Hello All,

I have just joined this forum after frequent stops as a guest looking thru the different topics. I have been considering starting an e-business. While looking thru the possibilities reseller webhosting has perked my interest. It seems to be a conservative investment that will require a fairly small amount of starting investment, a constantly rising need, and a new experience that has a good potential to grow, should i find that it is right 4 me.

To start my broad question i will provide some information about myself. I have never ran an ebusiness before, and i have never actually published a website. I a fair knowledge of HTML and the workings of various aspects of the web. I tend to be a hands on learner but can grasp most consepts thru reading. I understand that customer support will be fairly demanding and that this isnt to be taken lightly if u wish to succeed. And most importantly I am extremely willing and able to learn.

These is a broad questions that I am sure has been broached throughout various forum posts, but I wish to gather them all into one place to get me started.

What programs/software should i familiarize myself with? What scripting/programming languages would i benifit from familiarizing myself with or learning. What are the pros and cons of hosting on a Linux Server/Windows Server. And are than any specific websites that would help get me started? These questions pertain to shared hosting.

I know that the questions i am asking are rather vague, but i donot intend to jump into this hastily and desire to spend a fair amount of time familiarizing myself and deciding whether this is right for me.

Thanks for your time. And thanks ahead 4 ur responses.

Well here are a few ;)
What programs/software should i familiarize myself with?
Most Control Panels like CPanel,Plesk, DirectAdmin, Ensim etc
Billing Softwares like : LPanel, ModernBill, WHM Autopilot etc

scripting/programming languages
Well, here , sky is the limit....PHP/ASP, mysql, etc

What are the pros and cons of hosting on a Linux Server/Windows Server.

I prefer Linux as I love it ;) I dont see any cons beside some issues with JSP/ASP support on the server. More stable , more secure :)

Have some nice preparation to plunge into this wonderfull world of eBusiness.

Choose a reseller host that has been around for at least a year.

Test their support.

Some resellers offer both Windows and Linux, this allows you to offer both.

Thank u guys for your responses and advice.

Firestarter, or anyone else who cares to add. Could u go into better detail about the different scripts/programming languages, that would be benificial? As in what are the ones that are a must know and which would just be a benifit.

I would also like to know the various benifits of the two main hosting platforms: Windows/Linux. In all likelyhood I would ultimately end up offering both, but will most likely start out offering just one. I would like to decide early as to which i will offer first, so I can focus my learning on the various aspects of that platform, then gear myself towards the other.

Thanks Again

Programming languages I suggest php / perl / c these are highly used on the serverside as well as the end user where you develop control panels.

As for which is better linux / windows both has its advantages and disadvantages. Thus you cant really compare to two. As long as you get what needs to be done. Example is windows server support mssql, asp.net, asp, while linux does not support those. While linux is known for its mysql, jsp, php, etc..

Usually the client does not care what OS it is on as long as it support what they need to do and devlop.

Language wise, you don't actually need to know any necessarily - if you are only offeirng hosting and not site design/programming, then why would you need to be a php programmer for example?
Any programming qustions from your clients are outside the scope of the support you provide....
OTOH, it is *nice* to be able to answer such questions.

windows vs linux - I would suggest that, unless you especially need to offer asp/asp.net or MS SQL Server then go linux every time.
Those aside, it should not matter one jot to the client and IME, windows control panels are fewer in number and a lot less developed than linux equivalents.
For example, cPanel for linux is great, the Windows version is in development hell
Plesk for linux is pretty mature, Plesk for Windows still suffers from a lot of problems.

Also, you can get great things like fantastico for cpanel which adds a load of scripts you can install quickly and easily. There is, I believe an equivalent for Plesk.
Windows? forget it :(

Not such an issue as a reseller, as you provider should do this sort of stuff, but once you move on to a dedicated box, there are loads of tools like firewalls, antivirus software, anti spam software, root kit tools etc available for linux, again for free, which you just don't seem to get with windows.

As I say, windows is great if you need to offer asp/asp.net (yes, there is chiliasp! and project mono, but they're just not the same), otherwise no major advantages leap out that I can see...

Originally posted by disofthosting

Those aside, it should not matter one jot to the client and IME, windows control panels are fewer in number and a lot less developed than linux equivalents.
For example, cPanel for linux is great, the Windows version is in development hell
Plesk for linux is pretty mature, Plesk for Windows still suffers from a lot of problems.


