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Why Copying Another Website’s Code May Be Harmful

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Why Copying Another Website’s Code May Be Harmful

We all have a favorite website and a favorite website design. We are impressed by some websites and also detest many. We try and incorporate what we have seen and felt about other websites, into our own web design, sometimes copying large chunks of the other websites. While this may achieve a short term goal of having a website which is pleasing, it may not be a very good idea in the long term. This article explains why copying the code of another website may be harmful for your website in the long run.

Security Flaws

When you mindlessly copy code from another website, you also copy over the flaws and vulnerabilities associated with it. This means that you may be exposing your website to several threats and exploits, which you may be blissfully unaware of. 90% of website developers use template based code or reused code snippets for page elements like menus, slideshows, banners and even animation. There is never any improvements or modification made to the code and they just adapt it to suit the needs of the client. Little do they realise that if and when a security flaw is discovered in that code snippet, their client will also be affected. Once a website is made, very little care is given to updating the code or replacing old technology with new, thereby offering little hope for security. Once of our client’s website was defaced more than 3 times in one month, because the developers kept restoring the old site which contained an inherent vulnerability in its menu system. Despite repeated warnings and inconvenience, they were completely unaware about how to solve the issue and correct the menu.

Efficiency

Large companies very often have carefully planned websites, proportionate to the web hosting resources that they possess. This means that their systems are capable of handling heavy animation, large data processing and truckloads of visitor traffic. Simply copy pasting their code onto your website can drastically reduce the efficiency of your website, causing it to repel visitors rather than attract them. A lesson can be learnt by an upcoming online retail shop, which tried to introduce features similar to Amazon, on their own website. Little did they realize that Amazon had monster servers with tons of RAM and Processing Power, which their Shared Hosting was no match for. Their site started ranking lower and served up pages slower, due to the great disparity in what they wanted the website to do and the resources given to the website.

Copyright Infringement

Copying source code of a website is a Copyright violation. Large companies sue their competitors for copying their source code, thereby claiming damages worth millions of dollars. Although in developing countries like India, China and Brazil copying of source code is rampant, enforcement is weak. Even then, in all these countries, copyright infringement is a criminal offence and the punishment can be very severe. In India, the police can search and seize computers and devices used to copy the website code, without a warrant from a magistrate. This has greatly helped reduce copyright violations as far as software source code and websites is concerned.

SEO

Although there is no concrete indication to show that if your website has copied source code then search engines will penalize you, there is a large probability that your website will not do as well as the site from which you have copied. If you copy text from a website and use it on your own site, search engines are sure to give you a lower ranking. However, as mentioned earlier, many large websites which are our role models, have given great thought before designing their website in a particular way. Their website has been specifically designed for their website, their business, their brand, their target perception and their environment. It is exactly like a tailored outfit, which has been crafted as per the specific measurements of the customer. It just wont fit as well on anyone else.

How Many Servers Does A Web Hosting Service Need?

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How Many Servers Does A Web Hosting Server Need?

How Many Servers Does A Web Hosting Server Need?

Web Hosting customers don’t always realize what goes on behind the scenes of their web hosting service. The layman often thinks that the web hosting service is just another software installed on a monster computer, bit of which are sold to the end user. But there’s a lot more that goes on behind setting up a web hosting service. While some hosts use separate machines to run services like email, FTP, HTTP etc., some hosts install all these services on a single machine. This article takes you into the web hosting world and shows you which software servers are running to give you the best web hosting experience with different services.

Web Server

The web server is one of the most important parts of your web hosting service. The web server is what actually delivers your web page to the user’s browser. It also handles different requests for information that your browser makes and also takes care of incorrect or erroneous requests. When you see 404 error pages or warning messages, these are all served up by the web server. Web hosts commonly use IIS, Apache, Nginx and Tomcat amongst many different web servers. Web servers use the HTTP protocol to communicate with the user’s browser. The administrator also has the capability of restricting folders, files and websites through the web server configuration.

Mail Server

The mail server is essential when providing email service. The mail server allows the sending and receiving of email on specific ports. The mail server helps filter the received mail to different users’ folders and thereby allows multiple domains to be hosted on a single physical machine. Mail servers are also capable of redirecting mail and applying conditional filters to weed out unwanted mail and fight spam. Most mail servers allow the use of third party plugins or software to aid them perform their functions. For example mail servers can intelligently use third party RBLs or black lists to identify if a mail sender is actually a source of spam which should be rejected before he can reach the mail server. Mail servers usually use IMAP, SMTP and POP3 protocols to serve their purpose.

