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Are you looking to Linux in 2013?

A growing number of small and medium-sized enterprises could be looking towards Linux solutions to manage their data centers, web servers and even user PCs in the coming year as recognition grows about the potential benefits of the system.
In the past, many companies might have been wary about this - particularly if they are small businesses without the resources to allocate to dedicated IT professionals. Many businesses are also nervous about change, as any modifications to the way they operate can be disruptive and people often feel uncomfortable about abandoning familiar solutions.

Great interoperability

So why the sudden interest in Linux platforms? Specialist online publication Small Business Computing observed there's a growing understanding that it's not necessarily a choice between either Linux or Windows solutions.
Linux distributions offer great interoperability tools, meaning businesses can mix Linux and Windows-based servers and PCs across their network should they require, making them more convenient for certain uses.

Stable system

Linux-based operating systems are also extremely stable, secure and highly efficient - meaning a Linux solution won't clog up valuable server resources just to run itself. Because it's open source, there are also a wide variety of features, add-ons and software available to customise the experience to a firm's exact needs. And as many of these are free, you'll feel the benefits on your bottom line as well.

There are a wide range of Linux distributions you can use as a base for your web server, including paid-for professional enterprise solutions such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux, as well as free offerings like CentOS that could provide all the essentials you need to get your business up and running.

Range of options

Whether you opt for a commercial solution or a free alternative with community support, the chances are there will be an operating system to suit your exact requirements.
Small Business Computing noted 2013 is a great time to think about moving operations to Linux-based tools. Many distributions are bringing out new versions all the time to improve performance and, if you want to implement Linux throughout your business, the amount of applications available for the platform is also growing.

European report highlights top cyber threats

Cyber criminals and hacking attacks

One of the top concerns if you're running web servers at the current time is likely to be the growing threat posed by cyber criminals and hacking attacks. The variety and sophistication of these has been increasing over the last few years and isn't looking like slowing down any time soon. But its not just attacks attempting to take your website down or steal confidential data that you need to be worried about, as one growing problem is programs that infect web servers in order to spread to the PCs of visitors.

It could be the case that seriously harms your reputation if your website is found to be unwittingly delivering malware, so it's something you need to keep an eye on. In fact, drive-by exploits were recently found to be the top web threat for 2013.

This is according to the EU's cyber security agency ENISA, which recently published its Cyber Threat Landscape report, which analysed over 120 studies in 2012 to provide a comprehensive overview of the web landscape.

It identified ten top threats that anyone that works online needs to be aware of. These are:

1. Drive-by exploits
2. Worms/trojans
3. Code injection attacks
4. Exploit kits
5. Botnets
6. Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks
7. Phishing
8. Compromising confidential information
9. Rogueware/scareware
10. Spam

Several of these have the potential to cause serious disruption among businesses, so it's important you have the right procedures and technologies in place to prevent your servers falling victim to malicious attacks - whether it be in the form of malware that infects your systems or DDoS and hacking attacks that can compromise your website or data.
ENISA made a number of recommendations as part of its report to ensure that businesses are better able to fight cyber attacks in the coming year. These include having the latest security controls available to deal with emerging threat types and gathering intelligence about attacks - such as its starting point and impact - so companies are better able to prepare for the future.
With such a wide variety of potential threats being faced by businesses it's clearly important you plan carefully to minimise your risk and keep both you and your customers safe.

Why dedicated servers are the best choice

If you expect to do the majority of your business online, the choice of how you host your web servers will be one of the most vital considerations when setting up your systems. Get this wrong and you'll find you aren't able to meet the expectations of customers, leading to lost business and a negative reputation.

Therefore, choosing the right type of server is vital. There are three basic options to go for - shared services, virtual private servers and dedicated servers. While all three have their own strengths and weaknesses depending on what you hope to use them for, if you're developing web applications or running an ecommerce platform, dedicated server solutions are usually the best way to go.

Freedom of choice

This was stated by PC Pro magazine, which explained the key benefit of these offerings is that you get total control over the hardware through a browser-based control panel and root/admin-level access for advanced operations. What's more, it's completely up to you what operating system you choose, so you can select one that has the right features and modules you need. Linux-distributions and Windows Server are the most common options.

High bandwidth availability

Although these tools are more expensive than shared service, the fact they are solely for use by your website is another huge bonus for dedicated services and one that could be a deciding factor if you need to run a reliable, fast website that can cope with large numbers of customers. If you are using shared connections, these are unlikely to offer enough bandwidth to cope with periods of high traffic, even if it is just for short periods. This can frustrate customers who find themselves unable to complete a transaction and ultimately cost you revenue - something no business wants.
While this will be important for all online businesses, those that offer web applications or other services delivered via the internet will be particularly affected by this issue.

PC Pro concluded: "In other words, if your core product is delivered to the customer via the internet, rather than being a physical product that is merely ordered online, a dedicated server is likely to be the best choice."

New Microsoft tools boost ‘cloud OS’

One of the growing trends over the last few years has been the move to shift more functionality away from on-premises solutions to hosted dedicated servers and cloud solutions and one of the key firms pushing for this is Microsoft. It has been heavily promoting the 'cloud OS' over the last year and with new and updated tools including System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 and enhanced Azure services for Windows Server recently announced, now might be the time for businesses to start looking seriously at cloud data center technology.

