It isn’t very often you see hosting personalities being covered in the news. I don’t know why, because they are often some of the most successful out there.  That is why I was happy to find this video of Lanham Napier, Rackspace Hosting’s CEO, talking about how is company is competing with the likes of Google and Amazon.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Forgotten Negatives about Cloud Hosting
• What is Cloud Hosting?
• Benefits of Cloud Storage – Episode 188

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 198!
Running Time: 3 minutes | File Size: 5.14 MB

Brand new to the Web Hosting Show is the Web Hosting Show Coupons and Deals page, which – if you are browsing along at home, can be found at:

• http://www.webhostingshow.com/coupons/

What makes this page so great?  Well, it is my own hand selected web hosting coupons and deals I have found from around the Web.  That means no cutback to me, no wacky affiliate links, just straight forward links to hosts that are offering some amazing web hosting offers.

But wait, that’s not all!

If you act from now, until the end of time, you will also receive an RSS feed to subscribe to so you never miss a web host’s coupon or special deal.  Also, you can follow the Web Hosting Show’s Coupons and Deals page on Twitter too.  Just go to this link:

• http://twitter.com/whscoupons

and then click the, “Follow” button.

For web hosting clients this page offers a simple place to check and find the best deals for some of your favorite web hosts on the Internet.

For web hosts this page offers a clean and simple way to feature your coupons, specials and deals out there for the entire world to see.  Contact me, with your web hosting special, and you could see your own deals listed here too.

I really hope this is a new tool you will love, bookmark, visit often and share with your friends.  It is my goal to put together an honest list of coupons and offers for all of the Web Hosting Show’s listeners out there.  So, until next time – stay tuned for more great tools, more great offers and more great web hosting podcasts from the Web Hosting Show.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Should Web Hosts Twitter?
• The Webhostinator – Episode 190
• Best Way to Find Web Hosting Coupons

Find Files and Folders that Do Not Belong

Remember that old childhood game of figuring out, which one of these does not belong with the others?

Search through your web site files and folders to make sure that you don’t have anything that is strange or alien in there.  Look for files that are not apart of scripts you have installed, or that may have odd names.  Your web host will be able to tell you what files are safe to delete and which files are an important part of your web hosting account.

Try to view the source code of your web pages too, and look for anything that does not look familiar or is related to the problems you are having.  For example, many iframe injection attacks will attach the iframe code to the bottom of your web site files.

Make Sure Your Permissions are in Check

You should also check to make sure your file and folder permissions are in check.  Folders should be set no higher than 755, and files should be set to 644. You can check or change folder and file permissions through your web host’s file manager or through most modern FTP programs.

Now, for those of you who say this sounds like a lot of busy work, I have a special tip to share.  If you have a recent backup of your hosting account files, you can compare it with the files and folders on your hosting account to see which ones do not match up.  Also, depending on when your web site was infected, your web host may be able to restore your web site from and older back they have too.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Site Hacked? Scan Yourself First!
• Clean up and Repair Your Web Site – Episode 197
• What is the nofollow Link About?

Here is what I want you to do.  Make a list of scripts you have installed, and put them in two categories – the ones that you use on your web site and those you just installed to see what they look like.  You should remove any scripts that are not fundamental to your web site’s operation.

Choose, Update or Delete? - Keeping out of date scripts that you do not use on your web site is probably the number one way people can gain access to your hosting account.  Once you are sure the script you don’t use are gone, then you need to make sure you are using the latest version of and scripts you do use and that are a part of your web site.  Go to that script’s official web site to make sure you are running the latest version of the script.

Update Your Installed Script’s Plugins - Also, with some content management systems like Joomla, WordPress, or Drupal, you will want update any plugins you might have in place too.  Think of those as little installed scripts that can also be compromised.  The same thing could be said for any forum software, e-commerce script or more.  Many scripts out there use plugins to extend the original script, however each of these are security risks that you need to make sure you keep up to date and patched with the most recent version.

General rule of thumb time here, you shouldn’t keep any script installed on your web hosting account if you are not using it.  For scripts that are a part of your web site’s operation, be sure to keep the main script and the plugins that are apart of the script up to date.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Clean up and Repair Your Web Site – Episode 197
• Online Writing with Windows Live Writer
• Fixing Files and Folders After a Site Hack

Which Log-ins Should I Check and Change?

Here are some of the related log-ins you need to check and change, if you have found your web site has been infected by a virus, a trojan, or any other web site security issue there is out there.

