe you’re just trying to hard.

[Yup that must be it]

Amy: Rob is married to a gorgeous gal named Kathleen and they got married Vegas style. Tell us how you met!

Rob: An old girlfriend and I set her up with a friend of mine, and somehow neither relationship lasted. Worked out well for everyone.

Amy: SlashCats – How many cats do you and Kathleen have Rob? Are you a cat-a-holic?

Rob: In order of age they are Pixel, Dante, Matrix, and Sushi. We could probably stand to have a few die off- but I had 2 and she had 2 and then it was all Brady Bunch and we were stuck with a herd. But they are ours and we love them even when they puke strange colored fuzzy objects on the carpet.

Amy: On weekends I love to go to yard sales and buy random junk in the hope that I will make millions with that one treasure… What do you do in your downtime that doesn’t involve plugging something into a power socket?

Rob: Go to movies. Learn to cook. Go to interesting restaurants. Travel. Play Video Games. Watch the season premiere of Heroes.

Amy: For the web hosting freaks, tell us about the server set up when you first started SlashDot and the situation now?

Rob: DEC Alpha Multia/166 running Red Hat plugged into a T1. Now we have a dozen dual cpu webheads, 4 Quad cpu databases, and a few other random helper boxes, and are plugged into an OC3.

Amy: What is the next challenge or project for you, Rob?

Rob: You mean after surviving this interview? Finding shoes… Stop looking at my toes.

[Sheesh… now I’ll be known as the girl with the foot fetish ;)]

Thanks for chatting with me Rob! I had a slashtastic time!



About The Author

Amy Armitage is the head of Business Development for Lunarpages. Lunarpages provides quality web hosting from their US-based hosting facility. They offer a wide-range of services from dedicated servers and managed solutions to shared and reseller hosting plans.