How to Recognize a Professional Web Hosting Company

Sunday, November 22, 2009

One of the big problems is that when you are looking for a professional web hosting company, you are often at a loss to what you have to look out for to be able to identify a good professional company.

Because there are so many companies out there, you might be overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information out there. So this article is really a checklist on some of the things that you might want to look out for when you are choosing one of these companies, and keep this list close to your mind as you go through the list.


One of the more important things to look out for is the range of services that they have, and they should give you an option of having a shared server option, a virtual server and a dedicated server option.

Those tiers should also be split into two main categories of consumer and professional level web hosting solutions. There should be as much options as possible when considering what to choose and how you can level them out to fit your own needs online. This is something that is quite important as well.

Another thing you need to think about is the level of hardware that you are getting. One of the things that most good and professional web hosting companies often offer is a range of hardware options that you can choose from. Some might be lower level servers to high level servers, depending on your needs of course.

One thing that gets most people is that they are often stuck with limited choice, and no matter how intensive their online operations might be, they are often limited by the hardware of the companies that they have chosen and this is something that needs to be addressed from the start.

Another thing is the security features that are on the web hosting company's plan. One thing that you need to know is that the most important feature on your web site is the sort of security that you need to be able to promise to your customers.

For one thing, you need to be able to know that you need to protect against and that list can include Trojans, worms, malware, spyware and hackers. Also, since the financial transaction is also one of the more important things when thinking about the Ecommerce side of web hosting is that you also need to be able to give your customers the peace of mind that their financial information is safe and sound.

These are some of the things that you need to know when you are looking for a professional web hosting company. You need to be able to get a checklist of this whenever you are appraising one company from another, and see the features and services that they are trying to offer to you. It is important that you need to get a good web hosting company that is professional and can give you the level of reliability that you need.

How to Find a good Web Hosting provider?

Saturday, November 21, 2009

There is no one service which will please everyone. You can find free web hosts services by searches on Google and other search engines for "free web hosting".

How to choose a choose web hosting provider Choosing a free web host can be tough, especially since they are many who claim to be the best free hosts around. There are some that are great, some that are average, and some that are really bad. They might offer nice features, but with ads on your site.

They wont put advertisements on your site, but have really bad features and/or support. Choosing a good free host is usually a hit or a miss, and can be frustrating at times. Remember that you don't get any guarantees with free hosting, so if your site isn't there when you wake up next morning, you can't complain about it because its free!

Make sure you have these features when choosing a free host:

  • More than 100Mb disk space
  • More than 1Gb bandwidth
  • At least 1 FTP account
  • Free subdomain (i.e yourname.freewebhostprovider.com)
  • Allowed to host your own domain
  • No ads on your sites
  • Some good free hosts may offer:
    cPanel Control Panel or DirectAdmin Control Panel
    MySQL Databases, PHP, CGI
    Email Accounts
    Allowed to put up your own ads
    Reliability (this is hard to determine)
    Automatic software installer (Install a blog in minutes!)
    Community Forum, to discuss your website(s)

You can’t really expect too much from a free host, since they are providing the service for free.

THE IMPORTANCE OF WEB HOSTING SECURITY

Thursday, November 19, 2009

What do you look for in a web host? A low price? Reliability and good support I hope. If you’re anything like today’s ambitious webmaster, you’re on the hunt for the best features. There’s a lot of programs and management tools available to make your site standout but I bet there are some features you pay no mind at all. Often overlooked but one should never forget about critical security features as they will help to keep your web hosting environment protected from an array of threats.

Security features are abundant but here some you simply can’t do without:

SFTP
Short for Secure File Transfer Protocol, SFTP is more efficient and secure variation of FTP. In its purest form, FTP only has the ability to transfer files, leaving them vulnerable to a range of security breaches such as eavesdropping, tampering and even interception of the entire file. A web hosting company offering SFTP provides you with the ability to secure your files in transit with SSH (Secure Shell Host), a protocol that protects data with government recommended 128-bit encryption.

SSL
Secure Sockets Layer or SSL, should be incorporated on any website that sells products or services. SSL is a standard encryption protocol designed to keep Internet communications secure. If a web hosting company doesn’t support a shared or private SSL certificate, you need to turn in the opposite direction and find yourself another provider.