Hosting Account Passwords – First, update your hosting account password, and the passwords for any e-mail accounts or FTP accounts you have created in your web hosting account.

Installed Scripts Passwords – You also need to make a list of every script you have installed and you are using on your hosting account.  Update your passwords for each of these scripts you are using.

Customer Service Passwords – The last series of passwords you need to change are those that have to do with your customer service level support with your web host.  If you use a different series of log-ins to get into your account settings with your web host, you may also need to update those log-ins too.

The important thing to remember is you want to lock out any way a person could gain access to your web site files and settings.  Think of this as going through your house and changing all the locks, after you have had a burglar break in.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Fixing Files and Folders After a Site Hack
• Update or Remove Out of Date Scripts
• Web Site Hacked? Scan Yourself First!

How to Scan Your Personal Computers

You might think that time is of the essence, however it will do you no good if you rush to fix your web site, if you are the one infecting it.  You need to run a combination of a anti-malware and anti-virus on your computer to make sure you are not the source of your problem.  I would recommend scanning your PC like this:

• Scan Your PC with an Anti-Malware Program
• Scan Your PC with an Anti-Virus Program
• Scan Your PC with an Online Anti-Virus Program

You could use a number of different anti-malware programs however I wouldn’t recommend installing more than one anti-virus program.  You get your second opinion there with the online anti-virus service.

Here are some great free anti-malware and anti-virus solutions:

• AVG Free (free anti-virus scanner)
• Trend Micro Housecall (free online anti-virus scanner)
• Avast Home Edition (free anti-virus scanner)
• Panda ActiveScan (free online anti-virus scanner)
• Spybot Search and Destroy (free anti-malware scanner)
• AdAware Free (free anti-malware scanner)
• Microsoft Windows Defender (free anti-malware scanner)

There are others out there, this should help you get started finding the best combination of scanners for you though. Another important tip to mention is that you need to scan each computer that has had contact with that web site, either by visit or because you used it to work on your web site.

Just like you lock your door at night to prevent somebody breaking in and stealing all your stuff, you need to make sure your web site is kept as secure as possible so you do not have these problems in the future.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Fixing Files and Folders After a Site Hack
• Video Tutorial on Trace Routes
• What is JSP?

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 197!
Running Time: 11 minutes | File Size: 5.14 MB

Here are just a few topics from this week’s episode:

• Web Site Hacked? Scan Yourself First!
• Be Proactive About Password Theft
• Update or Remove Out of Date Scripts
• Fixing Files and Folders After a Web Site Hack

Here is this week’s web hosting news headline:
Web Host Boot Camp 2009 – Another Web Host Boot Camp is coming up.  December 7th through December 9th, attendees, exhibitors, sponsors and guests will come together for three days to discuss, learn, share tips and techniques and much more.

FastServers.net is Now LayeredTech – I would also like to welcome the Web Hosting Show’s new supporter and sponsor, LayeredTech.com.  LayeredTech specializes in enterprise, cloud, and dedicated server hosting.  I look forward to having as good of a relationship with them as we had with FastServers.net.

From iframe injections, to virus or trojan installs, we all need to make sure we are prepared for the worst, or at least know what to do when the worst might happen.  That is what today’s show is all about.  I hope you enjoy, and if you have any other web site security tips to share, be sure to leave them in the comments!

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Top 10 Reasons Your Site Isn’t Working – Episode 193
• Web Hosting Relationships – Episode 184
• Payment Processing Demystified – Episode 182

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• Big News! Podcast and Production Changes?
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Could H1N1 (the Swine Flu) take down the Internet?  Now, as we all get ready to get out shots, wash our hands and cough into our elbows, once has to wonder if an increase of sick people staying at home and browsing the Internet could possibly threaten the stability of the system?

According to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, absenteeism during a pandemic could peak at 50% during a six week period.  That would cause an unsteady rise in Internet usage for watching movies, playing games and doing other bandwidth heavy activities that are usually saved for the later hours in the day.

Now the question is, can the Internet handle a upswing in usage that great? One would think that they have designed backbones in the Internet networking structure to handle surges in traffic during big events.  For the web hosting workers out there, here is another disturbing report:

In 2007, the Department of Homeland Security published a report studying the effects that a pandemic could have on the Internet at large, and on telecommuting adults in particular. The report said that 90% of the telecommuting population would experience slowdowns or blackouts when accessing the Internet.