Hsphere is an excellent CP for windows

Hi,

Is that "excellent - for a windows control panel", or "an excellent control panel" ;)

I looked at a number of them not so long ago (Can't remember if hspehere was one of them tbh) and none of them came close to many of the linux cpanels.
In fairness, it's not just the control panel to consider - but all the other stuff like apf/rkhunter/bfd/mailscanner etc etc that you can get for linux boxes that just leave windows in the shade.

I am actually an asp/asp.net developer by trade, but from a hosting point of view, I prefer linux hosting!

I have not seen a control panel that matches Hsphere's functionality and automation, whether Linux or Windows. cPanel is good, but it comes no where close to the cluster-based features and automation that Hsphere offers.

Since you brought up Windows vs Linux (my favorite discussion topic ;)), I prefer Windows because .NET is a very good platform to develop in. I am a pretty good C++/VisualBasic programmer and what .NET allows me to do is develop sites in both these languages and combine them into a single unit :) Although I don't use PHP, a developer could integrate that as well with .NET if he wanted to all under one OS and one account :)

I also prefer SQL Server over MySQL because of features such as SPs, etc. that MySQL can't offer

There is no reason why a customer should should choose Linux by default. We have many windows customers using their accounts for rather large MySQL/PHP websites.

Give me one solid reason why customers should not consider Windows.

Oh absolutely re: developing in .NET, and MS SQL Server. I am very happy working with them and have done so for years.
Looking for hosting myself though, I would choose linux over windows unless I specifically needed asp/.net or SQL Server because of the wealth of features offered usually offered compated to a windows plan.

As a hosting provider I prefer linux too, partly because there is so much free stuff around to enable you to manage and protect your severs, but also because there seems to be a wealth of information out there about installing/configuring/maintaining/troubleshooting linux based hosting boxes, whereas on the windows side, it's generally people asking questions and getting no answers :(

I'm not saying people should not consider windows hosting - but if you don't need specific windows features, why would you *want* to choose windows hosting?

Originally posted by disofthosting

As a hosting provider I prefer linux too, partly because there is so much free stuff around to enable you to manage and protect your severs, but also because there seems to be a wealth of information out there about installing/configuring/maintaining/troubleshooting linux based hosting boxes, whereas on the windows side, it's generally people asking questions and getting no answers :(


Windows includes everything needed to really put websites online out of the box. Windows 2003 is ready-to-go security-wise out of the box. On the otherhand, our admins spend a subtantial amount of time securing linux boxes and hardening the file system, etc. I have never had a situtation where we couldn't find out why a Windows issue is occuring. MS has an excellent knowledge base and 24x7 support. You got excellent logging and performance monitoring available on Windows as well.

Maintaining windows boxes is substantially easier than maintaining linux, at least in my experience. If you have good windows administrators, they do an excellent job keeping the servers up.

From a hosting provider perspective, Windows does not come with everything needed - yes, you could give all your clients remote desktop access to the server and let them set up sites in IIS, but would you really want to do that?

I'm talking about windows vs linux from a hosting provider point of view, and also as a hosting client.

The windows control panels I've seen have paled in comparison to the linux ones.

In terms of security, windows does not come with antivirus software, eg for scanning emails. I have tried clamwin and not gotten on with it. clamav for linux + mailscanner however, work very well for me.

Point me to the windows equivalents of bfd/mailscanner/logwatch/fantastico/rootkit hunter etc etc please and I might reconsider my views on the matter.
Sure, you can shell out thousands on commercial products, but then the cost of providing a windows hositng server vs a linux hosting one becomes so disproportinate that not many would consider it.

Considered in isloation, not as a web hosting provider "tool" then I prefer windows servers, but not for the purposes of mult web hosting.

Anyway, I think we have strayed way off the "advice on reseller hosting" which was the original topic of conversation.
Some people love windows, some people love linux - go with whatever you are happiest with.

Originally posted by disofthosting


Point me to the windows equivalents of bfd/mailscanner/logwatch/fantastico/rootkit hunter etc etc please and I might reconsider my views on the matter.


http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/f...kitreveal.shtml

Hi,

Can you try posting the link again - it comes up in the browser exactly as it appears in your post, with the "..." in the address, so it's not a valid link.

thanks

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/rootkitreveal.shtml

Cool thanks, that's one of them sorted anyway ;)

Originally posted by disofthosting
From a hosting provider perspective, Windows does not come with everything needed - yes, you could give all your clients remote desktop access to the server and let them set up sites in IIS, but would you really want to do that?