FTP Server

Almost every web host offers FTP services to transfer files. But most users don’t realize that this requires an FTP server at the hosts end. An FTP server allows connections using the FTP protocol, for the transfer of files. This aids users in downloading or uploading files in simple, quick and efficient way. FTP servers control the bandwidth usage, user connections, authentication system and even file management for the user. FTP servers are inexpensive to maintain and are now considered as included in any web hosting package.

SQL Server

An SQL server is a database management server which allows users to create and store data in relational tables, using the Structured Query Language or SQL. On windows machines, Microsoft MS SQL is installed, whereas Unix based hosting systems usually come with open source alternatives like MySQL, Postgresql, MariaDB among others. Web hosts sell databases based on the package that the user takes. Each database requires CPU and memory resources to function properly. Databases form up the backbone of most websites which have a Content Management System or which store a large amount of data.

Others

Some web hosts offer their own DNS service, for which they need to run a DNS Server on their systems. The DNS server just maps the domain name to the servers IP address so that when a visitor is using a service on a website, he is served up the right information from the right source. Premium web hosts offer File Sharing services and have a Web DAV Server either separate or integrated into their Web Server (as above). This allows users to quickly sync files to and from their website onto their mobile devices. Almost all web hosts also provide an SSH service so that users can connect securely to different ports for different services on the account.

While web hosting may seem like an easy business, managing all these services can be quite a task, which web hosts need to do on a daily basis.

Why Website Builders Bundled With Hosting May Not Be A Good Idea

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Why Website Builders Bundled With Hosting May Not Be A Good Idea

Why Website Builders Bundled With Hosting May Not Be A Good Idea

Many web hosting companies around the world are offering free website builders or website template editors bundled with their web hosting plans. Some companies offer 100 templates while others offer thousands. For a new website owner, it may sound like a good idea to cut designing costs and take a bundled template system. But in the long term, the website builders may actually be doing harm to your online presence. This article deals with why the free website builders or website template editors could be harmful for your website and online presence.

Dependence

The main aim of the website builder services is to make you dependent on their service so that you are lured into buying a paid plan. Once you have setup your website and put in your information into their system it can become pretty difficult to migrate out of it or customize it to suit your needs. This dependence is exactly why these businesses are able to get renewals of the account. If you don’t renew the bundle, you end up losing everything. If you decide to split the bundle and buy hosting from another place, they will not allow you to use their template system. An article on TheSiteWizard website rightly says:

“Building your website using a site builder only seems easy on the surface, since it provides the illusion you don’t need to dream up the visual appearance of your website. You can simply use their provided templates.”

The article goes on to clarify: “Will you be able to move to another web host simply by transferring all the files to the other host? If you find that the terms of use of those templates do not allow this, you should not even consider using the site builder. Never allow your site to be locked into any web host. If the hosting company deteriorates, or unreasonably increases their rates, or even goes out of business, your website and your business will be held hostage.”

Limited Templates and Editing Options

The template editor, image, designs and layout are all limited to whatever the service offers. This means that however incorrect or irrelevant the elements in the template may be, you have no other choice, but to use them. Even addons for backups, colour schemes, customized coding, inserting external code and modifying the source will be restricted. Somewebsite builders also offer free code templates like for ad banners, chat scripts and even contact forms. However, these code snippets may not allow the customization that you want. For example, if you want to add a Captch Image verification, the form may not allow you to do so. Similarly if you want to log the IP address of the form sender for security purposes it may not be very suitable.

Impact on SEO

Many website builders have inherently haphazard coding with deprecated code. This means that the software contains obsolete code which is no longer used as a modern standard. The obsolete parts have been replaced by more efficient and optimum code to execute the same functions or perform the same actions, but your editor framework does not contain these improvements. Some services also prevent external apps and software from accessing the website code. This means that you are dependent on the internal addons and plugins which the vendor provides. These maybe buggy, obsolete or even vulnerable, but if you want that functionality in your website you have to use them.

Advertising Banners and Popups

Some website builders come free, but with some conditions. This means that if you use the site builder to make your design, you are consenting to allow popup ads or banner ads on your website. Every 3rd or 4th website visitor will be greeted with a popup advertisement inserted by the site builder and only if he closes the popup will he be able to access your website. Some website editor services go a step further and first redirect random visitors to an affiliates websites and then allow the visitor an option to go back to your site. This can be very damaging for your website, especially due to the fact that all your hard earned traffic is being diverted for the benefit of someone else. A friend of ours was suspicious that randomly on his website a banner ad would appear and then disappear after a while. Since he was not very tech savvy, he requested us to investigate. We noticed a suspicious script running on his home page, which had been placed there by the free website builder software that his web host had given him. Even upon removal, it returned. The problem stopped when he switched to a different web host.