Many of the people who work in the web hosting industry work remotely, so mix an upswing of Internet usage, with the fact that many web hosting workers can’t get online and we have big problems.  Now that same report recommends that the general public should limit their usage of online gaming and video browsing during any sort of pandemic.

So let us go back to the question, could H1N1 take down the Internet and effect many people who work in the web hosting world?  Yes, however – I wouldn’t start panicking just yet.

For more information about this topic, check out the Could Swine Flu Take the Internet Down? article over at the Wall Street Journal.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Hosting Panic – Episode 196
• Web Page Analyzer
• Video Tutorial on Trace Routes

Tip #1 – Stop Linking to Other Sources So Much

Now, you can’t stop linking to web site all together on your own domain, but you can cut down on the number of links you do.  Save them for when you absolutely need to.  Each time you link to  a different domain, your giving your visitors a way to exit your web page.

Also, search engines don’t like pages that have tons of useless links.  If you need to link to a source, first ask yourself if you have something on that topic yourself somewhere on your web site.  Link to yourself and keep that search engine spider on your own web site.  One single, good, authoritative link can do a lot more for you than a dozen crappy links, which can actually hurt you.

Tip #2 – Fresh Content, Delivered Daily!

Adding content to your web site can always help improve your rankings.  OF course, be sure to keep it useful and based around quality content, rather than just trying to get another page up about something.

Tip #3 – Controversy Creates Cash Links Back

Don’t be afraid to write about something controversial or targeting related content that will get a lot of eyeballs to check out your web site.  Start searching around for what people are looking for when browsing your type of web site and target your content based around that idea.  Create something that naturally attracts backlinks for your web page and gets people talking about your site.

Tip #4 – Put Your Page Title Before Your Web Site Title

When it comes to formatting your web site for the Web, be sure to pay attention to how you have written your web site titles, and what is listed up there.  For pages, you should put your page title before the web site title.  Such as:

How to Register a Domain Name | Web Hosting Show

There, I have identified what the page is about, and listed my web site name in the correct order.  Some people have even dropped listing the web site title too. Play around with your titles and see what gives you the best results.

Tip #5 – Pay Attention to Analytics

Be sure to check in on your web site statistics software daily, to watch for popularity trends, and see what pages are performing the best – and which might need some work done on them.  If you don’t have a good web page statistics package right now, I would highly recommend you look into using the Google Analytics service.  It is free to use, and much better than even some of the paid for analytics software suits out there.

Have another SEO tip that you think would be handy (along this these quick tips)? Leave a comment and share your own easy search engine optimization tutorials and suggestions.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Hosting Panic – Episode 196
• Zangief Does Domains? – Episode 150
• Find Better Hosting Coupons – Episode 198

You can see the chart for yourself here.

So what does this mean?  Well, a hundred different people could read into that data a hundred different ways.

Negative View – I would say the main reason why web hosting is down, is because social networks like MySpace and Facebook have kind of taking the place for some people of a standard web site.

Positive View – People don’t search for “web hosting” when looking for a place to start their web site.  Doing a search for “blog hosting” shows it has stayed steady since 2005.  People are looking for ways to host a particular type of site, rather than just general web hosting these days.  It is a much more niche market now.

As you can see, there are arguments to be made for either side on why web hosting is such a falling trend in Google searches. Which way do you see it?

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Learn to Please the Niche Markets
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Searching for a place to find free web site designs you can use?  OpenWebDesign.org has plenty to choose from, and they are all free to use.

If writing CSS code isn’t your favorite thing to do – and you would much rather tweak up a design that has already been done for you – finding a great free online design is the way to go.  So to help you jumpstart your next web site design project, head over to the stockpile of web designs found over at OpenWebDesign.org.

There are over 3,000 designs to choose from (and most are XHTML/CSS-based), so should be enough variation and choice for any web site designer out there.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Clean up Your Messy CSS
• A Web Hosting Blast – Episode 171
• Web Hosting for Charity

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 196!
Running Time: 12 minutes | File Size: 5.38 MB

Here are just a few topics from this week’s episode:

• Over 3,000 Free CSS Web Design Templates!
• Will the Swine Flu Take Out the Internet?
• Is Web Hosting a Falling Trend on the Web?
• 5 SEO Tips You Can Do, Right Now!

Here is this week’s web hosting news headline:
ICANN Breaks Free from US Control – Internet regulation body ICANN and the US Department of Commerce announced last week that they have signed a new agreement that ensures that ICANN will now be “independent and not controlled by any one entity”.

