[Courses] [Domains] Choosing a host

[Valorie Zimmerman]

Akkana's answer reminded me that I have a friend who does hosting. He runs Linux, is a Linux booster, and all around nice guy. Dunno how inexpensive he is, but he does offer mail lists, runs an irc server, and so forth. http://maddoc.net

People I know who host their sites and/or lists with Doc have been very happy with the service. I used to have a Recycling list there, but it died of neglect. Mailman was the software for the little list, and he has something else for gargantuan lists.

Valorie

On Sun, 11 Jul 2004 10:55:05 -0700
Akkana Peck <akkana at shallowsky.com> wrote:

> Replying a week late; but I wanted to mention a couple of issues
> that have come up in my hosting experiences.
> 
> BTW, thanks, Mary, for this excellent course!
> 
> Mary writes:
> > Your host may allow some or all of the following to be hosted on their server:
> 
> 5. Mailing lists.  It's nice to be able to set up a mailing list for
> a group of friends, for a particular interest, or perhaps to discuss
> your product, if you're a company.  You can use services like Yahoo
> groups, but that requires that every member join Yahoo, which not
> wants to do; and a Yahoo group doesn't look very professional if
> you're trying to project an image.  Some issues here are: 
> - Does the provider allow mailing lists at all?
> - What software (majordomo, mailman, other) is used?  How will you
>   administer the list?
> - Can the mailing list be named mylist at example.com, or does it have
>   to look more like mylist at listserv.hostingprovider.net?  You want it
>   in your own domain, in case you ever want to change providers.
> 
> > If you're using CGI scripts, check with your host that they have the
> > interpretor for your language installed (or that compiled binaries of, for
> > example, C programs, will run if you need them). Most seem to have Perl,
> > Python and various shells. Ruby is less common but some hosts have it. Many
> > Perl and Python CGIs require extra modules to be installed -- ask your host if
> > they are prepared to do this on request.
> 
> Some providers used to require permission to install CGI scripts:
> you send your script to an administrator, they approve it and
> install it in a particular place.  I don't know if any still do
> that.  It sounded like a major hassle.
> 
> > You'll almost certainly only need one
> > mailbox for each *person* (not address) using the domain. If it's just you,
> 
> One slight modification of that is that it's really nice to be able
> to use server-side filtering, like procmail.  You might consider it
> a bonus to be able to run procmail on the server to filter out spam
> before you download it, or to separate personal mail from mailing
> list mail and put it all into separate mailboxes.  This is probably
> most useful on hosts which allow IMAP access, since IMAP lets you
> maintain a hierarchy of mailboxes and access them individually,
> or if you're planning to read your mail on the server using mutt,
> pine or another command-line mailer.
> 
> On most hosts, this may still count as "one mailbox" since the other
> mail folders may just be files somewhere under your home directory.
> 
> > 8. Uptime and service guarantees
> 
> WARNING: Many ISPs do not provide reliable backups.  Even if
> they do back up their system, don't count on their being able to
> retrieve your web site in the event of a disaster.  (Yes, I learned
> this the hard way.)
> 
> Always make your own backups; don't count on your ISP to do so.