Tips To Prevent Failed Backups Of Your Website

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Tips To Prevent Failed Backups Of Your Website

Tips To Prevent Failed Backups Of Your Website

Most of us keep regular backups of all our important data, especially which is on the internet. Websites should also be backed up regularly as a safety measure in case of a disaster and also as a version tracking mechanism. This ensures that in the event of our website being hacked or becoming corrupt, we can quickly restore it to a prior version. Most of us have automatic mechanisms to take a backup. But little do we realise that taking a backup doesnt really end there. We need to ensure that it is a workable backup and not a dummy file which has not value. This article explains how we can prevent backup file failures and how to ensure that our website backup will be of use when we need it.

Elements

An important aspect of taking backups is not to forget any of the elements that make up your account. Your web hosting account has several elements which need to be backed up so that you can restore your entire account. This means that you need to backup things like Email, Website Files, Databases, Configuration Files, Web Statistics, Email Forwarders and any other customizations that you may have done with any of these elements. Hosting Control Panels like cPanel or Plesk may allow you to take backups of these elements separately or compile them into a single compressed file. Forgetting even one part of your account backup may render your website useless. Many people forget to take a backup of their database files since the backend is not something that the users interact with. Similarly, the small configuration files and customizations can also boost the speed and efficiency when you attempt to restore the backup.

Disk Space Shortage

The in-built backup options of your web hosting control panel will usually save your backup in the home directory of your account. This means that the backup will also consume hosting space within your account. If you are on a limited space plan, you should have atleast 50% free disk space before you backup your account. If you do not have enough space, the backup may not complete fully or may get corrupt. This can be disastrous when you are dependent on it and when you want to restore the account. Ensure that you have enough free space so that your backup is not stuck.

Failed Download

One of the most common failure points when taking a backup is the download to your local machine or onto the media you are ultimately backing up on. Very often, when the backup file is being downloaded on the media or machine, the network connection may drop or the process maybe terminated. This may indicate that the file has been downloaded, but actually the file is only partially downloaded. A client of ours who was switching from shared hosting to a dedicated server was taking a backup of his website on his own. He started downloading the backup file from his hosting account. The size of the backup file was about 600 MB. On his internet connection, it indicated that about 8 minutes were left for the download to complete. In between the download process, his internet connection dropped. He noticed that the file transfer had stopped and file was on his hard disk. However, he did not notice the file size and assumed that the entire 600 MB has been downloaded. The backup file was corrupt and had downloaded only 350 MB. Luckily he noticed the mistake and was able to retrieve the backup file. You may not always be so lucky.

Integrity Check with the Checksum

The best way to ensure your backup file’s integrity is using a checksum tool to verify the checksum of the file before and after it is downloaded. Ideally this means that you get a unique hash value of the file from the web server. This unique hash value is tied to the file and is almost impossible to reverse engineer. Then, after you have downloaded the file, retest for the checksum of the downloaded file on your backup media. The checksum of the file should be exactly the same. If the file is corrupt or tampered or has not downloaded properly, the checksum will mismatch and you will get to know easily. This ensures data integrity and provides assurance of a healthy backup file.

 

Why Free Business Email Services Like Google Apps Are No Longer Free

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Google Apps, Microsoft’s Outlook.com and many other smaller providers used to offer free business email accounts. This lured a lot of people into moving their business mail to these giant corporations. However, when these giants withdrew these free services around 2012 to 2014, there was a mass exodus of users to the regular paid email services. Although users who had signed up prior to the free account withdrawal were “grandfathered” in and allowed to continue using their accounts, there were very few upgrade options for them. This article deals with why most of the free business email services did not find it lucrative to continue their services at no cost.

Support

One of the most important concern for free email users was tech support. When you do take an email service for your business, when your business expands and the Proprietor is not the same as the IT Chief, then you know that you have outgrown the free services. The paid services of most of these providers was prohibitively expensive for most types of businesses. People expected a lot of support and assistance in managing and setting up their account. This is something that Google and Microsoft lacked. Although they did appoint authorized service providers to help local businesses, the continuous support requirement was getting overwhelming. This meant that for a free service, these companies would need to hire support personnel, without getting any direct returns. We must remember that companies like Google and Microsoft did not aim to make money from their mailing services. Their aim was to make money from profiling users for advertising revenue. Microsoft’s story is similar. Hence there was no intent to put back the money in giving any more than their standard free features.