Trivia Question – Where are the ICANN headquarters?

We are back yet again, with another great web hosting podcast for you all to enjoy.  Remember, you can subscribe to the RSS feed to get daily updates on the topics we discussed on today’s podcast, or keep checking back at webhostingshow.com.  Hope you enjoy the show this week, and if you do – drop in a comment and let us know!

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• When Spam Attacks – Episode 157
• ICANN Shakes Things Up – Episode 156
• SEO Magic and Hosting Competition – Episode 90

1. Most independent contractors do not get vacation time.  So, if you need to take time off, either forget about it or expect to not be paid for the time you ask off.
2. Make sure you read the contract from head to toe before you sign up to work for any major or small time web hosting company as a contracted worker.
3. Look into getting multiple monitors.  Sometimes you will need to keep an eye on or do several different tasks, so like with any job, be sure you show up with the tools you need to succeed.
4. In the contract, make sure they give you a set number of hours per week, and a shift each day.  Don’t let them fool you into being “on-call” in any hour of the day.
5. You have to have the patience of Ghandi to work tech support at times.  No matter how big of a jerk the customer is, you need to smile and do what is best for the company you are working for, and not yourself.
6. Be sure you feel at home with working by yourself at home.  While you might have the occasional phone call from your employer, much of the time you are your only company.
7. Get ready for an overly-complicated tax season.  When taxes are due, be sure you get your taxes done by somebody who knows what you independent contractor job is about.
8. You’ll need to educate yourself a times to extend the types of jobs you can cover.  Want to help with web design or development?  Start putting together web sites in your free time.  Experience is the best training out there.
9. Get a comfortable chair for your computer desk.  Nothing is worse than being uncomfortable all day long.
10. Treat it like a real job.  Since you no longer go to an office, you never have that separation of home time and work time.  You have to be able to mix the two together, responsibly.

If you keep these ten tips in mind, I am sure you will be a very successful independent contractor, and any web host around the world would be more than happy to have you.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Find Better Hosting Coupons – Episode 198
• 5 SEO Tips You Can Do Right Now!
• Web Hosting Panic – Episode 196

One thing you have to watch out for when you start working remotely in the web hosting world is how many hours you work.  Now some might think you should be working as much as you can, while this is true – you also need to have limits.  Any web host who would hire you as a remote worker should get you a set number of hours per week to work.

Don’t do more for less. When looking for a remote position with a web hosting company, many hosts may ask you to do as much as you can.  You should do your work assigned to you, however don’t let them get away with not giving you a set number of hours a day to work.  Any remote position should have the same benefits of a regular “going to the office” job, meaning you should work X amount of days, get X amount of days off and work a set number of X hours per day.

I can speak from experience, as somebody who will usually go beyond the call of duty, and as somebody who was fooled into this in my first remote web hosting job.  At the time, I was inexperienced and thought it might be normal to be on call 24/7 to help out with answering e-mails, or working live chat for a web hosting company.  What was the end result?  I was so burnt out I didn’t take another remote web hosting job for two years.

Now, I am not saying any web host out there will go out of their way to screw you over, sometimes they need all the help they can get and they might forget about the fact that they are overworking you.  If there is one thing I could tell every remote web hosting tech out there, to sum things up, it would be don’t allow yourself to be available 24/7.

So when you sign up to work remotely for a web hosting company, be sure to get it in print in your contract your weekly hours, days off and when or how you get paid if your asked to work overtime.  Both the web host an yourself need to be clear on these limits so that they can get the expected work out of you, and you don’t get overworked in the process.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• How to Find a Job in Web Hosting
• Web Hosting Job Hunting Guide (Part 2) – Episode 195
• How Should Web Hosts Adapt to the Social Web?

Now I do not plug my other projects very often, however I think this is an important enough update to share with the rest of my fans (even my wonderful podcast subscribers)!  I just finished up with a brand new redesign of my layout over at Mitchelaneous.com – and I would love your feedback on it.

What is Mitchelaneous?  It is my personal blog, with tutorials helping with tech tips, web development and geeky entertainment.  Pretty much everything else I want to post about is posted here, that does not fit under the web hosting category of WebHostingShow.com and the Mozilla category or FirefoxFacts.com.  

