Hemispheres Web Hosting Features

Server Reliability Disk Space & Bandwidth E-Mail Alias Accounts Traffic Statistics CGI Programs

Site Search Engine Secure Server Password Protection Real Audio/Video Mercantec Softcart (Shopping Cart)

 

Server Reliability

Hemispheres Web Hosting accounts utilize Mindspring's state-of-the-art Web server farm. Mindspring's redundant DS3 (T-3) lines are connected directly to the backbone of the Internet. Reliability is ensured by:

• Servers are housed in their own climate-controlled data center
• Servers are protected with 24-hour Uninterruptable Power Supplies (UPS)
• 24-hour network monitoring proactively targets potential network problems.
• MindSpring's servers up-times over the past 3 years have exceeded 99.9%!

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Disk Space and Bandwidth

Hemispheres offers two (2) hosting packages that differ only in the amount of server space provided and the amount of bandwidth allowed.

Graphics and PDF's files will represent about 80% of a sites total file size so they largely determine the server space required. A medium/large size graphic is about 25k in size. The 20MB provided with our basic Gold Hosting package is adequate for the great majority of sites.

Bandwidth is the technical term for how much traffic your site will have. As visitors click to a page, the bandwidth used is the amount of data transferred to load all elements of the page. An average web page with several graphics is about 45K in file. Our basic Gold hosting package allows for 2,000 MB (or 2 GB) of bandwidth per month before additonal charges are required. This equates to about 45,000 page hits per month.

 

E-Mail Alias Accounts

Hemispheres Web Hosting accounts provide you with an unlimited number of email aliases. An e-mail alias is not an e-mail box but is much more flexible. Your actual e-mail box is provided as part of your dial-up service and physically resides on their hardware. Mail sent to an e-mail alias is simply "re-routed" to your actual e-mail box for collection. An example:

John Doe has his Internet dial-up service with AcmeInternet. His email box is likely to be jdoe@acmeinternet.com. His business web site domain is doeconsulting.com. John could set up email aliases such as sales@doeconsulting, info@doeconsulting, and webmaster@doeconsulting. Mail sent to the three aliases could all be directed to jdoe@acmeinternet.com (or any other e-mail box of his business associates or employees). Multiple aliases can be routed to a single box, or a single alias can be routed (copied) to several boxes.

If John or any of his employees change dial-up services, they simply change the routing information for their respective aliases, avoiding the necessity of changing their published e-mail addresses (and business cards!).

If privacy or security are an issue, most dial-up providers allow you to purchase additional boxes at a nominal fee (Mindspring for example charges $5.00 for each additional box).
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Traffic Statistics

The success of a web site is impossible to assess without knowing the who, what and when of your web visitors. Your Hemispheres/Mindspring web servers log all activity and provide extensive statistics reports of your web traffic. The reports are available on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Each report will provide the following specifics:

• Total Hits by Request Date
• Total Hits by Request Hour
• Total Hits by Client Domain (.com, .net, or country domain)
• Total Hits by Sub-domain (acmesupply.com, universityx.com, etc.)
• Total Hits by Referer* (excite.com, magazinead.com, your_rep.com, etc.)

*Referer will indicate who provided the link to your site. This could be search engines, business directories, etc., and provides excellent information in measuring your promotion efforts.

The engine behind the statistics is a CGI program provided by wwwstat. Access to your statistics reports are password protected. Click here to see a sample report.
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CGI Programs

Hemispheres Web Hosting accounts include the use of CGI programs. If you already know that CGI stands for "Common Gateway Interface" then you already know how useful they are. Even if you didn't know what a CGI is you have still probably used one.

CGI's are web server programs (almost like desktop applications) that add interactivity to web pages. CGI's reside on web servers and provide the processing of user entered data. The most common use is the processing of e-mail contact forms. Other functions include:

• On-line order forms that include calculations
• Site search engines
• Auto-responding to visitors e-mail
• Password protection
• Shopping cart function

There are entire web sites, books, and magazines dedicated to the topic of CGI's and we are not about to compete with them here. The bottom line is that they are available on an as needed basis for your Hemispheres hosted site. (Note to Developers: Check out our Tools page for some excellent CGI resources.)
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Site Search Engine

By now we are all familiar with the power of web site search engines. Hemispheres hosted sites can utilize htDig, a CGI based search program. The layout of the search entry and results can be tailored to your site. A much simplified SimpleSearch script is also available if appropriate.
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Secure Server Transactions

The single largest obstacle to on-line commerce is security. Most web users are cautious about purchasing products with credit cards unless they are sure their transmissions are secure.

Hemispheres/Mindspring servers utilize C2Net's Stronghold secure SSL server technology. Secure SSL servers provide a secure means of exchanging data on the Internet through the use of data encryption. Encryption provides the security and privacy needed for transmitting sensitive information such as credit card numbers or private corporate information. Visit C2Net's Stronghold web site for SSL details.

Secured servers are only half the solution. In order to take full advantage of SSL security, a secure digital certificate should be purchased. The certificate is essentially a unique "key" that identifies your company and certifies that the web page belongs to the company/organization it claims to be. One certificate is required per domain name (www.yourcompany.com). Besides providing a unique I.D., the certificate minimizes the usual warning messages when loading your secured web page. The visitor can confirm that the site is indeed encrypted and secure by clicking the "Security" button on their browser.

Although you can obtain a certificate from a number of recognized authorities, we strongly recommend Thawte Certification. The cost for the certificate is $125.00 for the first year with a $100.00 renewal fee for each year afterwards. If you would like more information, Thawte provides a good overview of digital certification.
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Password Protection

Password protection can be provided on a directory by directory basis. This is useful for business sites that would like to protect certain information from the general public while allowing access to groups such as sales reps and other associates.
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Real Audio/Video

Hemispheres/Mindspring servers are equipped with RealServer version 5.01, allowing the delivery of RealAudio and RealVideo files. Both RealAudio and RealVideo require a browser plug-in which is downloadable for free.
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Mercantec Shopping Cart 3.0

Mercantec's SoftCart is a shopping cart system that is used to promote online commerce by making it easier for the shopper to purchase items on the Web. Cyber merchants open a "virtual store," and the shopper browses through the online store, collecting items in a virtual "shopping cart." SoftCart automatically calculates the price of each item, including tax and shipping charges, for a running total.

For more information on Mercantec, please refer to our Products and Services listing for Mercantec.

Mercantec SoftCart Pricing (Note - These prices do NOT include web hosting.)

Option I: Monthly License - $100.00
Includes software upgrades and support as long as you are paying the monthly license.

Option II: One-time software license purchase. - $1550.00
This entitles you to full support and future software upgrades for one year from your start date. Any upgrades after one year will need to be purchased from Mercantec.

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