Data Backups
Data backup and restoration is not only something that should be practiced with the files on your hard drive, but those on the web host’s server as well. All it takes is one technical difficulty or natural disaster for the web hosting company to lose a server and all of your website data. The good thing is that most providers perform redundant backups to ensure that your data can be restored in the event of a failure. To be on the safe side, I recommend looking into a web host that offers a utility that allows you to backup your own data.

Network Security
Aside from protecting your files and website transactions, you also need to keep an eye out for security features that protect the web hosting company’s network. Do a little research to learn how the web host is protecting their infrastructure, keeping in mind that intrusion detection systems, firewalls, DDoS protection, virus and spam filtering are common features. Servers are prime targets of hackers and malicious code writers so if the hardware is breached or goes down, your website will suffer right along with it.These are just a few of numerous security features a web hosting company should offer to ensure the safety of your website data. Hackers are constantly trying to crack into web servers while malware writers are releasing new infectious strains everyday. A web host that doesn’t take this into mind is essentially leaving you wide open for exploitation.

CHOOSE THE RIGHT PAID WEB HOSTING THREE STEPS

Choosing a paid Web hosting services provider can be a challenge. There are literally thousands of companies that offer countless products and services. It can be a difficult task for a novice as well as for a seasoned professional, but it doesn’t have to be. We’ve broken the process down into three steps.

Step One: Free or Paid Hosting?
Step Two: Determine Expectations
Step Three: Compare Hosts in the Right Category

Step One: Free or Paid Hosting?To pay or not to pay?A large percentage of Web sites are ‘free’ and posted by individuals for personal reasons. Typically, these sites are associated with one of the larger portals such as Yahoo or AOL and consist of a page or two with limited content. If you’re looking to put up a personal site like this, look no further than the solutions offered by these two companies. The tools and applications such as email, community interest portals and photo management software provided are straightforward and make setting your site up very easy.

The downside to free hosting? Generally you'll have to put up with banner ads on your homepage or other ads you don’t get to pick. To be fair, it’s how these companies can afford to set up your infrastructure for free. All the same, you have no control over whose ad shows up on your site. If that’s unacceptable, a paid hosting solution (some start lower than $5/mo) might be your best bet.

Most Web hosting companies bundle services into a series of packages. The standard hosting service component is normally a bundle of disk storage space (where your site is stored) and bandwidth (the capacity for data transfer of a wired or wireless communication system.) In addition, hosting companies usually bundle email services with standard plans. The email service contains POP and IMAP solutions which direct email received through your site to desktop applications (Outlook® or Exchange®.) “Web-mail” is also provided to view and manage email through a Web browser.

Frequently, small businesses want a Web site that functions only as an online brochure that provides information about the business but not sell products. Standard packages are ideal if you’re building a simple brochure site. Additional service packages offer eCommerce, media intensive applications for video and audio sharing and dedicated servers, designed to back-up more complex business requirements. Paid solutions pretty much come down to whether you’re going to sell products and services online or just display information in a brochure format and what kind of customer and technical support you’ll require.

Step Two: Determine ExpectationsYou Get What you Pay ForThere are basically two price levels prevalent in Web hosting. There’s a large group of Low Price or Discount hosts that offer nice solutions from below $5 to $15 per month and there are hosts that offer solutions that start above $15 and the pricing goes up from there. Companies such as Affinity have developed a number of different hosting brands to help simplify the customer experience. As an example, Affinity uses the Host Save and Win Save brands for their low-cost hosting solutions and the Value Web brand for their premium services.

Customer service is usually the primary difference between inexpensive hosting solutions and the higher priced options. Here’s where the “you get what you pay for” maxim comes into play. Prior to choosing a provider it’s important to determine how serious you are. In other words, if the site is your small business lifeline, where you’ll find customers, display, sell and even ship products you probably don’t want a hosting company that won’t answer calls when there’s a problem. On the contrary, many experienced professionals would rather not talk to someone and prefer technical support and customer service through email or online chat.

Clarifying expectations ahead of time can mean the difference between a great online experience or completely frustrated and without support. The extra $10 per month may be worth the piece of mind it buys.