Cloud OS will provide users with a consistent platform

The firm promises that the Cloud OS will provide users with a consistent platform that covers customer data centers, service provider data centers and the Microsoft public cloud, all with Windows Server and Windows Azure at its heart. This could be great news for businesses using Microsoft products at the heart of their data centers, as it might give them improved functionality and mean they can spend less time on administration tasks to keep the system up and running.

Some of the key features of the Cloud OS that might be hugely useful to firms include powerful management and automation functionality, which can take some of the burden off IT professionals and allow them to focus more heavily on innovation and delivering value for their company.

But what else could businesses stand to see as a result of adopting Microsoft Server and Cloud OS solutions? It offers a wide range range of features, such as:

• Centralised management for cloud-based applications and resources in their data centers.
• The ability to back up servers to Windows Azure, to prevent data loss and corruption.
• Monitoring solutions to ensure servers are running as effectively as possible and alert users to any performance issues.
• Easy management of a range of computing solutions, including PCs, laptops and mobile devices, from a single console.

Microsoft is trying to promote itself as being in a unique position to help businesses make the transition from on-premises data center solutions to hybrid and full cloud deployments. Therefore, if you're looking towards hosted solutions as the basis for your operations, it could be worth checking out what the company has to offer and considering if its a good fit for your operations.

Key reasons why you need to monitor your website

If you're running a website, there are many factors you need to keep into account in order to make sure you're providing a good experience to visitors. There are a range of issues that could affect this, from slow speeds to hacking attacks that result in downtime. Preventing these is critical, as no-one is going to have faith in a site that's frequently down, or one that can't cope with increases in traffic without slowing to a crawl.

Minimise your downtime and keep your site running smoothly

It was noted by news and advice website Business 2 Community that if you want to use your website as a selling platform, this is even more important. The website noted that in many industries, 90% of purchasing decisions start with on online search, so if you can't offer a good service on the web, you're immediately at a disadvantage.
"If you cannot be found because your website is down you lose credibility, customer leads and sales," Business 2 Community said. Therefore, it was noted it's essential to use tools that can monitor your web servers and keep a close eye on their performance in order to minimise your downtime and keep your site running smoothly.

If you're not convinced, the site highlighted five key reasons for investing in these solutions in order to monitor and manage your website and alert you quickly to any issues, so you can sort them out before they escalate.

1. Protect your image

With new tools such as social media allowing news of problems to spread around the world faster than ever before, any issues that affect your website on a regular basis will be shared instantly and potential customers will be able to find out if you're a reliable firm to do business with. There's nothing that can harm the reputation of web-based companies quicker than customers being unable to get in touch.

2. Keep customers happy

With so much competition online, if you can't offer a high-quality service, it's easy for consumers to turn elsewhere. If you suffer from prolonged downtime, don't expect existing customers to stick around when there are other options out there, so it's important you make sure they can access your services at any time.

3. Prevent lost sales

If your website isn't online, obviously you can't make any sales. Business 2 Community stated that seven hours of downtime could result in thousands of dollars of lost sales, with this increasing for larger companies. For example, it noted a two-hour downtime for Amazon in 2007 cost it $3.48 million (€2.6 million).

4. Improve search ranking results

Google hates slow and unresponsive sites, so it will penalise these by demoting them in its search results. Fall off the first couple of pages and you can expect a significant drop in sales as new customers won't be able to find you.

5. Spot hacking quickly

Monitoring tools can let administrators know quickly if a web server comes under attack, allowing them to respond quickly to counter the threat before it becomes a major issue. Failure to act on this could see your site infected with malicious code that causes far bigger problems than just downtime, such as compromising databases and confidential customer information.

Improve your website with new Nginx module

If you're looking to deliver a great website experience, the current environment presents a huge number of challenges that haven't been seen before. One of these is the ever-increasing number of web-enabled devices, as visitors are no longer limited to just desktop and laptop PCs.

Instead, more people are accessing their favourite sites from smartphones, tablet devices and even games consoles, which can present a challenge to web servers seeking to deliver a fast and reliable service due to their different properties, which can affect the way content needs to be delivered and displayed.

New module from Nginx

However, if you're basing your servers on the Nginx platform, help is at hand in the form of a new module. Nginx has been working with mobile web technology specialist dotMobi to come up with a new device detection module that sits on the server layer and can instantly tell what gadget a visitor is using to access a site.
The module, which uses dotMobi's DeviceAtlas solution, offers high-performance, high-speed device detection suitable for even the heaviest-traffic sites and gives servers the awareness needed to adapt content according to the properties of the requesting device.

Improved experience

The solution was welcomed by Igor Sysoev, chief technology officer and principal architect at Nginx, who said the fact it does not sit on the application layer helps deliver improved performance. He explained: "The DeviceAtlas module for Nginx enables us to offload device detection from applications to the web server, a logical step that helps us ensure the best possible customer experience."
It was observed that implementing the solution at the server layer of a technology stack offers huge advantages to website developers who value performance and efficiency. It is said to be especially useful for high-traffic sites, so if your servers are currently struggling to handle device detection processes for large volumes of simultaneous users, this could be the perfect solution for you.
In fact, a large number of sites may benefit from adding the module to their servers, as a recent survey by NetCraft revealed the use of Nginx is growing, with the platform now accounting for 12.77% of the world's million busiest sites.

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