How Does Cloud Hosting Function?

What is cloud hosting really? The term 'cloud' seems to be very fashionable in today's IT, Internet and web hosting jargon. Even so, only a select few actually know what cloud hosting is. Perchance it is a sensible idea to inform yourself about cloud hosting services. To render a quite lengthy story concise, we will first describe to you what cloud hosting is not.

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

1. Delivering a remote file storage service, which involves one single disk storage tool for all customers, does not transform any particular hosting company into an actual cloud hosting corporation.

The cPanel hosting companies dub the ability to provide remote disk storage services a cloud hosting service. So far there is nothing bad about the cloud designation, but... we are discussing hosting solutions, not remote disk storage solutions for personal or business purposes. There's always one "but", isn't there? It's not enough to dub a shared hosting solution, powered by a single-server web hosting environment, exactly like cPanel, a "cloud hosting" solution. That's because the remaining constituents of the whole web hosting platform must be operating in precisely the same way - this does not relate solely to the remote data storage. The rest of the services involved in the entire hosting procedure also must be remote, isolated and "clouded". And that's really difficult. Very few web hosting companies can really accomplish it.

2. It Includes Domain Names, Electronic Mails, Databases, File Transfer Protocols, CPs, etc.

Cloud hosting is not restricted to a remote file storage only. We are talking about a hosting solution, serving lots of domains, sites, mailboxes, and so on, right?

To name a hosting service a "cloud hosting" one demands a lot more than delivering merely remote disk storage mounts (or perhaps physical servers). The e-mail server(s) must be dedicated only to the email connected services. Carrying out nothing else than these specific assignments. There might be only one or maybe an entire assortment of e-mail servers, based on the total load created. To have an actual cloud hosting solution, the remote database servers should be operating as one, regardless of their actual quantity. Doing nothing different. The same is valid for the customers' CPs, the FTP, etc.

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

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

Here's an instance of a Domain Name Server of a true cloud hosting vendor:

dns1.dnmark.com

dns2.dnmark.com

If such a Domain Name Server is supplied by your hosting plans provider, it's not a sure thing that there is a cloud hosting platform in use, but you can definitely be certain when you discern a DNS like the one underneath:

dns658.hostgator.com

dns659.hostgator.com

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

Remote File Storage - The Distorted Definition of Cloud Hosting.

So, a cloud hosting service is not limited exclusively to a remote data storage service, as a lot of web hosting distributors wish it was. Sadly for them, if that was the case, most of the file hosting providers would have been classified as cloud web hosting ones long ago! They are not categorized as such, as they merely furnish file web hosting solutions, not cloud web hosting services. The file hosting platform is really quite plain, when compared to the hosting platform. The remote disk storage platform is not a cloud hosting platform. It cannot be, as it's simply one simple fraction of the whole cloud hosting platform. There's plenty more to be discovered in the cloud hosting platform: the Control Panel cloud, the database clouds (MySQL, PostgreSQL), the Domain Name Server cloud, the FTP cloud, the e-mail cloud and... in the foreseeable future, possibly a few brand new clouds we currently are not informed about will show up out of nowhere.