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Previously the
difference between Linux and Windows
hosting made a huge difference.
Picking which operating system to
host your website made a huge
difference in what you could do with
the server and what you could
accomplish with the website.
However, in today's context of
cross-system web hosting, there is
little that practically separates
these two operating systems: Linux
and Windows.
The first unique difference is how
you access the server. Generally,
both offer FTP access to your files,
however, Linux is the only one that
offers telnet or ssh access. This is
probably due to the target audience
that each operating system targets.
While windows is targeted to the
mass public, linux is probably more
focused in that it provides many
more features that would only be
demanded by programmers and people
familiar with computing and
programming. In any case, while this
may seem like a fundamental
difference, there really is very
little to separate FTP from telnet
or ssh in the practical sense. While
FTP allows you to download the file
to work locally, telnet and ssh
allows you to modify the root file
on the web server by using unix
commands.
The second difference between linux
and windows hosting is that windows
and linux support different
languages. Linux tends to be
associated with PHP, Perl and CGI
while Windows is usually associated
with ColdFusion and ASP. The
database languages are also usually
different, with Windows favoring
Access while Linux users use MySQL.
Windows also writes its pages in .htm
format while Linux writes its web
pages in .html. Ultimately these
differences are minor, but can make
significant difference if you are
not prepared for it. Trying to
modify Access files while you are
using a computer that only has Linux
can often be a surprising exercise
in futility for the beginning
programmer.
In terms of security, people tend to
argue against Windows, citing a
whole host of vulnerabilities. This
is correct in a sense; while Linux
tends to have the same amount of
vulnerabilities, it is patched and
updated faster due to its open
source and free nature.
Linux hosting Companies like
HostGator ,
iPower ,
Globat are leading and
affordable providers while
LunarPages ,
StartLogic are providing Windows
Server based hosting.
Ultimately, the choice is yours to
make, whether you prefer windows or
Linux. It is better to pick a web
host based on its features and
service rather than on what
operating system it is running on
its web servers. As the difference
between the two is very little.
However, if your website
particularly requires a certain
language due to the programmers you
work with or any other language, it
would be prudent to check for system
compatibility before subscribing to
a web host. If you do not require
such specific details, you should
simply sit back and let the web host
handle these complicated technical
details and focus on your website
itself. After all, the content is
way more important than the
programming language or the OS of
the web servers.
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