The whole Internet and networks are primarily based on client server technology. There is a server that serves a services, to a client that requests it.
An examples are websites. Websites are simple files on a computer… a server. And your web browser is the client that requests it from the web server.
So, what’s needed to run a server?
Well, the device must be up and running 24/7, unless you only want to transfer data temporarily, for example by using an FTP server. The device must listen and wait for requests coming in from the network. Which is handled by the according server application/software. Like for example Apache or nginx for web servers. And in case of a request the same must respond and send the according data.
So, servers are basically computers too, but they are usually specifically designed for the task at hand. They don’t need stuff like displays, graphics cards or keyboards. But they need to be up and running 24/7 and the components must deal with that kind of stress. Also, they run the according software that is listening for requests and sends the according data to the client upon request.
So yes, the server only serves to the client, in case the device is up all the time and the according server applications are running and listening to requests. That’s the whole point. You can’t drive a car with it’s engine off. A server needs to be running to listen to requests, respond and serve data.
You can make your PC, laptop or netbook a server, if you install and run the according software to listen and serve data. At least if you want to share data within the borders of your home network. Getting access from the outside might need a bit more tinkering. And there is the security stuff…
But basic servers are really not that complicated. It’s a simple application. It just needs to know the location of the data that’s being served, the network port it should listen on and maybe access permissions. Approximately like that. Of course that’s not all. But that’s the basis.
For the question one category is web development. So, just take a look at XAMPP, which is available for a number of platforms. Install it and give it a try. It’s a quite simple way to get started with servers.
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