Data compression is the compacting of info by reducing the number of bits which are stored or transmitted. Consequently, the compressed information needs less disk space than the original one, so additional content might be stored using identical amount of space. You will find many different compression algorithms that work in different ways and with many of them just the redundant bits are erased, so once the information is uncompressed, there's no decrease in quality. Others erase unnecessary bits, but uncompressing the data following that will result in reduced quality compared to the original. Compressing and uncompressing content requires a large amount of system resources, particularly CPU processing time, therefore each and every web hosting platform that uses compression in real time must have adequate power to support this attribute. An example how info can be compressed is to replace a binary code such as 111111 with 6x1 i.e. "remembering" the number of consecutive 1s or 0s there should be instead of keeping the actual code.

Data Compression in Cloud Hosting

The compression algorithm employed by the ZFS file system that runs on our cloud internet hosting platform is known as LZ4. It can improve the performance of any Internet site hosted in a cloud hosting account on our end since not only does it compress data more effectively than algorithms used by other file systems, but also uncompresses data at speeds that are higher than the hard disk reading speeds. This can be done by using a lot of CPU processing time, which is not a problem for our platform since it uses clusters of powerful servers working together. A further advantage of LZ4 is that it enables us to create backup copies more quickly and on reduced disk space, so we will have several daily backups of your databases and files and their generation won't influence the performance of the servers. This way, we can always restore any content that you may have removed by mistake.

Data Compression in Semi-dedicated Servers

In case you host your websites in a semi-dedicated server account with our firm, you'll be able to experience the advantages of LZ4 - the powerful compression algorithm employed by the ZFS file system that's behind our advanced cloud hosting platform. What distinguishes LZ4 from all of the other algorithms out there is that it has a higher compression ratio and it is much faster, in particular with regard to uncompressing web content. It does that even quicker than uncompressed info can be read from a hard drive, so your Internet sites will perform better. The higher speed comes at the expense of using a lot of CPU processing time, which is not a problem for our platform since it consists of a lot of clusters working together. Besides the improved performance, you'll have multiple daily backup copies at your disposal, so you can recover any deleted content with several clicks. The backups are available for a whole month and we can afford to store them as they need a lot less space compared to standard backups.