Step Three: Compare Hosts in the Right CategoryOnce you know whether you need a standard hosting plan or an eCommerce solution and whether low price or premium (a.k.a. better customer support) hosting is right for you, it’s time to shop. Any of the major search engines will provide a multitude of responses with a query such as Web Hosting or eCommerce hosting. You can even narrow your search with more definition. A search for “Cheap eCommerce hosting” will yield mostly companies whose solutions fall in the low price category.

Take some time and visit several hosting company’s Web sites. Go over plan options and see which offer the services and support that match your expectations. Because of the similarities, hosting plans can become confusing. Most major providers have a “Compare Plans” page you can print. Its good to print out the various packages and have them in hand while you shop.

Using Affinity’s Value Web brand as an example, some hosts offer a portal where you’re free to ask existing customers if they’re satisfied and recommend the provider. Look for this function as you shop, it’s an excellent tool in how to determine whether a company is right for you. Unless you’re an experienced professional you shouldn’t buy a solution without at least first talking to a sales rep at the company.

This gives a sense of the company’s commitment to its customers. Many also call the technical support numbers to see how long it takes to answer and how friendly and knowledgeable the staff is. Companies such as Affinity combined sales and support departments so when you order an account you’re talking to a technical support representative as well. This creates a forum in which all questions can be answered without having to be transferred to other departments.

It’s important to find a hosting relationship that fits your needs and whose level of involvement you feel comfortable with. Following these steps will make choosing a Web hosting solution easier and, hopefully, even fun.

WEB HOSTING WITH DOMAIN REGISTRATION IS VERY SIMPLE THING NOW A DAYS

Top rank, on the list below, could be given to the web hosting company that is most popular with it's customers. Because this is really a difficult stat to track, top rankings go to hosting that pays the most commission to it's sales affiliates (promoters of the hosting).

Payouts are easily tracked at cj.com under 5 bar Network Earnings, and by comparing commission of companies outside of cj.com. When payouts are good, the company shows good business relations.

Register your own domain name, Today!

Top 10 Web Hosting:

#1 iPowerWeb - 1500 GBs of space, 15,000 GBs of bandwidth and Free set up. Get a $50 free credit towards Google AdWords, and $25 free towards Yahoo Search Marketing. One good goal of iPowerWeb is to provide quality products and solutions at affordable prices. Now hosting over 700,000 websites, from over 100 countries! Hacker safe - tested daily!

#2 Reliable, Affordable, Unbeatable. Lunarpages takes care of your website, so you don't have to. Claim $25 off, with coupon code 25OffHosting . Plus, Free Domain for Life and Unlimited website hosting. Offers top web design templates and 24/7 award-winning support. All servers are tested daily and are hacker safe!

#3 Host Gator - Best dedicated web server hosting. 45 day Money-Back-Guarantee. 99.9% uptime guarantee! No contracts or hidden fees. Now hosting over 2 million domains! Meets all BBBOnLine membership standards!

#4 Reliable Business Hosting - Bluehost.com - Users can host unlimited domains! Claim a Free life-long domain, Today! Free site builder! Free set up, with no hidden fees. Maximum guaranteed uptime, for your site! See a Demo of the Blue Host Control Panel!

#5 Go Daddy - Offers Bulk Domain Registration, to save money! Web hosting, from $4.25 a month. No setup fee, no ad banners or pop-ups, and no annual commitment required! Offers free 24x7 monitoring. Voted "Best Registrar" in the 2009 Domain Name Wire annual survey, for the 4th consecutive year.

#6 Globat - The GX01 hosting package offers unlimited disk space, at only $4.44 a month. Zero set-up fees. 30 day money back and 100% customer satisfaction guarantee. Valid BBBOnLine Trustmark!

#7 Host Monster - Buy unlimited Domains on 1 account - for professionals. Free set up, no hidden fees. Now hosting over 450,000 domains! No long term contracts - cancel anytime, with No cancellation fee!

#8 StartLogic - Real people, real service, real savings. Transfer your existing web site for lower monthly rate. Offers Search Engine Optimization, to get your site seen by a larger audience. 99.9% uptime guarantee, for your site!

#9 IX Web Hosting - Basic Hosting "Expert" Plan is only $3.95/mo per month. Includes 1 Free domain registration and $25 free in Google ad credits.