No one gives Remote Desktop Access, I do not know what you are talking about. In linux, do you give all your customers SSH access to setup sites? No you don't. We give control panels whether linux or windows.

Originally posted by disofthosting

The windows control panels I've seen have paled in comparison to the linux ones.


Well, you don't have any experience with HSphere then so making a blanket statement like that is not right. Hsphere is an excellent windows CP

Originally posted by disofthosting
In terms of security, windows does not come with antivirus software, eg for scanning emails. I have tried clamwin and not gotten on with it. clamav for linux + mailscanner however, work very well for me.


ClamAV is a free-ware antivirus tool. They do have the resources and and sort of strategy/structure to deal with emerging virus threats like companies such as TrendMicro, Symantec, McAffee, etc. do. What you pay to these companies is used to make software that works and that are far more effective than ClamAV. They aren't very expensive either, and you can easily integrate these tools with a commercial Windows mail server. There are many commercial linux AVs available (TrendMicro makes Linux versions too) and I'd give them much more respect than ClamAV. FYI, there is a freeware antivirus tool for windows as well - AVG.

qmail/vpopmail has its limitations especially on large mail domain systems (in terms of mail boxes). Some of the commercial mail server solutions I've worked with outperform qmail with mssql as their backend.

Originally posted by disofthosting

Point me to the windows equivalents of bfd/mailscanner/logwatch/fantastico/rootkit hunter etc etc please and I might reconsider my views on the matter.
Sure, you can shell out thousands on commercial products, but then the cost of providing a windows hositng server vs a linux hosting one becomes so disproportinate that not many would consider it.


Any good windows administrator can put Windows Performance monitor and the logging capabilities to good use. You can easily monitor every service on the system and configure alerts to be sent by email or whatever. Fantastico, that is nothing but a collection of free scripts. I have never liked the idea of that because many of these scripts get quickly out-dated with security holes, etc. This leaves the customer and risk and they come back to blame the host.

What you pay for is what you get. If I had the choice between a free product that was being developed by a loose group programmers, and a product costing $1000 developed by an established firm, well tested backed by 24x7 support, I'd anyway pay the $1000 especially if I plan to offer commercial services with it.

Originally posted by disofthosting

Considered in isloation, not as a web hosting provider "tool" then I prefer windows servers, but not for the purposes of mult web hosting.


We run Dual XEON SCSI servers with 1000 to 1500 domains each. They perform flawlessly. We have a team of administrators that has been working with this OS for 2 years and know it in and out, literally. So saying that it cannot be used for multi-domain web hosting is false.

I do not intend to come off strongly, but I do seek to educate the many who misunderstand Windows as a hosting platform.

Originally posted by Yash (JodoHost)
[B]No one gives Remote Desktop Access, I do not know what you are talking about. In linux, do you give all your customers SSH access to setup sites? No you don't. We give control panels whether linux or windows.


My comment was in response to you saying that windows comes with everything you need to host websites. OF course I wouldn't give ssh access to everyone, no more than I would give remote desktop - but without a control panel to manage things, and windows does *not* come with a control panel, then remote desktop and access to iis is the only way I can think of.


Well, you don't have any experience with HSphere then so making a blanket statement like that is not right. Hsphere is an excellent windows CP


If you re-read what I said, I said that that the windows control panels *I have seen*. I have not looked at Hsphere or, if I did, I don't remember it so it did not impress me. It was not intended as, nor written as, a blanket statement about all windows control panels.
This is only an opinion anyway, nothing more.....


ClamAV is a free-ware antivirus tool. They do have the resources and and sort of strategy/structure to deal with emerging virus threats like companies such as TrendMicro, Symantec, McAffee, etc. do. What you pay to these companies is used to make software that works and that are far more effective than ClamAV. They aren't very expensive either, and you can easily integrate these tools with a commercial Windows mail server. There are many commercial linux AVs available (TrendMicro makes Linux versions too) and I'd give them much more respect than ClamAV.


This comes back to another thing I said:
"Sure, you can shell out thousands on commercial products, but then the cost of providing a windows hositng server vs a linux hosting one becomes so disproportinate that not many would consider it."

I am well aware of symantec etc - indeed, I use Norton AV on all my windows PC's at home, but when you buy that, buy a decent mail server, firewall etc etc, then you have paid a heck of a lot to get the sort of facilities that you get get for linux boxes from sourceforge and other such places.
Not all freeware is pants, equally not all paid for software is worth the money....

FYI, there is a freeware antivirus tool for windows as well - AVG.