Here are a few of the popular posts to check out too:

• Best of the Free Zombie Flash Games
• Free Mega Man Desktop Icons
• Garfield Without Garfield is Funnier
• 9 WordPress Alternatives
• Get More from Google Calendar

As you can see, I go all over the place with this blog.  For the most part though, I try to keep the madness focused on helping you get more out of what you want to do, and provide you with the best advice I can on a number of different topics.  From wallpaper downloads, to free custom desktop icons, to the best of the video game world.  There is something for everybody’s inner-geek to enjoy.

How can you subscribe for free?

You can also get updates via e-mail of new posts, or from your favorite feed reader:

Subscribe in a Reader! | Subscribe to Mitchelaneous by E-mail

You can also just copy and paste this into your feed reader of choice too:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/mitchelaneous

Go check it out at Mitchelaneous.com and let me know what you think!

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So, if I was going to start looking for a web hosting job, where would I turn to?  Well, there are three resources you should keep in mind.  You have the web host themselves, the web hosting forums out there, and special job hunting resources that will list for you spots available with a number of different web hosting companies.

Find Jobs at the Web Host

Some web hosts will look for contracted workers in their own user base, so that is something to keep in mind.  If you want to go work for one specific web host, join their user forums and help out as much as you can.  See if you can become friendly with the current staff, and let them know if there is a spot available, you would like to be the one to fill it. Many web hosts also have “employment” pages up with positions that are open in the company.

Find Jobs on the Web Hosting Forums

Web hosting forums are another place to look for web hosting related jobs.  One of the most popular out there would be the Employment Offers and Requests section over at WebHostingTalk.com.  Other web hosting forums may have equally as helpful resources too, to start looking for a new web hosting job.

Find Jobs on the Web Hosting Employment Resources

Be sure to check out the web sites that specialize in advertising web hosting jobs too.  One of the more popular job boards for web hosting positions is webhostingjobs.com.  Run by the same staff the control TheWHIR.com, they have a lot of jobs listed for local and remote positions.

Don’t get discouraged if you get turned down by the first web host you try to get a job with.  Just go to the next one on the list, or try to ask around at several web host if they have any spots available for you as a local technician or remote contracted worker.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Hosting Job Hunting Guide (Part 2) – Episode 195
• Remote Workers Should Not be Overworked
• What is an Independent Contractor in Web Hosting?

So, What is an Independent Contractor?

In most cases, an independent contractor makes an agreement to do a specific piece of work, however retaining control of the means and methods for getting the job done.  The contractor is never legally recognized as an employee, and in turn has to pay a self-employment tax. So they are self-employed people who are hired to do a job, by a company.

What Else Are Independent Contractors Called?

I don’t really like the name “independent contractor”.  It makes me feel like I need to be wearing a bright yellow construction hat, for one. Sometimes you hear this position called something else.  Another term tossed around the web hosting circles is “remote”.  Many industries farm out their work to such contractors, because they might have hard time finding people to do the work where they are located.   Other terms you might hear tossed about would be self-employed or a freelance worker.

Pros and Cons of Being an Independent Contractor

Here are some of the good things and bad things about working as a contractor:

Pros in Independent Contracted Work

• You get to set your own rules, since you are not tied to an employer.
• You get to be your own boss, which many people feel good about labeling themselves with such a title.

Cons in Independent Contracted Work

• Taxes are complicated.  You’ll need to worry about other expenses not covered by an employer/employee relationship.
• You have to be able to work sometimes, without being told what to do.  Some people can’t get a task done, without being told they need to do it by following a series of steps.

As somebody who might want to get into this line of work, you might want to do a little more research on what is expected of you.  I have merely touched upon a few topics that independent contractors need to be aware of.  To web hosting clients who might feel a little funny about having people who are not technically “employees” helping them, don’t.  While independent contractors are not technically an employee of a company, they are still expected to do their best to give you the best service possible.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Hosting Job Hunting Guide (Part 2) – Episode 195
• 10 Reminders for Web Hosting Remotes
• How to Find a Job in Web Hosting

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 195!
Running Time: 13 minutes | File Size: 5.99 MB

Here are just a few topics from this week’s episode:

• How to Find a Job in the Web Hosting World
• What is an Independent Contractor in Web Hosting?
• Remote Workers Should Not be Overworked!
• 10 Reminders for Web Hosting Remotes

Hope you enjoy this second take a question I know a lot of you have, how to get a job in web hosting, and advice for those of us who already work in this great industry.  Remember, you can always leave your questions, feedback or comments on this very page, or send it to me at mitch@mitchkeeler.com.  Enjoy the show!

