Web Hosting Jargon Buster
Please read this in conjuction with our Web Hosting FAQ. If there is anything that isn't clear please don't hesitate to contact us so we can improve on our documentation.
Disc Space
The amount of physical space devoted to holding your "content." This will be manly your website files, but can include stored email and databases.
Monthly Traffic
When people visit your site, data is sent from our servers to their computer. This data can be composed of web pages or anything else on your site that can be viewed or downloaded by visitors. It also include email received and downloaded to your PC. Every month this requested data is added up, to give your total data transfer.
POP3 Email
The "pop" in POP3 stands for "post office protocol." It's a client/server protocol for collection email on a server from individual mail accounts. You can configure the users and passwords from a straightforward online control panel.
Email Redirects
This is sometimes known as "Email Forwarding." Rather than collecting your email off our server, you can arrange for mail addressed to your domain to go to mailboxes hosted elsewhere (perhaps at your ISP).
Mail Responders
The ability create automated responses to incoming email. This is quite handy when you are out of the office, or on holiday and can't respond in person immediately.
MySQL Databases
MySQL (pronounced "my ess cue el" ). An open source relational database management system (RDBMS) that uses Structured Query Language (SQL), the most popular language for adding, accessing, and processing data in a database. MySQL is noted mainly for its speed, reliability, and flexibility and usually used in conjunction with PHP scripting to create exciting dynamic websites such as bulletin boards and content management systems.
CGI and Perl
Perl is a high-level programming interpreted language originating fromLarry Wall. It derives from C and to a lesser extent from sed, awk, the Unix shell. Perl's process, file, and text manipulation facilities make it particularly well-suited for tasks involving quick prototyping, system utilities, software tools, system management tasks, database access, graphical programming, networking, and world wide web programming. A CGI script is a program written in Perl that is stored on the remote web server and executed on the web server in response to a request from a user.
PHP
Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP) is a popular general-purpose server side scripting language that is especially suited for Web development and can be embedded into HTML pages. It works particularly well when used for database driven applications using MySQL. Many popular CMS systems, such as Drupal, Mambo and PHP-Nuke are based on MySQL and PHP.
FTP
Stands for File Transfer Protocol (part of the TCP/IP protocol stack). It is used for transfering files between networked servers and clients and it will allow you to upload your website files to your virtual hosting account. You will need to install an FTP client on your PC to do this. Windows comes with a very basic command line FTP client. We would recommend a graphical client such as SimpleFTP, CuteFTP or WS-FTP.
Frontpage 2002/2003
Microsoft Web Site creation and publishing platform. Weycrest use Microsoft's implementation of Frontpage Server Extensions for Linux. This gives full support for all Frontpage products, up to and including Frontpage 2003. Our hosting plans allow you repair and re-install the extensions from the control panel, in addition to creating subweb. Not to be used in conjunction with FTP (above) which can corrupt the server extensions.
IMAP and Webmail
IMAP stands for Instant Message Access Protocol. It differs from POP3 in that it allows remote clients to access email stored on a remote server, rather than downloading it. Webmail allows you to view these stored emails. This is quite handy especially if you are on the move and don't have access to an email client. Also as the mail is centrally stored you can always access your mail from your home or work PC, laptop or mobile device. Additionally Outlook, Outlook Express, Mozilla Mail and Mozilla Thunderbird all have IMAP support.
