Learn About Domain Management & Hosting Management

1. By RIYA JAIN Learn About Domain Management & Hosting Management

2. Domain Management

3. A Beginner's Guide to Domain Name Management • Your domain name is one of the most important parts of your web presence. It‘s your “address” on the internet, and points to your digital home base: your company website. • The domain name system is not terribly complex, but it’s just complex enough that not everyone understands how it all works. For this reason, many organizations turn over all control of their domain name to an agency or web firm to manage. • This has some pros and cons, and depending on your unique situation, it might be the best option. However, for those looking to learn a little more about domain name management for themselves, let’s dive into some of the basics …

4. What’s a Domain Name? A domain name (like “spinweb.net“) is an address that defines a “realm of authority” on the internet. It can be thought of like a physical address for your office. Your address is where mail is sent and where people drive if they want to visit your office. A domain is similar. If someone wants to visit your website, that person will use your domain name to access it. Your domain name “points” to your website just as your physical address “points” to your office. This is 101 stuff, but hang with me as we get into the details.

5. A Basic DNS Glossary DNS (Domain Name Server or Domain Name System): A server that translates a web address into one or more IP addresses. Registrar: If you want your website to be called MyTastySandwich.com then that domain must be registered with an entity called a “registrar.” A registrar is a company that issues and manages domain names. Examples include: • Lean Domain Search:Simply enter a word you want your domain to include and Lean Domain Search will turn up domain names that are available based on different variations of that word.  • Domainr: This handy tool gives you a quick snapshot of what is available for your domain, as well as alternatives.  • Whois.net: Look up information on a domain name to see who owns it, when it expires, and much more.  • GoDaddy.com: Find the perfect domain name, register it, and set up your hosting all in one place.  IP Address: Your website lives on a web server and has a specific address assigned to it, called an “IP address,” which stands for “Internet protocol address” and is made up of four segments separated by a period, like 123.456.789.123. This IP address points to your website. Name Servers: These are machines that are set up specifically for the purpose of routing domain names to the proper IP address. When a domain name is delegated to a set of name servers, that gives authority to those name servers to point the domain name anywhere. Name servers are usually set up by the company that hosts your website. For example, SpinWeb’s name servers are identified with the names “ns1.spinweb.net” and ns2.spinweb.net”. This means that if a domain name is delegated to our name servers, we can point the domain anywhere we need to.

6. Who Should Control Your Domain Name Registration? Imagine this scenario: Your IT guy set up your website, registered your domain name, and manages all of the DNS stuff for you. Convenient, right? Yes, very … until said IT Guy moves to Barbados and forgets to tell you. Now, your domain name is expiring and you don’t know how to login, where to log in or update your information. Maybe you don’t even find out about this until your domain has already expired. What a nightmare. Many organizations turn over control of their domain names to an agency simply because they don’t understand how it all works. Or, if they need a new domain registered, they will ask their agency to do it for them. In most cases, I am heavily in favor of outsourcing many things to a digital agency. However, when it comes to domain names, my preference is always for our clients to retain control over their own domains. Why? Your domain is the most critical component of your online presence. It controls who can get to your website, your email, your blog, and any other online properties that you own. Aside from that, it’s not difficult to control. Most registrars have a pretty easy-to-use control panel that will allow you to make updates to your domain name, specify who in your company is in control of it, and what nameservers it points to. At the end of the day, the ball is in your court. However, when it comes to something as sensitive and significant as your domain, I’d encourage you to remain involved in the process — at least to some extent.

7. Hosting Management

8. Managed hosting is an IT hosting model in which the client leases servers or cloud computing resources from a service provider is responsible for overseeing the administration of the client environment or specific aspects of the client environment. Managed hosting services typically encompass server upkeep, resource monitoring, networking configuration, security updates, and operating system management. Many managed hosting providers also offer managed backup and disaster recovery solutions, and extend management services beyond their own data centers to third party cloud providers like Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure.     

