Data compression is the compacting of data by reducing the number of bits that are stored or transmitted. As a result, the compressed data needs less disk space than the original one, so extra content can be stored on the same amount of space. You'll find many different compression algorithms which function in different ways and with many of them just the redundant bits are removed, which means that once the information is uncompressed, there is no decrease in quality. Others remove unneeded bits, but uncompressing the data subsequently will lead to lower quality in comparison with the original. Compressing and uncompressing content takes a significant amount of system resources, and in particular CPU processing time, so each and every web hosting platform that uses compression in real time should have enough power to support this attribute. An example how information can be compressed is to substitute a binary code such as 111111 with 6x1 i.e. "remembering" how many consecutive 1s or 0s there should be instead of keeping the actual code.

Data Compression in Cloud Hosting

The compression algorithm used by the ZFS file system which runs on our cloud internet hosting platform is known as LZ4. It can boost the performance of any Internet site hosted in a cloud hosting account with us since not only does it compress info much better than algorithms used by other file systems, but it uncompresses data at speeds that are higher than the hard disk reading speeds. This is achieved by using a great deal of CPU processing time, which is not a problem for our platform because it uses clusters of powerful servers working together. A further advantage of LZ4 is that it enables us to create backups more rapidly and on lower disk space, so we will have multiple daily backups of your files and databases and their generation won't affect the performance of the servers. That way, we could always restore all of the content that you may have erased by accident.

Data Compression in Semi-dedicated Servers

Your semi-dedicated server account shall be created on a cloud platform which runs on the innovative ZFS file system. The aforementioned uses a compression algorithm called LZ4, that's a lot better than other algorithms when it comes to compression ratio and speed. The gain is visible particularly when data is being uncompressed and not only is LZ4 quicker than other algorithms, but it is also faster in uncompressing data than a system is in reading from a hard disk drive. This is the reason why sites running on a platform which employs LZ4 compression perform better since the algorithm is most efficient when it processes compressible data i.e. web content. Another advantage of using LZ4 is that the backup copies of the semi-dedicated accounts that we keep require less space and are generated a lot quicker, which enables us to store a couple of daily backups of your files and databases.