Each and every notebook or desktop or web server is run by an Operating System - the low-level software that communicates with the hardware, including peripheral devices such as a mouse or a printer, together with any apps that are present on the system. Any program input through a command line or a Graphical User Interface (GUI) is processed by sending an Application Program Interface (API) request to the OS. On a web server, each application runs within the parameters defined by the OS as well - priority, physical memory, processing time, and so on. This goes for both standard website scripts and server-side software like a media server. In case a virtual server is created on a physical one, there can be two different Operating Systems, called guest OS and host OS, so you'll be able to set up a different software environment on a single machine.
Multiple OS in Dedicated Servers Hosting
We offer three Operating Systems with our dedicated server packages - CentOS, Ubuntu and Debian. They are all different Linux distributions and we offer them not only because they're absolutely free and they will not increase the price of your new web hosting server, but also because they are exceptionally stable and secure. Each one of them is backed up by a large community of developers, so you'll be given the option to choose from countless software packages that you may install on your server if the app that you would like to use has certain requirements. The Operating System will also determine what web hosting Control Panel you can use since the Control Panels that we offer are compatible with specific OSs only and because we want to provide you with as much adaptability as possible, we offer a couple of OSs and multiple Control Panels. If you choose a server with a given OS, we will change it upon request in case it turns out that you need another one. We could also keep your OS updated on a weekly basis as part of the optional Managed Services upgrade.