I'm considering going with HostingMatters. They have "search engine' listed in their features table. Would this be a search engine program I can set up a page to access so that users can use it to find pages with particular information on my website?

Other hosts I'm considering don't mention this, just "search engine submittal" and things like that. Is a site search engine as standard a feature as a cgi bin, or is it something that I would need to ask each host about?

Also, Server Side Includes is a standard feature, right? And can I count on being able to use it on any host by editing a .htaccess file instead of renaming all my files to .shtml?

The other hosts besides HostingMatters that I'm considering right now are akashik.net and jaguarpc.

Well even though we're in the running I'll mention HM's search engine submit as it's the same as any cpanel server uses. :)

The search engine submit is a script that submits your site to a selection of search engines automatically. Type in your URL, poke a button and sit back. Having said that.. there is a serious advantage to hand submitting your site to the majors, as well as looking at search engine optimizing tactics - ie: what makes your website look more attractive to SE spiders.

As for SSI, yes it's available to pretty much any account on any server has allows mod_rewite (.htaccess) Just make a .htaccess file that has the following:

AddType text/x-server-parsed-html .html

and your .shtml files can be named .html and still include your SSI headers etc

Greg Moore

oh...

as for a website search engine I personally recommend this one:
http://phpdig.toiletoine.net/

It's free, easy to set up, and easy to customize. It acts as a mini SE spider. Type in the URL at the top of your account (your domain name), and it spiders your site via links and meta tags.. very slick :)

Greg Moore

Thanks, Greg.

Oh, I guess I can just find a search engine script and use it on my site instead of depending on my webhost to provide one, can't I. I'm new to the whole idea of having a cgi-bin. :)

I did a search and found several scripts. So that shouldn't be an issue.

yes certainly. The advantage of having a cgi-bin, or the ability to use PHP and Perl scripts is that it allows you to install a massive range of features of your own into your account.

A good example would be to go to http://www.hotscripts.com and view their PHP and Perl sections (around 9000 scripts on that site alone and mostly free)

Greg Moore