Web Server Architecture

Now, let’s look at these 5 servers we had read about in the previous chapter.

So, like we said, it is not necessary to have these as 5 different servers, but a combination of these can be present in one physical server, depending on the requirement of the application.

Now, this server will have some architecture which should be appropriate for the kind of functions that the server will perform.

This architecture is called a web server architecture. It is made up of these 5 basic elements. Let’s look at each one of these.

Server OS- Just like every computer has an operating system, similarly the computer that hosts the website also needs to have an OS.

Examples are Linux, Windows, IBM AIX, etc.

Server Software- We know that every website needs to address the incoming requests of the users. This request could be for a web page in the website, or for any other functionality that the website provides. For this, the server needs to run the code of the website to generate a response for the user. But, to handle all this function, the server needs a software which is called the server software.

Examples are Apache, nginx, IIS, etc.

Programming Language- Every website has a backend part which is basically written as lines of code, using a programming language. So, the web server architecture includes a particular programming language that is used to write this code.

Examples are: PHP, Python, Perl, Ruby, ASP (.NET), JSP, etc.

Database Software- Every website has users and it stores the information of these users in the database. So your login credentials, your preferences, cart items in case of an e-commerce, or any other details that you provide while accessing a website is stored in the database in a secure and efficient manner. And to access this data from the database, a software is required. This is known as the database software.

Examples are: MySQL, MS SQL, MongoDB, Casandra DB, Postgre SQL, etc.

Front End Components- So, we know that every website has a frontend or a user interface, which is what the user sees on the browser while browsing through the website. So, there needs to be a front end language to write the front ends code.

Examples are: HTML, javascript, Jquery, CSS, Bootstrap, etc.

Now, we know that the architecture will contain one of each of these elements. We will look at some of the most common combinations of web server architecture in the next lesson.