London based Coreix , a managed hosting and colocation provider recently expanded its product range to include Managed Hosted Exchange 2007. This email hosting service which is aimed at businesses and is fully scalable, and aimed at those enterprises that require the full range of benefits provided by a fully resilient deployment without the initial setup costs or ongoing resource requirements that come with an in-house solution.
Coreix’s Hosted Exhange allows you to access your business email and data from anywhere, including Blackberry’s, iphones and other mobile devices giving you all the features of an Exchange Server for a fraction of the cost. The service which is currently on special offer, starts at £3.50 per month and includes ActiveSync Wireless Push Email and Postini Anti-Spam, Anti - Virus Software. The service is also bundled the Microsoft Outlook Client and also works with Entourage software.
http://www.coreix.net/exchange/index.php
Tuesday 22 July 2008
Sunday 27 April 2008
21/04/08 - Nominet has issued an urgent call to action
From Hazell Pegg's website...
The Nominet Board has usually taken the view not to make recommendations as to how members should vote, however in this situation we feel that it is necessary considering the seriousness of these matters. For those members seeking Board guidance, the Board recommends that you:
- vote for adoption of resolution 6 for the introduction of independent non-executive directors
- do not vote for any of the three candidates that are against this resolution
Nominet is not the company it was back in 1996 when it was formed. It has grown into a company with a mulit-million pound turnover and is the custodian of the .uk namespace. A namespace that is now of increasing importance to the UK business community.
Special Resolution 6
Seeks to change the Articles to allow for the appointment of two non-executive directors,
in addition to the current four elected non-executive directors and the two executive directors.
This allows for the Board to recruit people with expertise that may be needed.
It also has the useful side-effect of making it more difficult for any special interest group to gain control of the Board.
Namesco shamed in moneysupermarket.com survey
Money website moneysupermarket.com took a close look at contracts from 14 leading broadband providers (I wouldn't describe Namesco as "leading" in this area, they are more of a fringe provider compared with the likes of Virgin, Sky etc...
The research uncovered "surreptitiously imposed additional charges" and highlighted which of the providers had "the least transparent contracts."
It should come as no suprise that one of the firms named and shamed was our old friend, the "award winning" Namesco (now controlled by Italian Web 2.0 and mobile phone group Dada) which charges £25 plus VAT for a failed or missed payment! Thats worse than the UK banks who were recently wrapped in a Court Case bought be the OFT.
It seems Namesco have a problem with Terms and Conditions, as they were severely wrapped several years ago by the OFT for Exclusion Clauses and Unfair Contract Terms. (since closed)
The research uncovered "surreptitiously imposed additional charges" and highlighted which of the providers had "the least transparent contracts."
It should come as no suprise that one of the firms named and shamed was our old friend, the "award winning" Namesco (now controlled by Italian Web 2.0 and mobile phone group Dada) which charges £25 plus VAT for a failed or missed payment! Thats worse than the UK banks who were recently wrapped in a Court Case bought be the OFT.
It seems Namesco have a problem with Terms and Conditions, as they were severely wrapped several years ago by the OFT for Exclusion Clauses and Unfair Contract Terms. (since closed)
1&1 Hosted Exchange Service suffers outage
Whoops picked this up on a Google News Alert. It seems 1&1's hosted exchange service provided by 1and1.com has been totally "unreachable" all day (26th April).
Apparently some users were reporting their Outlook Web Access (OWA), email push clients even Outlook got absolutely nowhere trying to establish a connection.
According to 1&1 tech support they were down for 14-16 hours as of about 10:30PM PST (UTC -8) though the status page at http://status.1and1.com had not apparently been updated.
Apparently some users were reporting their Outlook Web Access (OWA), email push clients even Outlook got absolutely nowhere trying to establish a connection.
According to 1&1 tech support they were down for 14-16 hours as of about 10:30PM PST (UTC -8) though the status page at http://status.1and1.com had not apparently been updated.
1&1 Linux Web Hosting
For a limited time, 1&1 are offering three months free hosting on their Linux Web Hosting platform. Then s just £4.99 per month. Each hosting plan comes with free Web Building and Marketing Tools which is pretty comprehensive.
Recently 1&1 announced major changes to it's web hosting plans. ASP and PHP scripting was added to all its plans and free .co.uk, .me.uk and .org.uk are included for the life of the plan. Don't know what happens to those domains if you cancel, but I suspect you can transfer them to another tag as they will be registered in your name.
The PHP enhancements recently introduced on even the most "basic" plans are welcome as they allow a wider range of blogger and forum type applications to be installed in your webspace. Admittedly 1&1 provide free CGI's but these seem a little tacky. You are of course free to download any free CGI/Perl scripts you find on the internet and upload them to your 1&1 webspace!
About 1&1 Internet,( 1and1 Hosting ) Confusing?
Maybe its just me. But I've always thought there has been some confusion over 1&1's actual name. They are officially `1&1` but of course their websites are at 1and1.co.uk and 1and1.com obviously.
This forces some people to hunt on Google for the correct URL for 1&1, Some search for "oneandone." One or two searchers make common typo's such as `i&i` or `1&i` `i&1` `iandi` and so on, but despite this the company has become a massive success, and has earn't the title "the worlds web host."
