Uploading and downloading

Uploading and Downloading are related terms used to describe the transfer of electronic data between two computers or similar systems. More colloquially, they are sometimes applied to transfers to/from removable media such as CDs.

Download

To download is to receive data from a remote or central system, such as a webserver, FTP server, mail server, or other similar systems. A download is any file that is offered for downloading or that has been downloaded. The word's primary usage comes in the form of a verb. Increasingly, websites that offer streaming media or media displayed in-browser, such as YouTube, and which place restrictions on the ability of users to save these materials to their computers after they have been received, say that downloading is not permitted. That is, "download" is used to mean "receive and save" instead of simply "receive".

Upload

The opposite operation, to upload, is to send data from a local system to a remote system, FTP server, or website. For example, "Uploading a video to Wikipedia" means sending a video to the website. The difference between uploading and downloading is downloading means to receive and uploading means to send.

File hosting service

A file hosting service, online file storage service, or online media center is an Internet hosting service specifically designed to host static content, typically large files that are not web pages. Typically they allow web and FTP access. They can be optimized for serving many users (as is implied by the term "hosting") or be optimized for single-user storage (as is implied by the term "storage"). Related services are video sharing, virtual storage and remote backup.

Software file hosting

Shareware authors often use file hosting services to serve their software. The inherent problem with free downloads is the huge bandwidth cost. These hosts also offer additional services to the authors such as statistics or other marketing features.

Personal file storage

Personal file storage services are aimed at private individuals, offering a sort of "network storage" for personal backup, file access, or file distribution. Users can upload their files and share them publicly or keep them password-protected.

Prior to the advent of personal file storage services, off-site backup services were not typically affordable for individual and small office computer users.

Sometimes people prefer hosting their files on a publicly accessible HTTP server. In this case, they generally choose paid hosting, and use their hosting for this purpose. Many free hosting providers do not allow the storage of files for non-website-related use.

Content caching

Content providers who potentially encounter bandwidth congestion issues may use services specialized in distributing cached or static content. It is the case for companies with a major Internet presence.