Yes, but I have not heard good things about this.


Any good windows administrator can put Windows Performance monitor and the logging capabilities to good use. You can easily monitor every service on the system and configure alerts to be sent by email or whatever.


I think you are missing my point really. It's not about what you can do with windows, given enough time, money, and resource.
I was merely pointing out that you get a lot more bang for your buck with a linux hosting server than a windows one.
In part because some things are not available, in part because you generally have to pay a lot of money in the windows world to get what you get for free in the linux world.
If you are tyring to run a hosting business and you have a choice between spending thousands and spending hundreds, I would suggest that the latter is more likely, particularly when to your clients, it may make sod all difference (asp/sql server requirements aside)

I am not trying to say that one OS is better than another - that is not the issue, but seems to be what you are bringing it around to.


Fantastico, that is nothing but a collection of free scripts. I have never liked the idea of that because many of these scripts get quickly out-dated with security holes, etc. This leaves the customer and risk and they come back to blame the host.


Fantastico gives the clients pretty much 1-click install of 40-50 scripts. They do actually keep it pretty up to date as it happens.
Even if they did not, the installer is available and you can choose to purchase it or not for your clients to use. You don't have that choice on windows.

With plesk for example, there is a 3rd party ( I forget who) doing a fantastico-a-like for plesk for linux.
Plesk for windows gets the "application vault" with 8 scripts in it.
As an end user, would you prefer a choice of 8 or 48?


What you pay for is what you get. If I had the choice between a

That's a bit sweeping TBH - mySQL, apache, linux are all very well respected products.
They are all available for free.
That does not make them amateurish or bug-ridden.


free product that was being developed by a loose group programmers, and a product costing $1000 developed by an established firm, well tested backed by 24x7 support, I'd anyway pay the $1000 especially if I plan to offer commercial services with it.


Again, this is not a windows vs linux contest. The original poster was talking in terms of a reseller account. Clearly shelling out $1000 isn't in his immediate game plan.

It isn't even about free vs paid, since cPanel, plesk, fantastico are all paid for products as hsphere is.

Please stop making this discussion about something it's not.


So saying that it cannot be used for multi-domain web hosting is false.

I do not intend to come off strongly, but I do seek to educate the many who misunderstand Windows as a hosting platform.

That's fine that you don't want to come off strongly, but you are not actually reading my posts correctly. I never said windows cannot be used for multi domain hosting. I know it can - I do actually offer windows hosting plans myself.
I still think linux hosting has more to offer clients than windows hosting - as I said before, unless you really need asp or sql server, what reason would you as a client have for choosing windows over linux hosting?
Again, I am not debating the merits of windows the operating system vs linux the operating system.
Nor am I suggesting that you simply cannot do things on windows that you can do on linux - you can, but it may cost you a lot of money.

Can we please just leave it as some people prefer linux hosting than windows hosting? I think this thread has gone on long enough - apologies to the original posted.

Well, you are arguing that the total cost of running and maintaing a windows system for hosting is higher. I disagree.

I am not arguing which operating system is better. I am arguing that Windows and linux are equal players.

ClamAV can hardly be considered as having a good reputation to catch viruses. I've seen AVG catch more viruses than the win version of ClamAV which I have used.

Mailenable is a free-ware windows mail server that is quite powerful and can handle alot of load.

Apart from that, all other software whether backup or firewall are available both proprietary and open source for both windows and linux. There are free firewall solutions for windows as well although I'd only trust those CISO PIX external firewals that are used.

Originally posted by disofthosting
That's a bit sweeping TBH - mySQL, apache, linux are all very well respected products.
They are all available for free.
That does not make them amateurish or bug-ridden.
.

Definately not, they are great products. And you have equivalents available for free with Windows as well that are equally good. I am referring to the 3rd party software you are referring to. I personally would not trust a sourceforge project for something as critical as backup or security unless that project was very widely used.

Originally posted by disofthosting

I think you are missing my point really. It's not about what you can do with windows, given enough time, money, and resource.
I was merely pointing out that you get a lot more bang for your buck with a linux hosting server than a windows one.
.

As I have said before, we actually spend LESS time on the windows servers than we do on the linux ones. A good reason why I prefer Windows.

As for getting more bang per buck in linux than for windows, I do not see where I am spending more money on Windows? We spend money on both are linux and windows servers equally, for both backup and security. I like to rely more on proprietary software for 3rd party solutions, you may like to rely on opensource.