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Web Hosting Panic – Episode 196
• How to Find a Job in Web Hosting
• What is an Independent Contractor in Web Hosting?

PEER 1 10 Year Anniversary Tattoo’s from Charnell Pugsley on Vimeo.

I have to give them credit, you know you have love for a company when you get it tattooed onto you. Happy 10 year anniversary to PEER 1 from your close personal friends at the Web Hosting Show!

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At its core this means that the provisioning of space, bandwidth and power is controlled by a third-party data center.  They do not control it all though.  Most of the time, the web host who is using the third-party’s data center services will need to provide the management for the hardware or servers they are running from there.

To try to make sense of this, lets say I want to start a store.  I go rent a building downtown that has all the shelves, cash registers, and shopping carts – however I have to stock the store myself and, of course, figure out a way to bring the customers in the door.  Instead of spending money on buying the store and some of the basic necessities, I get to rent them – in turn bringing my overall costs down.

So, with it explained like that – where is the evil in it?

Well, many web hosting elite look down upon this practice because it is a money saving practice.  It lowers the proverbial bar on the point of entry somebody has to become a web host too.

Since building a data center from the ground up is a very expensive and time consuming act, I see no problem in getting your hosting through collocation.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Should Web Hosts Twitter?
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• Host Improvement – Episode 179

Need to take a screen shot of a web site to show off to somebody?  By far, one of my favorite programs to take screenshots is WebShot.  It is almost the perfect screenshot and web page thumbnail generator utility.  How do you use it?  You put the web site address you want to get the capture of in the URL text box, and then hit the button labeled, “Start”.

Diving deeper into the download you can also set it up to capture multiple URLs, a specific size image, edit the default browser sizes and more.  For most people the free version should get the job done – however if you want even more features you might look into getting the personal or server edition.

To pick it up, or get more help on how to use it – go visit WebSiteScreenshots.com.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Squarespace is an All in One Hosting Package
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Looking for a new site to measure the effectiveness of your web site in a number of different ways? BuildStats.com will give you all kinds of details about your domain, or any domain name out there from around the Web.

Some of the statistics included are:

• Indexed pages in Bing, Yahoo, and Google
• Onsite Information
• Rank on Traffic Scoring Sites
• Popularity Graphs
• Social Popularity on the Web

Using tools like this will help you determine where you might need to spend more time working on your web site.  For example, if your web site is not the popular across the social sites, you might look into seeing what needs to be done to get your domain mentioned there more.

BuildStats.com is a handy domain scoring tool that you should keep handy.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

• Site Popularity Checking with URLmetrix
• Find Better Hosting Coupons – Episode 198
• Web Hosting is a Falling Search Trend?

As a standard network protocol we all use to upload, download and change files over the Internet, FTP is something we all use, but many people still have questions about.  FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol, and usually works in a type of client-server relationship to allow you to easily upload documents to a server or download them.

The way we have interacted with FTP has changed over the years. FTP clients, the programs you use to interact with the server via FTP, were originally interactive command-line tools with a standardized command syntax, but graphical user interfaces have been developed for all modern desktop operating systems in use today.

Setting up a desktop FTP client might vary between programs, however most can be configured by giving the following information.

• Hostname: yourdomain.com or ftp.yourdomain.com
• Username: your account username
• Password: your account password

If you are logging in via a secondary FTP account you have created, be sure to use the full user name format user@yourdomain.com as the user name when you input your login information into the FTP client.  Some of my favorite FTP clients out there are:

• WS_FTP
• CuteFTP
• SmartFTP
• FileZilla

Now, you can use your Internet browser to access your hosting space via FTP, however I would advise against it.  The clients mentioned before and the number of other alternatives out there handle FTP in a much better way than any Internet browser out there.

So to make things as simple as possible, FTP is what allows you to easily transfer files to and from your hosting account very easily via a special program.

Related Hosting Posts & Podcasts

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Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 194!
Running Time: 10 minutes | File Size: 4.80 MB

Here are just a few topics from this week’s episode:

• What is FTP and how do you use it?
• A great domain scoring web site resource!
• What is so bad about collocation hosting?
• How to take better web site screenshots!

Here is this week’s web hosting news headline:
Brinkster Launches URL Shortener – Web hosting provider Brinkster announced this week that it has launched a new URL shortening service it is calling br.st!, throwing its hat into an already quite well-served market associated with several of the most popular social networking services.

Bonus! Check out br.st and see if it is better than the rest!

