Selecting a web hosting service can be difficult, especially if you’re working with a huge website that’s going to need special features and a huge amount of disk space and bandwidth. One of the options some people eventually turn to is home web hosting. While this does require some extra costs and a good amount of computer knowledge, it is an option, especially if you have a computer that is powerful enough to act as a web server and don’t mind investing in an operating system designed for web hosting.
There are a number of requirements to host your website yourself. However, the good news is that the Microsoft Home Server operating system and several other operating systems are designed for those who don’t know that much about servers or hosting. This system is very similar to standard Windows, in fact, and in addition to being easy to use is also very secure. There are, however, three things you need to know about when hosting your own server:
1. Static IP addresses. You may have no idea what your IP address is, but if you’re going to host your own site from your home, one option is to make certain you have a static IP address, or an IP address that never changes. This way, your domain name will always know where your server is and can send traffic to your server. You’ll have to buy this from your internet service provider, and it can be expensive. However, while it’s certainly an option, it is no longer the only option.
2. If your IP address is dynamic, or changes every time you have to reconnect to the internet and you don’t want to spend the money on a static IP address, you can choose what is known as dynamic DNS. With this, your domain name will always point to whatever your current IP address is. A small program will continuously update your Dynamic DNS provider with your computer’s IP address. On the downside here, there can be some lag between changing your IP and updating the DNS provider, so your website may be down for a few minutes here and there. While this may not be a huge concern if the lag time is minimal, if the lag time becomes longer or if it happens often, it can be an issue. Note also that Dynamic DNS solutions can be complex, and some users may not have the knowledge to deal with errors.
3. A reverse proxy can take the place of Dynamic DNS solutions by having your home server connect to a reserve proxy server. Your domain name points to the reserve proxy, which has a static IP. It keeps a list of the dynamic IP’s of all home servers, but unlike Dynamic DNS, there is little to no lag time. However, there are some restrictions on security and port forwarding, some of which requires advanced knowledge of servers.
