Web Spreadsheet

Under the category of really really cool.

Google has introduced a web based spreadsheet thing.

Create, store and share spreadsheets on the web.
Imagine a spreadsheet that's always current and that others can update from their own computers, even at the same time.

Get started quickly.
Import your existing spreadsheets or create new ones from scratch.

Edit your spreadsheets from anywhere.
All you need is a Web browser - your spreadsheets are stored securely online.

Share changes in real-time.
Invite people to your spreadsheets and make changes together, at the same time.

Keywords: spreadsheet, web spreadsheet, web,
Category: web hosting

Security

When you publish a web site to the web server, most of the data is public information that you want the world to see, but some of the data is private. For example, you might need a database on the web server with private client contact information. Further, you don't want anyone else to be able to change the content of your site.

Recently, an associate wrote a program to see how much of a web server's hard drive he can access from the computer his web site is hosted on. At the time, he had his site hosted by another company and he was shocked to find that he could access the data for any other web site on the same computer. He could have accessed data in their databases or changed the web page content. When he tested our computers, he found that he was only able to access the files in his account and not any of the files in our other customer's accounts. You can place your data on our servers with confidence. None of our other customers are going to be able to access that data.

This leads to another issue. You are going to store all this data on a computer in some other location. How do you know your data is safe? Our server rooms are only accessible by authorized personnel using key-card access.

Keywords: security, web hosting security, web hosting, asp, hosting, asp.net, php, perl, windows hosting, linux hosting, frontpage hosting
Category: web hosting

Plan upgrades...

Great news for everyone. All plans now have more space, more bandwidth, and more email.

ALL accounts now have scripting ability. Yep, even the $3.77 plan which we've renamed from "Windows Static" to "Windows Starter"

We've also added SPF (look here for a description of what it does http://www.openspf.org/) and account backup to all accounts.

If you are using the ASP.NET Advanced or Linux Advanced plan, they now come with 3 meg of SQL space.

To see the new plan limits, visit http://www.dmbhosting.com/compare.aspx for the Windows plans and http://www.dmbhosting.com/nixcompare.aspx for the Linux/FreeBSD plans.

Keywords: web hosting, asp, hosting, asp.net, php, perl, sql, mysql, pgsql, mssql, windows hosting, linux hosting, frontpage hosting
Category: web hosting

Router Failure

Remember the phone switches from our example in a previous post? The last router on the way to the servers is our router. It can be replaced, but for the few minutes it will take to replace it, you won't be able to get to any of our servers here. And remember, we have backup hardware, so that switch isn't going to take that long.

Keywords: web hosting, router Failure, hosting
Category: web hosting

CPU Failure

Each computer has a clone sitting on the side waiting to take over if one of our computers fails. In most cases we can just put the hard drive from the computer that isn't running and place it in the new computer and have everything back up and running before you even know there is a problem.

Keywords: web hosting, CPU Failure, hosting
Category: web hosting

Can you hear [my cell phone] now?

This is suppose to be a ring tone that adults can't hear, but kids can. I guess I'm not old enough, 'cuz I can hear it fine (and for those of you who don't know me, I'm well past college age.)

Keywords: cell phone, ring tone, phone
Category: web hosting

Power Failure

The power goes out here just as it does in your house -- but, our data center has backup power for just such a time. Power outages aren't the only power problems though. The power supplies on the computers can fail as well. Each of our computers have dual power supplies that provide additional protection against power failure.

Keywords: web hosting, Power Failure, hosting
Category: web hosting

Hard Drive Failure

Hard drives fail. No one likes it but it happens. We have extra hard drives of exactly the same type sitting on a shelf ready to be installed in just such a case. Sometimes this can be a simple matter of copying data. Other times it requires rebuilding the computer. Between the extra hard drives, the daily backups and a test restore once a month, we are confident that we can recover from disk failure. However, this is the one place where it may take more than a few minutes to recover from the failure.

 

Keywords: web hosting, Hard Drive Failure, Disk Failure, hosting
Category: web hosting

SQL Server Access

While many sites can get by with storing data in a Microsoft Access database, some of our customers, such as those operating high-traffic stores, need a more powerful database called SQL.

Our SQL servers are all accessible via standard Internet protocols. So far, the only problem we could have had was a port attack aimed at the MS-SQL servers. We already had the patch applied to our server but, in an effort to stop the attack, we temporarily disabled Internet access.

Keywords: web hosting, SQL, hosting
Category: web hosting

So, what happens if the email servers go down?

You would think that if the mail servers did go down, any mail sent to you during that time would never be delivered. Fortunately, this is not the case. You see, if an e-mail server cannot send e-mail to another e-mail server, the originating server will keep trying until the e-mail is sent. Most servers will retry for up to 24 hours. Once the time limit is exceeded, the mail will returned to the originator. In this way mail is never lost on the Internet.

Keywords: email, smtp, hosting, web hosting
Category: web hosting