It's often been said that Linux is more secure and much more stable in general. Linux users tend to be sometimes fanatic in their support for their favorite operating system.

Desktop vs Server - Stability

Many people who are just taking their first steps in "the wonderful world of hosting", assume that, because their desktop computer or the computer that will be used to create the web pages uses Windows, they must look for Windows hosting. That's not true at all. The pages can be created in Windows and hosted on a Linux box and vice versa. There's no problem with that.

Performance

Comparing Windows and Linux, one thing that has been often noted is that Linux handles high numbers of processes running at the same time much better than Windows - that Windows' stability decreases faster when more processes run on the machine. At the same time a properly tuned windows server can take as much load as a similar Linux system.

This in the end means that Linux might be able to squeeze more out of the server, but in the hands of a knowledgeable system administrator, a server will perform very well, regardless of the operating system, may it be Windows or Linux.

Linux is free while Windows is all about the money

This is a very popular view on things. Linux is open source and thrives because of the work of many volunteer programmers. The volume of work they put in and the quality of their work can only be commendable. Windows, just like Linux, is a product created by the work of many programmers. They however are hired to do a job and they are paid to do it. Microsoft is their employer - a business - and, like any other business, its goal is to make a profit - to make money and at the same time give a better and user-friendly product

Then, which one should you look for?

The decision of going for Windows hosting or Linux hosting should be based on actual needs, not myths. More often than not it should be based on the knowledge that you and/or your staff/business partners/friends have, on the things that you plan do to with your website or on the things you'd prefer to learn.

Basic, static web pages are written in HTML (HyperText Markup Language) which the browser interprets into the web pages as we see them, containing text, tables, images and so on. Pure HTML pages can be hosted on any type of web server, regardless of the operating system.

Dynamic, interactive web pages however, are a different kind of beast and they require powerful programming languages. Don't confuse dynamic with animated. There may be animated objects such as gifs on the web pages, but that doesn't make them dynamic. Dynamic pages are those of a forum, of a shopping cart etc. where you send information to the server and the server will store it and do things differently, in accordance with that information.

Some such programming languages are Perl, PHP, ASP, Python, Java etc. PHP and ASP are special with respect to this article due to their popularity and more. PHP is open source and free, while ASP is a Microsoft product.

ASP and ASP.net

To date, ASP and ASP.NET are fully usable only on Windows. If you plan to use ASP or ASP.net, you'd better stick to using Windows for your hosting. It's the safer choice if not the 'only choice.

PHP

PHP was developed by the open source community, much of which is gathered around Linux. Linux, Apache, PHP and MySQL form a well known combination and they are known to work very well together.

Fortunately PHP works well on the Windows-IIS (Internet Information Services) platform too, which means that PHP scripts will work on a Windows machine as well (although a few changes in the scripts might be necessary).

PHP gained its popularity quite rapidly and it is renowned for being free, fast and powerful. Add to that the big number of scripts (many of which are free) that are written in PHP, the abundant information on just about every PHP related subject, and you can understand why PHP becomes the choice of ever more users.

Making the choice

Windows as a hosting platform has at least one big advantage: full use of ASP and ASP.NET. If your plan to use ASP because your employees know ASP or because it does a better job for your specific application, Windows hosting is the best choice right now.

Good thing is that PHP is not confined to Linux and it works quite well on Windows. If, at a later time, you decide to use PHP for certain things, you can do so without much worry, provided that your host has PHP on that server, of course.

Back to Linux - while it is not yet able to take full advantage of ASP, it is a very popular choice as an operating system for web servers. It is widely acclaimed for its stability and that has to count for something. While Windows' instability, although it might be somewhat anecdotal, is a subject that is often discussed, Linux's stability is almost undisputed.

Price and availability

Although Linux is known to be free and it basically is, some disputes over total cost of ownership as an operating system for web servers, do exist. Certain studies revealed that Windows might be cheaper to use than Linux in time and under certain conditions.

While the "big guys" run their numbers and fancy extrapolations, in the real world, for one reason or another, Linux hosting is generally cheaper than Windows hosting, meaning that a dedicated server running Linux will cost less than a dedicated server running Windows. Moving this into the "shared hosting" space, one can obtain more web space and data transfer for the same amount of money if he chooses Linux.