Web Hosting

Beginners Guide: What is Web Hosting?

Having an online presence is crucial, whether you’re running a business, starting a blog, or creating an online portfolio. One of the first steps in establishing this presence is choosing a web hosting service. For beginners, shared web hosting is often the ideal choice. This guide will explain shared web hosting in simple, easy-to-understand language, highlighting how UK Cheapest can be your go-to solution for this service.

What is Shared Web Hosting?

Imagine living in a large apartment building where you share facilities like the swimming pool, park, and laundry room with other residents. Shared web hosting is similar. It involves hosting your website on a server that hosts other websites too. Each website on the server shares the server’s resources, such as memory, computing power, and storage space.

Why Choose Shared Web Hosting?

  1. Cost-Effective: Since resources are shared, the cost is much lower compared to renting an entire server. This makes shared hosting an excellent option for small businesses, bloggers, and individuals looking to establish an online presence without a significant investment.
  2. User-Friendly: Shared hosting platforms, like those offered by UK Cheapest, often come with easy-to-use control panels, making it simple to manage your website, even for beginners.
  3. Maintenance-Free: The hosting provider, such as UK Cheapest, takes care of server maintenance, security updates, and technical issues. This means less hassle for you and more time to focus on your website’s content and design.
  4. Built-In Features: Shared hosting packages typically include useful features like email accounts, website builders, and one-click installers for popular applications and content management systems.

Considerations When Using Shared Web Hosting

While shared web hosting is a great starting point, there are some considerations to keep in mind:

  1. Shared Resources: Since you are sharing server resources with other websites, large traffic spikes on one website could impact the performance of others.
  2. Limited Customisation: There are limits to how much you can customise server settings and capabilities.
  3. Security: While providers like UK Cheapest prioritise security, sharing a server inherently comes with some risks. It’s crucial to follow best practices for website security.

How Does UK Cheapest Fit In?

UK Cheapest understands these considerations and addresses them effectively. With a focus on balancing cost-effectiveness and quality service, UK Cheapest offers shared web hosting solutions that are secure, reliable, and perfect for anyone new to web hosting. They provide an easy-to-use control panel, essential for beginners, and their customer support is geared towards helping non-technical users get their websites up and running smoothly.

Conclusion

Shared web hosting is an excellent, budget-friendly way to start your online journey. It’s perfect for smaller websites, blogs, and businesses that are just beginning to establish their online presence. With services like those offered by UK Cheapest, you can enjoy a hassle-free hosting experience, with all the tools you need to build and grow your website. As your website or business grows, you can always upgrade to more advanced hosting options, but for many, shared hosting remains a reliable, cost-effective solution for a long time.

UKC10 – Server and Performance Upgrades

Security, Performance and Feature Enhancements

In our ongoing efforts to enhance your hosting experience, we will be upgrading all shared hosting accounts currently hosted on UKC10 (Plesk Obsidian) to a new, cutting-edge High-Performance Server Hardware configuration.

This advanced infrastructure harnesses the power of the latest AMD Ryzen™ 9 7950X3D processor based on the Raphael (Zen 4) Architecture, DDR5 RAM, and lightning-fast NVMe SSD storage. We have partnered with Hetzner to power this server using 100% renewable energy sources.

This upgrade is scheduled to take place between 1800 on Wednesday, September 6th, and 2200 on Friday, September 8th, 2023. We want to assure you that this upgrade will be seamless, and there will be no disruption to your services during this period.

Access to the Plesk panel and the recommended name servers remain unchanged:

Panel access: https://ukc10.uk:8443
Nameserver 1: ns.ukc10.uk
Nameserver 2: ns2.ukc10.uk

Please take note that the web server’s IP address will be transitioning from 194.163.188.11 to 94.130.54.52. If you employ custom name servers (as opposed to the recommended name servers, ns.ukc10.uk and ns2.ukc10.uk), we kindly request that you update your DNS A records to reflect the new IP address within a grace period of 7 days. This adjustment will ensure the uninterrupted accessibility of your website.

We’re committed to providing you with top-notch hosting, and this hardware upgrade is another step toward delivering the best performance and reliability for your website. If you have any questions or need further information, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our support team.

Thank you for choosing us as your hosting provider, and we look forward to continuing to serve you with even better performance and security!

Mastering Essential Server Management: Safeguarding, Backing Up, and Optimising Your Digital Fortress

In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, effective server management stands as the cornerstone of maintaining a secure, responsive, and reliable online presence. Whether you’re a seasoned server manager or just starting, prioritising three key tasks can significantly impact your server’s performance and security. This blog post delves into these essential server management tasks, which every server manager should treat with utmost seriousness.

1. Ensuring Robust Security

Security breaches carry dire consequences, making server security a non-negotiable priority. Regular maintenance and updating of security measures are paramount to safeguarding your server and the sensitive data it houses.

  • Patch Management: Remain vigilant in applying security patches and updates to the server’s operating system, software, and applications. This fortifies potential vulnerabilities against exploitation by cybercriminals.
  • Access Controls and Firewalls: Implement stringent access controls to curtail unauthorised entry. Firewalls serve as the initial line of defence, sieving out malicious traffic and shielding your server from cyber threats.
  • Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS): Set up IDS to keep watch for and flag any suspicious activity in real-time, thereby providing timely alerts of potential breaches.

2. Data Backup and Recovery

No matter how secure your server is, unexpected data loss can rear its head due to hardware failures, mishaps, or human errors. A robust backup and recovery strategy serves as your safety net.

  • Scheduled Backups: Regularly back up critical server data, databases, configurations, and application settings. Automated backup schedules ensure data is protected without manual intervention.
  • Testing Restoration: Regularly test the restoration process to ensure backups are functional and data can be successfully retrieved.
  • Off-Site Backups: Maintain off-site backups to guard against physical disasters or breaches impacting the primary server location.