9. Evolution of Hosting Before the proliferation of web hosting services, a business that wanted to be online had to first purchase their own server and networking infrastructure, as well the expertise necessary to maintain their websites. This proved both costly and challenging for most businesses, paving the way for hosting companies to lease server space for a fraction of the cost. But there was still a skills gap. Traditional hosting services required customers to maintain their own systems, a challenge that gained prominence as services and system architecture grew more complex. Hosting companies quickly noticed the high demand for technical assistance from customers who lacked the capabilities to manage their own environments.  

10. Top Benefits of Managed Hosting Economies of scale, network uptime, expertise and the ability to outsource repetitive tasks unrelated to one’s core business are among the most important benefits of managed hosting. Learn About Hosting Management.   • Time Savings: With traditional, dedicated hosting, customers are required to manage their own networks, storage, servers and software upgrades. With managed hosting, much of the backend workload is taken care of so customers can focus on their applications and data. • Cost Savings:  Managed hosting plans trade capital expenditures for operational expenditures, meaning companies aren’t locked into expensive hardware refresh cycles and costs associated with maintaining on-premise data centers. Compared to unmanaged hosting services, managed hosting plans typically have a larger sticker price; however, the difference is  often made up in reduced labor costs, which are typically the No. 1 expense of operating IT infrastructure. • Technical Support: Available on-call around the clock, managed hosting providers employ technicians, system administrators and network operations engineers certified in a vast range of technologies. Hiring in-house for this degree of collective expertise is prohibitively expensive for all but the largest of enterprises. • Reliability: Quality managed hosting providers operate fully redundant, Tier 3 data centers staffed by a 24/7 network operations center team, resulting in reliable service and high uptime.        

11. Managed Hosting Differentiators: Solution Flexibility and SLAs Two areas of managed hosting plans most often distinguish service providers: levels of control offered to customers and service level agreements (SLAs), which stipulate benchmarks around performance and service quality.     First, some fully managed hosting plans restrict customers’ access to their own environments. Meaning, the provider owns the entire management process. While ideal for customers who have no interest in maintaining any aspect of their infrastructure, many companies prefer to maintain control of certain processes, and thus need root access. Co-Management plans allow customers to work as partners with the hosting provider to define areas of responsibility with granularity. Flexibility is also an important concern. Prospective customers should ask providers if they’ll be able to adapt the terms of the managed services at any point during the contract to accommodate changing needs. Secondly, SLAs are doubly important for managed hosting services, as the value-add extends well-beyond network up time. Make sure your provider’s SLA accounts for support response time, issue resolution and access to senior-level management in the event of severe incidents. Furthermore, customers should expect full transparency and ensure the provider has a means of displaying up-to-date status of SLA performance. Learn About Hosting Management.

12. Is Managed Hosting Secure? Managed hosting providers know that the confidence in their service is derived from their ability to secure and handle their customer’s data and information with sensitivity. Most hosting companies employ enterprise grade firewall, antivirus and network security solutions, and also ensure that only authorized personnel can access sensitive materials. Economies of scale is a factor here, as well. The cost of employing security personnel and technologies  to protect environments is drastically lower per customer since the provider spreads these costs across their install base. Customers can also access premium managed security services such as DDoS (distributed denial of service) identification and mitigation at the network level and OS hardening and patching at the server level. Learn About Hosting Management.

13. Future of Managed Hosting: Software Defined Management for the Hybrid Cloud World As more companies are choosing to move their infrastructure off-premise, the managed hosting industry is expected to grow for the foreseeable future. The biggest change, however, will be how providers manage environments. Most companies are opting for hybrid or multi-cloud strategies, in which applications are hosted in multiple environments and different providers. As a result leading hosting providers like INAP are turning toward advanced automation and software defined processes for managing customer operating systems regardless of where they’re hosted. By putting the workload and application first, companies can derive the benefits of flexible, hybrid hosting solutions while consolidating complex monitoring and management tools to one provider.

14. Thank You So Much For Paying Attention - RIYA JAIN