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10 Jun 2011

Advantages and Disadvantages of POP3

POP3 or the Post Office Protocol is the oldest and best known of the two Internet message access protocols. It was designed to support “offline”/local email processing. Email is delivered to an email server and a remote email client periodically downloads messages from this server to the user’s PC. Once the messages are delivered to the client they are permanently deleted from the email server.
POP3 stands for Post Office Protocol (version 3), comprised of mailboxes for email systems so that a user can retrieve email from a central location where the email is stored. POP3 accounts allow users to have mailboxes on a server with their domain name. Post Office Protocol Version 3 provides a simple, standardized way for users to access mailboxes and download messages to their computers.
One of the advantages of POP3 is that once the messages are delivered to the client PC the messages can be read whether connected to the Internet or not. Another advantage is that it is a very popular email protocol and just about all email clients support it.
A disadvantage of the POP3 protocol is that it is inadequate for the mobile user. Since messages are permanently downloaded, the user will only be able to access the messages from one PC. A couple ways around this are mobile PCs (laptops, palmtops, etc.) or some email programs have an option to “leave the messages on the server”. The best way to work around this problem is to use IMAP.

10 Jun 2011

How Domain Name Server (DNS) Works?

Domain name Servers (DNS) are an important but invisible part of the internet, and form one of the largest databases on it. Each machine on an internet is assigned a unique address, called an IP address, which is 32 bit number and is expressed as 4 octets. The method user to represent these IP addresses is known as dotted decimal Notation”. A typical address looks like this: 199.249.150.4
It is very difficult to keep in mind the IP addresses of all the websites we visit daily, because it’s not easy to remember strings of numbers. However, we do remember words. This is where domain names come into the picture. If you want to connect to a particular site, you need to know its IP address but do need to know its URL. The DNS gets the mappings of the IP addresses and the corresponding names,
Names and numbers

DNS converts the machine names (such as www.xyz.com) to IP addresses (such as 199.249.150.9). Basically, it translates from a name to an address and from an address to a name.

The mapping from the IP address to the machine name is called reverse mapping .when you type http://www.xyz.com into your browser, the browser first needs to get the IP address of www.xyz.com. The machine uses a directory service to look up IP addresses and this service is called DNS. When you type www.xyz.com your machines firsts contacts a DNS server, asking it to find the IP address for www.xyz.com. This DNS server might then contact other DNS servers on the internet. DNS is therefore is considered as the global network of servers. The great advantage of DNS is that no organization is responsible for updating it. It is what is known as distributed database.

09 Jun 2011

IIS and Apache are equivalent in functionality

IIS performs better than Apache (I’ve done the testing myself on the same machine) for straight HTML pages. IIS also has a better security model than Apache by far (based on NTFS as it is). IIS is also a heck of a lot easier to use than Apache, although you can certainly purchase GUI’s for apache which make it usable for the average person. And the first major problems (including security) with Apache 2.0 have started appearing, and they are just as nasty as anything found in IIS.
To my way of thinking the main reason to prefer Apache over IIS is (a) initial cost, and (b) knowledge of your people. If you and your group already know apache, then that is the best choice for you. If you already know IIS, then that is probably the best choice.
Browsers? IE won the browser wars for a good reason (besides ruthlessness) – it’s far superior to Netscape 6 and before. Now that Mozilla and Opera have had a couple of years, it looks like they might give IE a run for it’s money. Even now, though, I’ve found IE is superior to the competition and I’m sure there is a new version in the works.
But all of this is not as relevant as the cost of modifications. I’ve found the initial cost of the software, regardless of what it is, is puny compared to the cost of modifications. I would never even consider hiring programmers, for example, to modify the OS, the browser, or the web server, so the availability of sources is not relevant. As far as an application system is concerned, I am interested in modifying the business rules, not the application itself. In fact, if my accounting system requires me to modify it’s primary code just to change a business rule, I’ll find something else.
There are many companies which provide good application systems, including SAP, Ultipro and hundreds of others. To date, not one open-source version of these (the really important things) has even made it to the initial RFP.
I find the “religious wars” about this subject fascinating. Ask Apache admins and they will tell you Apache is best and death to all unbelievers. Ask IIS admins and you will get the same story. same with Windows, Linux and OpenVMS and any other similar thing. I personally believe we all like what we like and are used to. What I personally like to do is ignore the hype and rumors and so forth and do my own analysis. And yes, I ignore Microsoft hype as well … they have more PR skills than any hundred other organizations. But PR does not make for a good product.
The decision to use or not use a product should depend upon rational facts, not opinions and noise. Apache is in many ways better than IIS, and IIS is in many ways better than Apache. Which is better? Depends upon what you are using it for, the goals of your organization and many other things. Same with Windows Vs Linux, or any other argument.
Our experience, and keep in mind this is for corporate intranet web servers, is that the cost of Windows and IIS over a long term (5+ years) is far, far less than the cost of Linux and Apache. We performed our own internal study and factored in the cost of the software, maintenance costs, upgrades, time to support, training and so on. Windows 2000 server came out far ahead of Linux (even with all of the patching) and IIS came out ahead of Apache. I have only just installed Apache 2.0 on a windows platform and so have not formed any opinions on this product yet. In a few months, perhaps, I will have some solid data about what appears to be a great new release of Apache.
Cost, however, should never be the primary criteria of this kind of decision. Cost is the least important of many different factors which go into a decision. I have found over my career that when I chose something based upon cost as a primary factor I wound up with that sore behind feeling. Yet when I chose something based upon features and requirements and a good analysis, then picked the product which fit the best, then and only then was it comfortable sitting down.

09 Jun 2011

Domain Name Choice Tips

Before buying your domain name, give some thought to the following:-

1) If possible use your sites name as the basis of your domain name e.g www.discountdomainsuk.com for Discount Domains UK. This might seem common sense but not every site follows the convention. If you use your name in your URL it will be much easier for your customers to find you.

2) Generic names – if you can register a generic domain such as toys.com that’s great, but most of these have already gone. Also getting ranked in the search engines is likely to be harder. Selected a domain closer to your market segment will cut down the competition. E.g toyplanes.com

3) Hyphenated Names – Its easy to forget the hyphen! Which is the problem, particularly if your customer remembers your name but not your URL. Though on a positive note hyphenated names are less likely to be registered already.

4) If the .com or .co.uk extension is not available then consider the alternative TLD ( Top level domain types) such as .net or .biz. If your domain name has already been registered then approach the owner and ask if they’ll sell. They may accept a £100. If you ask, they can only say no.

5) Plurals. Very often a domain name will be free in the plural but not in the singular form. It’s a personal choice, but if your prefered choice of domain name is not available you might be stuck.

6) Short or Long domains – A short domain name is more memorable, but less likely to be available. A longer domain is harder to remember, but can contain more keywords which is important as some of the search engines, use keywords in a domain name as part of the search algorithm.

7) Which Top Level Domain Type – .com, .co.uk , .net etc This is a question I am often asked. There is no evidence that any domain name type is given preference by the search engines. However some search engines such as Google, have local searches e.g www.google.co.uk which do select local content. Customer often get re-assurance from seeing a local TLD as they know they are dealing with a local company etc. You can, of course, register all of them

Archives: Knowledge Base

Advantages and Disadvantages of POP3

How Domain Name Server (DNS) Works?

IIS and Apache are equivalent in functionality

Domain Name Choice Tips