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An Introduction to UNIX Web Hosting

What Is UNIX? UNIX was first developed in AT&T's Bell Laboratories in the early 1970's. In the four decades of use, the UNIX operating system has earned the reputation as one of the most powerful, versatile and flexible secure operating systems around.

The UNIX operating system has been under constant development ever since its inception. It is extremely stable system for servers, desktops and laptops.

UNIX systems also have a graphical user interface similar to Microsoft Windows which provides an easy to use environment. In the early 1980's, UNIX systems began to grow rapidly and was noticed by industry analysts and researchers. Throughout the 1980's, the debate about the strengths and weaknesses of UNIX systems often raged. And, in an effort to further differentiate competing UNIX system products, analysts kept developing and adding features of their own.

Why Should I Choose UNIX?

You should choose the platform based on your website needs. Define specific functions you need your website to perform along with the programming language and database required to perform them.

What is Free BSD and OpenBSD?

There are two main Unix-based operating systems: FreeBSD and OpenBSD. The good thing about these systems is that they seem to be very stable once you install them on your machines. OpenBSD is also known to be one of the most secure operating system in the world. But with OpenBSD you will have to sacrifice some features for security. Again the best thing about these systems is that they are both free.

What Scripting Languages Are Available For UNIX?

UNIX supports a wide variety of application languages, more than any other operating system. The most common include C, C++, Shell, Perl, Tcl, Python, Java and PHP.

What Databases Does UNIX Support?

Databases available for UNIX are SQL and mySQL. Which one you choose depends on your needs and what your Web Hosting Provider offers. This is an important item for you to review when choosing your web hosting company.

Why is UNIX better for your hosting purposes?

Most obviously because it is cheaper than Windows. It is also more reliable and secure. About 70% of the internet web servers run UNIX/LINUX operating system.

What Is Linux?

Linux is an Open Source Unix-type operating system. A young student named Linus Torvalds at the University of Helsinki in Finland initially created it as a hobby. Today, it has become quite popular worldwide because of its functionality and availability. This is functionally very similar to UNIX, so most web servers will use Linux.

Linux is a very popular open source operating system today and several users run websites that support PHP. Many really enjoy the open-source atmosphere and is the reason it continues to grow.

What Is Apache?

The Apache HTTP Server is an open-source HTTP server for modern operating systems including UNIX and Windows NT. Apache has been the most popular web server on the Internet since 1996 because of its reputation as a secure, efficient and extensible server, in sync with the current HTTP standards.