#10 3Essentials - Free set up for all shared hosting - no hidden fees. 30 day money back guarantee. 99.99% server and network uptime. Free WordPress install. Valid BBBOnLineTrustmark.

Oanda

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Well, it seems it has been ages since Oanda’s last platform update, but as of 18th July 2005 Oanda have a new beta version of their FXTrade platform which they originally have been using in their FXGame but have now moved it over for live account traders.


Some of these new features include:
* You can select chart views (basic or advanced). The advanced chart view allows you to see the bid/ask/average price of the currency being displayed.
* There is now a quote panel similar to that seen in FXCM
* By placing your mouse cursor over the quote list you can bring up a sell or buy order according to which side of the quote list you click on
* There’s BUY and SELL buttons in the lower left hand corner of the chart
* They’ve seem to got rid of their annoying news ticker and replaced it with a much better news platform (I isn’t real time… yet… coming soon)
* Changed the format of the user preferences section - a bit cleaner and easier to navigate now
The most exciting change is the news!! I can’t wait until it becomes real time!!
Apart from that I can’t see any other changes, if there are other great ones please post them into the comment section below.

What’s The Attraction?
What attracted me to Oanda was the ability to trade any lot amount. As most brokers only allow users to trade either the standard (100k) or mini (10k) lot size Oanda is a breath of fresh air.
One other thing that attracted me to Oanda was its own user forum and plethora of information - it sure is one content rich web site! Whatever you are looking for regarding the forex market I am sure you will be able to find at Oanda.

Live & Demo Differences
As with other platforms we found no difference between the demo and live accounts, bar the reset button for demo accounts - I wish they would implement that button in the live
accounts too!!! Another excellent feature of Oanda’s demo account is that it never expires.

What We Liked About Oanda:
The charting package that came equipped with the platform was not bad. It wasn’t the best charting package we had seen, but it altogether was not the worst either. Some time frames that we like to monitor were not available which was disappointing (time frames that are not available include: 10min, 15min, 2hr, 4hr, 8hr, 12hr, 1week, 1month).
Oanda has the capacity to have multi-denominated sub accounts other than in USD with no minimum deposit. The different currency accounts available include: AUD, EUR, JPY, GBP, CAD & CHF and allows the user to transfer between their primary account and their sub account easily with the only restriction being that you cannot externally withdraw funds from a sub account, it must all come out of the primary account.
One other little thing that might go unnoticed by others is that Oanda display the volume currently available at the current market price. It is only seen when you place an order - it can give you an idea of what size order can be taken.
The orders screen is nothing new, however, where the orders can go is unique. Oanda do not have any restrictions on how close you can place a stop or limit order to where the current market is (I have experienced placing limit orders within the spread)!


Similarly there are no real restrictions on attaching stop and limit orders bar just covering the spread and adding one pip. Orders also have a variety of expiry times allowing you to place an expiry time of 1 hour (the earliest) to 1 month (the largest) on your orders.


Added to those features we also have Oanda paying us interest by the second for currency positions that do accrue interest - obviously it works in the reverse for positions that require us to pay. AND they also pay interest on a daily basis on your account’s capital.


What We Didn’t Like About Oanda:
The highest leverage available from Oanda is set at 50:1, which you can change to 40:1, or 30:1, or 20:1, or 10:1 if desired. We would have preferred at least the standard 100:1 leverage.


It has been stated in other forums that you will encounter more slippage with Oanda, but I personally have never enountered this slippage. However, do keep in mind that Oanda clients do experience both negative and POSITIVE slippage - it just depends on which side you sit.


The news package offered by Oanda is not the best we have seen and could be much better. I personally think that all a forex broker would need do is have streaming live news headlines on their platform - nothing fancy, but effective in providing the latest news. Oanda do have streaming news, but it’s some weird UBS feed that doesn’t display relevant economic headlines.


Oanda is also a web based platform. I personally have never liked web based platforms, I prefer to have the platform physically on my hard drive, but that’s just my view.