This is because the company founded in 1992 by Ralph Dommermuth, operates on a global scale with over 15,000MBit of network capacity. 1&1 currently employ's over 150 developers and administrators. Total Employees amount to nearer 1,300.
Microsoft Windows Web Hosting
1&1 (1and) have extremely strong Microsoft Hosting options for those wanting .ASP, and .Net scripting capabilities. Prices are a little higher than for Linux based hosting but is still very good value, starting at £5.99 per month. Even the most "basic" plan hardly scimps on features including a free domain, website builder and PhotoGallery, togethor with 10GB of bandwidth.
1&1 were also one of the first to offer a Microsoft Hosted Exchange option as an alternative the Linux based IMAP and POP3 mail services more commonly found. This means small business can have a hosted email solution rather than having the expense of running their own Exchange server in the office
Additionally 1&1 offer Microsoft Sharepoint Hosting for an increasing number of organisations and teams wishing to setup online communities for document collaberation and development.
Weycrest Hostgator Speed Test
Quick and dirty test comparing the speed of UK Weycrest Shared Web Host and US based Hostgator.
The faster the server and page load, the less time visitor has to wait for a page to load in their web browser.
There are additional factors which can vary response times, for example database query (if you have a dynamic site) php script execution time and process, peak time etc.
Ping results show my Weycrest server is fast with ping times from my Entanet broadband connections less than 28ms
Pinging www.weycrest-coupon.com [85.13.195.119] with 32 bytes of data:This also illustrates how important it can be to host in the UK if your target audience is mainly based in the UK. Let ping a US based web hostsReply from 85.13.195.119: bytes=32 time=26ms TTL=55
Reply from 85.13.195.119: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=55
Reply from 85.13.195.119: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=55
Reply from 85.13.195.119: bytes=32 time=26ms TTL=55
So there you have it. Your Weycrest UK website would be almost 5X faster than if it were were hosted in the US.Pinging hostgator.com [67.18.54.2] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 67.18.54.2: bytes=32 time=137ms TTL=47
Reply from 67.18.54.2: bytes=32 time=138ms TTL=47
Reply from 67.18.54.2: bytes=32 time=138ms TTL=47
Reply from 67.18.54.2: bytes=32 time=138ms TTL=47
Lets try another host. How about 1&1?
Pinging 1and1.com [217.160.232.1] with 32 bytes of data:So Weycrest (in my quick test) come out better against 1&1. But wait a minute where exactly is 1and1.co.uk hosted?Reply from 217.160.232.1: bytes=32 time=136ms TTL=46
Reply from 217.160.232.1: bytes=32 time=135ms TTL=46
Reply from 217.160.232.1: bytes=32 time=135ms TTL=46
Reply from 217.160.232.1: bytes=32 time=137ms TTL=46
Seems to route out to Germany. Thats another thing to watch. You might think you are getting UK based hosting, but in fact you end up your site hosted in Germany.Tracing route to 1and1.co.uk [212.227.126.68]
over a maximum of 30 hops:1 <1>
5 27 ms 27 ms 28 ms te4-3.telehouse-east.core.enta.net [87.127.236.8
1]
6 28 ms 28 ms 26 ms linx.gw-backbone-a.lon.schlund.net [195.66.224.9
8]
7 42 ms 43 ms 42 ms te-1-3.bb-c.bap.rhr.de.oneandone.net [212.227.12
0.49]
8 44 ms 45 ms 45 ms te-1-1.gw-dists-a.bs.ka.oneandone.net [212.227.1
16.208]
9 45 ms 47 ms 46 ms 1and1.co.uk [212.227.126.68]
Also you stand a better chance of ranking well on Google.co.uk with a UK based IP address. This might give your site the edge if your competitors chose a slower overseas based hosts.
Host Multiple Domains to Maximize your Search Engine Rankings
Its well known that shorter domains are better for "humans" (hence the demand for very short two and three letter domain names) however search engines tend to favour longer domain names.
What do you do? Advertise your shorter domains but submit your longer domain name websites to the search engines. Many hosting services will allow you to host multiple domains to point to the same Web site. Multiple Domain or Multi Website Hosting is more commonly known as Reseller Hosting, but this just means you have the ability to create your own hosting accounts and packages.
However if your are going to have portfolio's of multiple domains why not take full advantage of the other factors favoured by Google and other search engines? You have probably noticed that search engines tend to favour the index or home page of any website over the inside or sub pages.
So why not have ten (longer) domains optimized for your chosen keywords, all pointing at their own hosted homepages optimized for those keywords? Suddenly you have increased by ten times the chance to rank well for all your keywords.
You might think the cost of hosting 10 unique websites would be prohibitive? Well not any more. Weycrest Web Hosting offer a reseller hosting package allowing you host up to ten unique websites for less than £100 a year. There is also a choice of cPanel/WHM and Plesk Control Panels.
What do you do? Advertise your shorter domains but submit your longer domain name websites to the search engines. Many hosting services will allow you to host multiple domains to point to the same Web site. Multiple Domain or Multi Website Hosting is more commonly known as Reseller Hosting, but this just means you have the ability to create your own hosting accounts and packages.