So why should consumers not give Windows equal preference?

To quote the last line in my first post in this thread:
As I say, windows is great if you need to offer asp/asp.net (yes, there is chiliasp! and project mono, but they're just not the same), otherwise no major advantages leap out that I can see...

I'm still not seeing any major advantages in anything you have said, either to the end client, or to the reseller who asked the question.

Thanks for your contribution, it's been....interesting ;)

I never mentioned any advantages, I was just arguing against your views. You were stating your reasons why windows shoudn't be used as a hosting platform, I was countering them.

Let me turn your question around. Give me any major advantages of using Linux against Windows. Windows gives you everything linux does plus more.

But that said, my advice to an end-user is always go with an affordable, reliable and established company to host your website that fulfills your requirements. Whether they host you on linux or windows shouldn't matter much to you although if you would require ASP.NET & ASP, Windows would be your only option for the moment.

To resellers, I think you'd find it very profitable to sell windows along with Linux.

For the record, we offer Linux hosting as well and host quite a number of linux customers. Both our windows and linux servers perform very well and we do good business from both of them.

I have enjoyed your somewhat heated debate. I had expected a debate to arise over that question, and am greatful it was rather small and informed. I could start quoting and asking various questions about those quotes, but I would have to be better informed about various aspect before doing so.

The conversations have left me with a new insite as to both of the platforms I had inquired about, so I have gained the majority of the information i was desiring.

I now come down to the choice of deciding which to use initially, both having their pros and cons. Altho I believe some of the things will be a null point for me because I intend to concentrate on shared reseller hosting at first, I now have future insite about what I need to know to step up to VPS, or a dedicated server.

I will need to decide on my target audience and consider what their requirements would be. Both platforms seem to offer "equivalents" of most things, some may cost more than others, but that is also something to consider. I had initially been vearing towards the windows platform for one sole reason, I am very aquainted with that platform. I have never ran any linux distro, not that it hadn't crossed my mind frequently, but because windows is still the dominant OS in most aspects beside networking/server/business. On those aspects it seems to be a toss up between windows, linux, and unix (which is closely related to linux from what I understand). And my use of computers has been better suited to windows until now.

After doing a bit of research into web hosting, and reading the previous debate, I have been left with one question.

Would it hurt me and my potential customers if i were to offer Linux hosting with my limited linux knowledge?

Keep in mind that I am initially looking towards using a reseller plan,
and I consider myself able to quicky grasp anything related to computers, except programming, which takes a bit of effort to understand.

Hi,

I feel your pain about the windows/linux dilemma too - I have been using windows since v3.0, many moons ago - and windows development is where I earn my bread and butter, so I too had the issue of "go with what you knoW" vs the great unknown etc.
At the time, about 3 years ago, very few hosters offered windows packages, and certainly not at affordable prices - though this has now changed somewhat.

Anyway, I went with linux hosting and learned what I needed to. Now we have started offering windows servers, I am back to more familiar territory - though I have to say, it does not really help because web hosting/control panels/the various issues people have are not really relevant to all my years of windows, so in that sense it doesn't help much.
Sure, I know where to find the event viewer and stuff like that, but it's still a whole other ball game.

Certainly as a reseller, your need to know the underlying operating system is pretty minimal - you are unlikely to have full access to the box anyway to do the sorts of things you might want to do - eg install firewalls, anti virus etc. This sort of thing would be under the control of your provider because they would not want an individual doing something that affects everyone else on the server.

I would say that your lack of knowledge of the control panel you are provided with is going to be the issue more than any operating system knowledge - you could be a windows god, but still not know why you can't delete that domain in plesk for windows, or a linux guru yet you have no idea why all your clients appear to have unlimited disk space and bandwidth in WHM etc.

You should be reasonably supported by your provider to deal with problems you have, or answer your questions - though don't expect to just pass all YOUR clients issues onto them as they won't be happy with that.

Find a provider you think you'd be happy with, in the price range you have budgeted for and, if they offer both for about the same money then flip a coin ;)

Remember though - if you NEED asp or asp.net then you really have to go with windows. There are linux sort of equivalents but any windows programmer will tell you they are just *not* the same and they would rather host on a "proper" asp/asp.net server

good luck!

Thanks to everyone who posted on this thread. I believe I gained the information I was seeking with this post. Your information was extremely helpful and I plan to use it the best that I can.

On to a new thread.

Thanks,
PopRawkS

make sure they provide good service in installing script and management for u if you're usual with server setting (VPS)