In summary then…
Oanda PROS:
* Charting package okay
* Platform not bad
* Can trade any sized lots (not restricted to the $100k and $10k lots imposed by other firms)
* Account can be denominated in any currency & you can have multiple sub accounts in any currency too
* Demo account that doesn’t expire
* Active user group forum
* You can place stop and limit orders right up to the current market price bar a couple of pips
* Orders can have a range of expiry times
* Tight spreads on EURUSD (~1.5 pips!)
* Interest earned on positions by the second (for currency positions that do accrue interest)
* Interest paid daily on account capital
Oanda CONS:
* 100:1 leverage NOT offered
* Interest paid on positions by the second (for currency positions that do require you to pay interest)
* News & charting package could be better
* Slippage can occur on stop and limit orders more frequently than would otherwise be exhibited at other forex brokerage firms (can be a positive if you place limit orders)

Our Oanda Rating
Oanda is another forex broker firm that is heading in the right direction. I think you will begin to see many more advancements with this firm in the future as they seem to take a lot of what their customer base recommends to heart. I personally recommend Oanda to everyone that starts out in the forex market.


As you can see from the summary above there aren’t too many major negatives that weigh Oanda down, and that is why we have given it quite a good score. If Oanda can implement a trailing stop feature, offer 100:1 leverage and can allow OCO type orders I think we would have a near 10/10 broker!

North Finance

Friday, November 6, 2009
  • Minimum Forex Deposit - from 100 USD
  • Forex Spread From 2pips
  • Leverage from 1:1 to 1:500
  • Mini and Standard Account
  • Swap free available upon request
  • Min pip value: $1.00
  • Funding/withdraw: TT/wire/Credit Card
  • Free Mobile Trading Software

I have been dealing with this broker for te past six months on demo not until last month i started trading live with them.
So my experience so far with them has been ok not until recently i came accross an official document from IFSC,Belize informing the public that the company is not registerd.
Up till now there service is ok but the issue of their registration with the regulatory body in the country is QUESTIONABLE, also their registered office address is something that worths scrutinising.
These made me to rate them 2 Stars until they clarify this issues before they entitled to full 5 Stars rating.
Also i have only wire money to them i haven;t made any withdrawal yet but they have been responding to problems very though it may sometimes late but definitely they responds to problem. I am planning to make a withdrawal by next week. i will keep you all aware of their response.

Managing Forex Trading Activity

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Maybe some of you get frustrated when see the earning of you Forex account wasn't match as your expectation. Or even maybe you still loose all the time? All the tings you should do is managed your Forex account carefully.
Forex isn't like a gamble game but Forex is an investment and for that reason you need to serious to do this investment and manage you invest as good as you can, to avoid or even raise your earning.
If you new to Forex just remember that not all people say about Forex was true. Lot of them think that Forex is a great business that can change your live in a short period of time. Forex is a lot complicated than that where you need to play carefully for the first time and maybe you will see the improvement and make you able to go the next step. Once again the most important thing is you activity as Forex managed account.
Happy trading and remember to always careful on you decision

Forex Currency Trading Software Types: Robots and Indicators

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Looking for the best Forex currency trading software? Well, nothing is perfect, but there is software out there that will get you pretty close.

This is a very volatile time, with world economies under great stress and fluctuations. So the currency exchange market can be quite lucrative, if you know what you are doing.

But unless you are willing to learn the intricacies of the exchange process, follow the Forex market, and monitor business news real time, so you can somehow "predict" the future movement, you risk loosing your investment.

That is why Forex currency trading software has become so popular. No longer do you have to spend years learning the system and sit at your terminal to monitor the exchange rates and analyze their trends, you can make use of the power of the computer to reliably do this for you.

Robots and Indicators

There are two types of Forex currency trading software: robots and indicators. The (almost) sure fire Forex trading robots will make instant decisions based on the market conditions and automatically execute buy/sell orders within the parameters you set, even while you are asleep! If you prefer more of a "hands on" approach, there is also indicator software available that merely tell you the right times to buy/sell based on the current market conditions, leaving you in complete control of the decision making.

Besides being accurate, a big benefit of the Forex currency trading software is that they take the emotions out of trading. It is very easy to panic when you see a currency crashing, or to over react when the currency is rising.

The latest systems remove the ego from the equation, allowing you to make profitable trades based on proven algorithms with 80% to 96% success rates.