Personal web server

This page is about computer system. For Microsoft's offering, see Microsoft Personal Web Server.

A personal web server (PWS) is system of hardware and software that is designed to create and manage a web server on a desktop computer for individuals or employees.[1] It can be used to learn how to set up and administer a website, to serve as a site for testing dynamic web pages, or to serve web pages in a closed environment not accessible on the internet. One of the main functions of PWS is to provide an environment where web programmers can test their programs and web pages. Therefore, a PWS supports the more common server-side programming approaches that can be used with production web servers.

A personal web server, or personal server in short, allows users to store, selectively share, or publish information on the web or on a home network. Unlike other types of web servers, a personal web server is owned or controlled by an individual or organization, and operated for the individual's needs. It can be implemented in different ways:

* as a computer appliance
* as a general-purpose server, such as a Linux server, which may be located at the owner's home or in a data center
* in a shared hosting model, where several users share one physical server by means of virtualization, or virtual hosting.
* as one feature of a computer that is otherwise also used for other purposes.

A personal web server is conceptually the opposite of a web server, or website, operated by third parties, in a software as a service (SaaS) or cloud model.

## Contents

* 1 Advantages
* 2 Disadvantages
* 3 See also
* 4 References

## Advantages

* Privacy: as the personal server is owned by the individual that derives the main benefit from it, they are in control of who else may access information on the server
* Autonomy: the owner of the personal server decides which applications to run on the server, whom to allow access to, when to upgrade, etc.
* Hackability: the owner of the personal server can configure and change any aspect of the personal server

## Disadvantages

* Administration overhead: the owner of the server is responsible for system administration
* Higher power consumption: the power consumed per user is higher, on average, than in a model where many users use the same server, such as in the SaaS/cloud model.
* Poor scalability: the server may function poorly or crash if its resources are heavily accessed

## See also

* Comparison of web server software
* Microsoft Personal Web Server

## References

1. ↑ "personal Web server". https://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia/term/personal-web-server.

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