3. Performance Monitoring and Optimisation

A sluggishly performing server can vex users and taint your online reputation. Consistent monitoring and optimisation of performance guarantee a seamless experience for visitors.

  • Continuous Monitoring: Keep an eye on key performance metrics, including CPU usage, memory utilisation, disk I/O, and network traffic. Use monitoring tools to nab anomalies and detect potential issues early.
  • Resource Optimisation: Proactively tweak server resources, configurations, and settings to maintain peak performance. Tailor settings based on usage patterns to sidestep bottlenecks.
  • Problem Resolution: Swiftly address any performance issues identified through monitoring to uphold a responsive server environment.

Mastering these three vital server management tasks not only ensures a secure and dependable online presence but also underscores your commitment to offering users a seamless experience. By bolstering security, fortifying data backup procedures, and optimising performance, you’ll be primed to navigate the intricacies of server management in today’s dynamic digital sphere. Remember, a well-managed server forms the bedrock of a successful online venture, resilient against potential challenges.

Your Path to Effortless Server Management: Partner with UKC for Security, Performance, and Reliability

If managing your VPS or server is becoming a challenge, rest assured that you’re not alone. At UKC, we understand the complexities of server management and are here to lend a helping hand. Let us create a tailored plan for you, ensuring that your server is fortified with top-tier security measures, optimised for high performance, and backed up meticulously to safeguard against data loss. Your server’s well-being is our priority, and our expert team is ready to guide you toward a seamless and worry-free server management experience. Contact us today to explore how we can work together to elevate your server’s security, performance, and overall reliability.

Hosting Prices – Update 2023

Hosting Price Updates

At UKC, we are dedicated to delivering top-notch hosting services that exceed your expectations. Over the past two years, we’ve witnessed significant rises in hardware, power, and licensing costs. We’ve always aimed to provide the best value for our customers and have worked tirelessly to absorb as much of these increased costs as possible.

Starting from 1st September 2023, we’re introducing some updates to our web hosting prices. We want to ensure that our services continue to meet the highest standards while accommodating these necessary changes.

We understand the importance of flexibility, which is why we’ve maintained our commitment to providing affordable hosting solutions. While we’ve had to make some adjustments, we’ve done our best to keep the impact minimal.

To address the rise in transaction costs, our monthly billing will include a £0.50 premium. We believe in transparency, and this small addition helps us continue to offer seamless transactions and excellent support.

We sincerely appreciate your continued trust in UKC. These updates will allow us to enhance our infrastructure, improve service quality, and ensure that your hosting experience remains exceptional.

If you have any questions or would like to discuss these changes further, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our dedicated support team. We’re here to assist you every step of the way.

Thank you for being a valued member of our hosting community. We look forward to serving you with even greater excellence in the future.

Upgrading to PHP 8.2: Boosting Performance for Your Plesk Web Hosting Account

Upgrading to PHP 8.2: Boosting Performance for Your Plesk Web Hosting Account

As a valued user of our Plesk web hosting services, we want to ensure that you have access to the latest technologies and improvements to optimise your website’s performance.

One such advancement is the transition from PHP 7.4 to PHP 8.2. In this article, we’ll explore the differences between these two versions and the compelling reasons to upgrade.

PHP 7.4 vs. PHP 8.x: Performance and Features:

PHP 8.x introduces a range of features and optimisations that can significantly enhance your website’s speed, efficiency, and overall functionality. One striking example is WordPress, which experiences a remarkable 19% increase in handling requests per second on PHP 8.2 compared to PHP 7.4. This enhancement directly translates to improved user experiences and faster load times for your visitors.

Notable Benefits of PHP 8.2:

1. Performance Boost: PHP 8 is designed to be faster and more efficient than its predecessors. The underlying improvements in performance can lead to quicker page loading times, better response rates, and an overall smoother browsing experience for your site’s visitors.

2. Enhanced Type System: PHP 8 introduces a more advanced type system, allowing for stricter typing and improved error handling. This results in more reliable code and reduced chances of bugs and runtime issues.

3. Attributes: With PHP 8, you can use attributes to add metadata to your code. This provides better code organization and enables you to create more maintainable and readable applications.

4. JIT Compilation: Just-In-Time (JIT) compilation is a significant feature of PHP 8. It can further enhance performance by dynamically optimizing code execution during runtime.

End of Life for PHP 7.4:

It’s important to note that PHP 7.4 reached its end of life on November 28, 2022. This means that it will no longer receive official updates, bug fixes, or security patches. Continuing to use PHP 7.4 could expose your website to potential vulnerabilities and compatibility issues.

How to Upgrade to PHP 8.2:

Transitioning to PHP 8.2 is a straightforward process. Here’s how you can make the switch:

1. Backup Your Website: Before any major changes, it’s advisable to back up your website and database to ensure that your data remains safe.

2. Check Compatibility: Verify that your website’s applications, themes, and plugins are compatible with PHP 8.2. Most modern plugins and themes are updated to support the latest PHP versions.

3. Update Settings: Access your Plesk control panel and navigate to the PHP settings for your domain. Select PHP 8.2 as the desired version.

4. Test and Monitor: After making the switch, thoroughly test your website to ensure all functionalities are working as expected. Monitor its performance and address any issues that may arise.

5. If you get stuck or require assistance simple log a ticket with the support help desk and they will gladly assist.

Conclusion:

Upgrading to PHP 8.x brings a host of benefits to your Plesk web hosting account, including improved performance and enhanced features. With PHP 7.4 reaching its end of life, now is the ideal time to make the transition and take advantage of the advancements in PHP technology. Enjoy a faster, more efficient website and ensure the security of your online presence by upgrading to PHP 8.2 today.