However if your are going to have portfolio's of multiple domains why not take full advantage of the other factors favoured by Google and other search engines? You have probably noticed that search engines tend to favour the index or home page of any website over the inside or sub pages.
So why not have ten (longer) domains optimized for your chosen keywords, all pointing at their own hosted homepages optimized for those keywords? Suddenly you have increased by ten times the chance to rank well for all your keywords.
You might think the cost of hosting 10 unique websites would be prohibitive? Well not any more. Weycrest Web Hosting offer a reseller hosting package allowing you host up to ten unique websites for less than £100 a year. There is also a choice of cPanel/WHM and Plesk Control Panels.
Use Keywords in your Domain Name
Using keywords in your Domain Name doesn’t directly help improve your search engine rankings on that search term. Search engines actually concentrate more on what is in the body and content of your pages, not the Domain Name.
However, choosing a domain name is important as it can dictate how people link back to your site. When Google ranks sites, one of the things it looks at is how many inbound links are pointing back to your page. You will get a better rank if the links are high quality and related to what your site is about. When Google and other search engine rank a site, they look into many factors. One of the most important is the number of (quality) inbound links.
You achieve a better rank if the links are high quality and related to the content of your site. So when someone decides to link to your site, the easiest thing is to copy the URL of your web site and use that as the "Anchor Text "for the link. If the name means nothing, you may not get any clicks - or PageRank help - from the link. So let us say you had setup a really good "web design self help group" site and your chosen domain was bcwwwsh.com. If you were surfing the web and ran across that link, would you be more likely to click on it? What does it mean? Needless to say, this could be a very poor choice of domain name.
Not using a keyword in the domain name could make life much harder. When you ask for a link back, you have to specifically ask site owners to put in the descriptive anchor text like "self help web design group"; some will, but most simply won't bother. So choosing the right Domain Name can still help in the long run. If you can get a domain which has a good keyword phrase as part of the name, it will be more plain sailing to get more inbound links that are considered by Google to be related.
However I suggest avoiding too overlong or "spammy" sounding domain like "get-out-of-credit-card-debt-for-free.com." Its still important to keep the domain short and snappy (to avoid typo mistakes). Also keep it memorable.
Click Here to your Domain Names
However, choosing a domain name is important as it can dictate how people link back to your site. When Google ranks sites, one of the things it looks at is how many inbound links are pointing back to your page. You will get a better rank if the links are high quality and related to what your site is about. When Google and other search engine rank a site, they look into many factors. One of the most important is the number of (quality) inbound links.
You achieve a better rank if the links are high quality and related to the content of your site. So when someone decides to link to your site, the easiest thing is to copy the URL of your web site and use that as the "Anchor Text "for the link. If the name means nothing, you may not get any clicks - or PageRank help - from the link. So let us say you had setup a really good "web design self help group" site and your chosen domain was bcwwwsh.com. If you were surfing the web and ran across that link, would you be more likely to click on it? What does it mean? Needless to say, this could be a very poor choice of domain name.
Not using a keyword in the domain name could make life much harder. When you ask for a link back, you have to specifically ask site owners to put in the descriptive anchor text like "self help web design group"; some will, but most simply won't bother. So choosing the right Domain Name can still help in the long run. If you can get a domain which has a good keyword phrase as part of the name, it will be more plain sailing to get more inbound links that are considered by Google to be related.
However I suggest avoiding too overlong or "spammy" sounding domain like "get-out-of-credit-card-debt-for-free.com." Its still important to keep the domain short and snappy (to avoid typo mistakes). Also keep it memorable.
Click Here to your Domain Names
Cheaper Alternative to 123-Reg Hosting
Some people are concerned when transferring domain names, or changing hosts. In reality the process can be very simple. For instance lets say you have registered your domain with 123-Reg but want to host with Weycrest. All you need to do is carry out a "partial transfer" from 123-REG to WEYCREST. With this method administrative control (billing etc) for your domain name will remain with 123-REG but only the nameservers are updated. Your domain management remains with 123-Reg, you but your domain name will point to your hosting plan with Weycrest. Please note any nameserver changes are not immediate, due to the distributed way that DNS operates (all the ISP nameserver cache's in the world have to update) so you still need to allow 12-24 hours for propagation to take place. Click here for a 123-Reg Hosting Comparison
Cheap Web Host Goes Carbon Neutral
Weycrest.Com relocated their business operation in an eco friendly business centre in East London, next to the River Thames, opposite the "famous" O2 Arena. The buildings are constructed entirely from recycled shipping containers! Their carbon offset contribution, in the form of data centre fee's are helping towards the purchasing of a 45 hectare extension to the Buenaventura Reserve in the foothills of the Andes in south-western Ecuador. This area was once covered by low-altitude cloud forest with exceptional biodiversity including many species found nowhere else in the world but the tree cover has now been reduced to scattered patches in pasture. The carbon offsetting is achieved by the reforesting of the land through a combination of natural regeneration by removing grazing pressure and by re-planting a range of native species
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