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Joomla Web Hosting

Written by Marco Conti Saturday, 25 October 2008 19:03

Web hosting is a critical component of your web business and should not be left to chance. Joomla and most other Open Source scripts are actually quite tolerant of less than ideal hosting set ups, but that's no reason to skimp or try to save a few dollars by choosing the cheapest or most convenient host (such as the one where you bought your domain name).

For those of you that can't wait to read the how's and why's of choosing a hosting plan, these are the hosting companies, in order of preference, I usually suggest to my clients for their hosting needs:

For Joomla and most PHP based Open Source scripts a LAMP (Linux, Apache, PHP, MySql) based host is usually preferred. But not all LAMP servers are created equal. In addition to using Apache and PHP, a host also uses a specific "Control Panel" which is a "web Hosting Automation Program", a graphical interface to the hosting software main functions.

As with servers, there are many kinds of Control Panels with various features and not all of them work the same. Currently, the best Control panel for any kind of PHP script is "Cpanel/WHM". Other popular control panels are Plesk, Ensim and H-Sphere, as well as several custom programs used by the major hosting services like GoDaddy, 1&1 and others.

Over the years I have had the chance to work with all of these programs and Cpanel/WHM is hands down the best for the average website owners needs. It combines powerful features with ease of use.

Choosing the best Control Panel

But even within Cpanel, hosts can choose to offer features sets that can make managing your server easier or harder as the case may be. Many servers turn off useful features to force customers to upgrade to a premium plan. Others use older versions of the software that are not as powerful. In other words, it pays to do your research and ask those that have more experience.

In general, I have created my own list of desirable features for a server control panel:

Easily accessible features from the main page
Access to backup features (such as a single backup page with individual database backups and directlory backup. A "restore backup" feature is also highly desirable)
Good email management (with forwarder, webmail, etc.)
Stats management
Easy access to PhpMyAdmin, Crons and other server features
Powerful file manager. A file manager should be able to:
- Upload and download files
- Create and expand archives (.zip files)
- Easily move, rename and manage files and file permissions
- Create and delete files and directories
- File edit

Sadly, Control Panels with all these features turned on are few and far between outside of Cpanel/WHM. Yet, the lack of some of the key features above can easily put your website and your investment at risk or require you (or your web developer) to invest far more time than necessary performing routine tasks. Cpanel X3 (one of the latest versions of Cpanel/WHM) has all of the features above and then some. When I use Cpanel, performing a Joomla installation and then a full site backup usually takes me around a 1/2 hour. Just recently I had to setup a website for a friend on GoDaddy.com and the same exact process took me closer to 3 hours.

Note: Since I first wrote this post, GoDaddy has begun offering Cpanel/WHM as an option in their shared hosting accounts. If you already have a GoDaddy hosting plan or you were considering getting one, I would strongly suggest you request the Cpanel option.

With Cpanel I was able to upload the Joomla installation script archive directly to the server and expand it. I created a database and after installation I backed up just the installation directory and the database locally with a couple of clicks. On GoDaddy, I had no way to expand the archive on the server so I had to FTP the expanded file system. The database was only slightly more cumbersome, but when it came to backing up the files and the database I had to once again FTP the files down and I had to use PHPmyAdmin to backup the database. Even on its best day FTP is slow and unreliable and always time consuming.

Speaking of backups, Cpanel easy to use backup system involves a simple click for the files and one for the database. Backing up your database is especially important with Joomla, Wordpress or any other script. In fact, you should get into the habit of backing up before any changes are made to the website. I learned that the hard way. But, if I had to go through the process GoDaddy forces me to go through each time I have to make a simple backup, even I would not do it as often, consequently risking my site's well being and countless hours of grief.

What is "Shared Hosting"?

By and large, most hosting plans are so called "Shared plans". In other words, your hosting account will be one of many on a given server. How many? Often on the order of hundreds of other accounts, and note that I am saying "accounts" not websites. Since an account from a good host can usually have multiple websites hosted within, it's likely that your website will rub shoulders with another thousands or so websites, all on the same server.

Naturally, this can slow you down and it limits what you can do with your website to an extent. Let's say that one of your new hosting pals decides to start sending spam from the same IP address your site is on, suddently your emails will get bounced by spam filters. Or let's say that some genius is sharing files or uploading videos to their site, your site will start running a lot slower.

The cure for that is to get your own server. But a dedicated server can be quite expensive. Often to the tune of $200 or $300+ a month.
A good solution is to use a VPS or "Virtual Private Server". The idea is similar to shared hosting, with the difference that each customer has a separate installation of the server and different IP addresses. In essence, you share the same machine, but everything elase is separate. As with shared hosting, if a fellow squatter is a "youtube" wannabe, your server will sklow down as well. Often considerably, but for every other purpose it will be like having a dedicated server at a fraction of the cost. As low as $245 a month in some cases.

Dedicated servers are great, but they require a certain amount of knowledge to maintain them and most hosts provide limited support to teir dedicated customers. In this regard the exception is Hostgator.com, whom has excellent tech support for all their plans, shared or dedicated. They also offer a sort of "hybrid" they call a "reseller plan" whereas you have essentially a shared account but you can resell hosting to others and give each customer their own Cpanel access. This is a great option for those that have multiple websites and like to have each on a separate Cpanel. (but that's not essential, since Hostgator's plans allow as many websites as you can fit on your allocated disk space)

What should I pay?

Another important factor when purchasing hosting is cost. No, it's not important for the reason you think. Saving money should really be your last worry unless you are only trying to build a website for your pet hamster or some site yu don't really care about. Cost is important because hosting is not where you should concentrate on trying to save money. Buy the best hosting you can afford but buy hosting based on al the factors listed above, not on cost.

The difference between expensive hosting and cheap hosting is often as little as $4 or $5, or what I like to call a "Grande Latte" at Starbucks. Is the grief and the time wasted dealing with an inferior hosting plan worth the savings? My experience tells me no. And if your business is so strapped that you can't afford the extra $5 a month a good plan costs, then maybe you should rethink your strategy.

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