Trivia Question – True or false, Brinkster’s CEO Jared Stauffer is on Twitter.  (to find out the answer, be sure to download and listen to this week’s podcast!)

Tons of fun and useful tools packed into this week’s show.  Don’t forget to leave your feedback in the comments or contact me anytime at mitch@mitchkeeler.com.  Also, if your like what you hear, and you want to get more subscribe to our RSS feed (it is free to do!) so you never miss another post, interview or podcast!

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So that, my hosting homies, is the topic of today’s show.

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 193!
Running Time: 10 minutes | File Size: 4.67 MB

This week on the podcast we will be covering the top ten reasons why your web site is not working. So without further interruption, let us take a dive into these troubling web site problems.

10. The Tubes Are Broken – It was former senator Ted Stevens who famously said, “the Internet is a series of tubes”. With that in mind, when the tubes are broken, it can cause a massive web site problem.

When you navigate to your web site, your request bounce from this point, to that point, to that point over there until you reach the server your web site is hosted at. Now what if one of the points is having problems? Well then your request gets stuck, and you can’t see your site.

One way to see if this is the issue is to do a trace route to your domain. With each line, you see a different hop your request took to get to the server. If it looks likes stopped, then your, “big truck” as Ted Stevens would call it has come to a halt.

9. Server is Down, Please Try Again! – Sometimes stuff happens on a server, causing it to go bonkers, stops it from serving your web site and makes it think it is a toaster. Any server at any web host can (and probably will) go down for any number of reasons, the trick is to find the one that has done so the least amount of times.

Think of a server as MacGyver on a busy day. Sometimes it gets it’s requests out of order, breaks down, and needs a few fixes here and there to keep it running better, faster, and for a little longer.

8. What, I Need Hosting Too? – It might be a rare occurrence in the web hosting world, but sometimes it happens. You forgot to purchase a domain name with your hosting, or you forgot to purchase a web hosting account with your domain name.

For people new to the web hosting world, they often think, I want a web site, so I am buying one thing, “the ability to have a web site”. Why would this be separated into two major things? Well, it is – so remember to tell people they need both!

7. Somebody is Abusing my Poor Little Server! – If you think of a shared web hosting server, as a community that you live in, and all the other sites hosted there are your neighbors, then it is easier to understand the idea of server resource abuse. Think of the annoying neighbor that keeps playing his music so load, everybody else in the community can’t get any work done.

This can happen in the Online world too.

Say for example, another web site hosted on the same server that your site is hosted on is using up too much of the server’s CPU. Due to this problem, your web site performance has started to slow down or come to a halt.

6. YOU Are the one Abusing That Little Server! – When somebody is found to be abusing a server (for example, by using too many server resources) and that person is you, that too can bring your web site down.

No mater if it is caused by a sudden burst in traffic, or a crazy script that is badly configured – you are using too many resources, and will be shut down so your neighbors (who are playing by the rules) can go back to seeing their web sites again.

5. Using Too Many Server Resources – Now number seven through six are pretty similar, and all mainly have to do with abuse to the server. One major thing you have to watch out for (and get ready to upgrade because of it) is the use of too many server resources.

When you are hosted on a shared server with 100 to 300 other customers, one guy can’t get away with using too large of a percentage of RAM or CPU power. What about disk space and bandwidth? Those can be abused too, but since those two are much cheaper these days – the new thing to really watch out for when it comes to server abuse is the amount of the server’s RAM and CPU you are hording for your own site.

4. You Got DDoS’ed – When a DDoS happens, you can say goodbye to your web site until your web host figures where the attack is coming from, and filters it out.

What is a DDoS?

DDoS stands for distributed denial of service attack and occurs when multiple systems flood the bandwidth or resources of a targeted system or systems. These systems are compromised by attackers using a variety of methods.

3. Disturbing (or Rule Breaking) Content – Every web host out there has a series of rules (often found in the terms of service or acceptable use policy) summing up what you can and can not host there. Some of it is common sense, (like anything that is against the law), however others might deserve checking into at least.

For example, some web hosts allow “adult” content on shared servers, and others require you to upgrade to a virtual private server or better. Also scripts that are known to cause high server usage, like many of the YouTube-clone scripts out there, might also get you in trouble with the rules.

2. Web Site was Hacked – Always make sure you are using the latest version of any script or plugin you install on your web hosting account. Getting your web site hacked is a major problem that is never much fun to deal with. Also, check out folder and file permissions (to make sure files are at least 644 and folder are set to no higher than 755).

