Difference Between Linux and Windows Hosting

Windows versus Linux Web Hosting.

What System should you use to host you website?

Years ago the differences between Windows and Linux hosting were many. Choosing what operating system to host your web pages made a big difference in what you could do with the server and what you could achieve with the web page. However, today there are very little differences between Windows and Linux web hosting.

The first difference that most people notice is how you access the server. In general, both offer FTP access to your files, but only Linux offers Telnet or SSH access. FTP is a means of transferring files from the Pc to the server. Telnet and SSH are a way to open a window directly on the Web server and edit files right there. This is probably because they target a differente audience. While windows target the mass public, Linux is more focused on those features that would only be demanded by programmers and computing and programming savvy.

The second difference between window and linux hosting is that they support different programming languages. While Linux is more predisposed with PHP, Perl and CGI, Windows favor ColdFusion and ASP. Windows use Access as database language while Linux use MySQL. Both Windows and Linux will serve HTML pages and JavaScript. Windows servers use files named .htm while Linux use files named .html even though there is no difference between these names.

In terms of security, many people argue that Windows have more vulnerabilities than Linux servers. The reality is that they both have security problems. However, security depends mostly on your network administrator. If you have good administrators, your website is in safe hands regardless of OS.

Finally, whether you prefer Linux or Windows is not important. What is most important is to choose a web host based on its features and service that you really need. As the difference between the two is very little. Nevertheless, if your website needs a certain language in particular due to the programmers you work with, it would be wise to check for system compatibility before choosing a web host. If you do not need such specific requirements, you should simply take it easy and leave the web host take care of these complex technicalities and concentrate only on your website. At the end of the day what is really important is the content and not the programming language or the operating system of the web servers.

Copyright notice: This article is original and is the property of Hosting-Avenue (http://www.hosting-avenue.com). Hosting Avenue provides Top reviews of Best 5 web hosting providers, web hosting rating, web hosting articles and more.