Configuration

Going hand in hand with support are the configuration issues that people used to face. Almost every user at some point in time will need to configure or sync or connect their account with some hardware device of theirs. Whether its a mobile phone or desktop or laptop, this was inevitable and should have been foreseen. However, Google Apps and Microsoft lacked the basic support infrastructure that paid email providers were offering. Hence, even though their service was free, their support partners charged money and made up for the free service. This money did not benefit Google or Microsoft and hence did not help them in any way. There was no direct incentive for offering free email services, especially when people required extensive support when setting up their account.

Expensive

Google Apps for business is priced at $50 per user per year, whereas Microsoft charges $48 per user per year at the minimum. When you realize that they also offer a free email service till today, you feel cheated. In effect you feel that you are actually paying for something which is being given out for free. What most people don’t realise is that the free accounts come without any support or without any assistance. But nobody wants to pay just for the additional support. Although the companies are justified in their pricing, they are not able to match competition, due to the simple fact that they have large expenses. Just like all other branded products, business email from these large corporations also costs more, without any visual value addition.

What About Website Hosting?

Why Free Business Email Services Like Google Apps Are No Longer Free

Why Free Business Email Services Like Google Apps Are No Longer Free

A big put off for people who used services like Google Apps and Outlook.com was that they wanted a one stop solution which included their website hosting, file storage and email. While Google Apps offered business email, it left a big void as far as web hosting was concerned. Google did offer alternatives like Google Sites, but the options left a lot to be desired. Almost all the business email options offer their own website editor with a limited number of templates. Beyond that no customizations can be made. The same was the case for Microsoft’s Outlook and Office 360 service. This is one of the main factors why people prefer conventional web hosting, even if they have a free option.

Why Your Website Should Be Mobile-Friendly

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Why Your Website Should Be Mobile-Friendly

Why Your Website Should Be Mobile-Friendly

With the improvement of smart phone technology, websites are being constantly accessed from mobile browsers and mobile devices. This means that the conventional design techniques may need to be tweaked to suit different screen sizes and be cross compatible with the plethora of devices in the market. With multiple companies launching newer models every day, the competition for how your website will be viewed is also hotting up. The experience of a mobile user is so significant in making or breaking a sale that now website’s are forced to change the way they looked or behaved based on what the users want. This article explains why you should make your website responsive or mobile friendly if you haven’t already started.

Higher Ranking in Google Search

Starting April 2015, Google will start giving priority to websites which have a mobile-friendly version of their site. Google has already started providing tags to search results which indicate which web page is mobile friendly i.e. can be easily viewed on a web page. As per Google’s Webmaster Blog:

“Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. Consequently, users will find it easier to get relevant, high quality search results that are optimized for their devices.”

They go on to say: “When it comes to search on mobile devices, users should get the most relevant and timely results, no matter if the information lives on mobile-friendly web pages or apps. As more people use mobile devices to access the internet, our algorithms have to adapt to these usage patterns. In the past, we’ve made updates to ensure a site is configured properly and viewable on modern devices. We’ve made it easier for users to find mobile-friendly web pages and we’ve introduced App Indexing to surface useful content from apps.”

Other search engines are also most likely to follow suit and give preference to mobile friendliness in a website. Yahoo and Bing, like Google also give priority to responsive websites and openly indicate that.

Multiple Screen Sizes

The main aim for any website should be to serve up what the user wants and how the user wants. With the drastic shift in internet usage to mobile devices, websites also need to adapt to this shift in pattern. This is called Responsive Design. Responsive Design is used to reduce data usage on mobile connections by stripping off unimportant parts of the website and only focusing on the important aspects. Modern web design must make adjustments for different types of screens including mobile phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, projectors and even window displays. Every screen needs to have the unique features based on their usage and based on their functionality.

W3CSchools says that “RWD stands for Responsive Web Design; RWD can deliver web pages in variable sizes; RWD is a must for tablets and mobile devices.”

Focus on important features

Larger buttons, larger font size and a design optimized for a mobile screen are ideal in giving the best website experience to a mobile user. Other factors which are given priority is element spacing, especially for things like links, popups, buttons and even drop down lists. The whole point of this is to ensure that the end user focuses on exactly what they want and not the flowery features of your website which are presented to desktop users.