Now I could probably do an entire second show on web site security, but one more tip I think is worth mentioning is don’t install a script, say you never used it again, and that is your excuse for not updating it and creating a big hole for any hacker out there to use to get into your web hosting account.

1. PEBKAC – For those of you not in the web hosting support world, the acronym PEBKAC might leave you a little confused. PEBKAC stands for “Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair”. It is nothing to be ashamed of, sometimes a user just configures things incorrectly.

Sometimes they forget to set their domain name to the right name servers. Sometimes they upload their web site, but all the file paths are pointing to locations on the PC. The thing to remember is don’t be ashamed to ask for help, because in this wild and wacky world of web hosting, we are all here to help learn from and teach each other.

I hope you enjoyed this look into the top ten reasons why your web site isn’t working today. If you have any other common errors I might have missed, be sure to leave a comment and share it with the rest of the Web Hosting Show listening audience.

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The dead body pose in Yoga is an easy one for relieving stress.  It is pretty simple too.  You want to lay flat on your back on your floor.  Next, turn your palms up. Let your arms and legs fall to a natural relaxed position. Stay in this position for about five to ten minutes.

The main benefit of this pose is both mental and physical relief.  You want to try to clear your mind, and stop thinking about what has got you in this position in the first place.  After words, you should feel a little better and should be ready to go again.

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WordPress is probably one of, if not “the” most popular blogging script out there.  One of the things that makes it so great is the wide variety of plugins you can install to extend it’s usability.  So how do you install a WordPress plugin? Why, I am happy you asked.

First thing you need to do is to download the plugin, from the plugin’s official site, or from a directory like WordPress’s Plugin Directory site.  Once that has been done, you see it often comes in a .zip compressed folder.  You need to un-compress it using your favorite file unzipper – to it’s own folder.  Now you have the folder for the plugin setting on your desktop.  What is next?

Next, you will want to start up your favorite FTP program and upload the folder to this directory:

/wp-content/plugins/

Each plugin should have it’s own folder, so since your plugin you want to install is already in a folder just upload the entire folder to the folder named “plugins” within your wp-content folder.

Now, login to your WordPress administrator interface and click on the Plugins link in the left-side menu.  Scroll down the list till you see the plugin you just installed, and click the the link labeled “Activate” in the box for the plugin.

Simply follow the on screen instructions after that, and your new plugin should be up and running.  Often plugins have additional features you need or can setup and customize, so check the plugin’s documentation for that information.

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The .htaccess file is a way to make a change to the configurations of your hosting account for each directory.  For example, once you put a .htacess file in your public_html folder, on a Linux based hosting account, it will set the rules for that folder and all the folders created in it.

Here is everything you need to know…

Step 1 – Open up a text editor (such as Notepad or cPanel’s File Manager) and add in the lines you need and save the file.

Step 2 – Using the cPanel’s File Manager or your FTP client you will need to upload the file to the location you need it. This is usually inside of your public_html folder.

Step 3 – Rename the file to .htaccess, and save. It should be noted that .htaccess is the file extension. It is not filename.htaccess or yourpage.htaccess, it is just named .htaccess.

Truth be told, you really don’t need to know what the .haccess file is, as long as you can find the right snipits of code or “recipes” in it to get the job done.  At least now you know how to create it… and knowing is half the battle.

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How should web hosts act on social networks? It is all about striking the right balance of many different things you want to get out into the public.  Here are a few topic ideas.

Contacting Customers – Be sure to search around Twitter, Facebook and the like for people who are mentioning you, good or bad.  With the people who might be saying they are having trouble with you (you can often spot this, because they are saying that you suck) be sure to lend a helping hand.  To those who are singing your praises, be sure to thank them for doing so.

Support Updates – Having a major problem that is effecting many customers?  Rather than hiding under your desk and sucking your thumb, it might be better to get out there in the angry mob and let them know what is going on.  For the most part 95% of the population out there will be ok with disaster, as long as they know what is going on.  Just think how happy those people on the Titanic would have been, for example, if the ship had a better PR person.  It is something to think about.

Plug Yourself and Market to All – If you have a good following of people requesting to be your friend, you need to make sure you strike a good balance between giving your current followers something they can use, and also give the searchers out there a reason to look into you.  Half you marketing posts should be focused towards your base and the other half should be focused toward potential customers.

So there you have it, follow these steps and you will finally have something to do on that Twitter account or Facebook fan page you haven’t touched in a while.

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