[Techtalk] Web-hosting dilemma

[Kathryn Andersen]

On Wed, May 25, 2005 at 07:07:14PM -0400, Michelle Murrain wrote:
> 
> there are things called Virtual private servers - I got one for $10/ 
> month - and there are a number of OSes to choose from. - and I think  
> it beats running your own server in your house (been there, done that).
> 
> I got mine from Redwood Virtual - and they were nice folks. http:// 
> www.redwoodvirtual.com/

Well... here we are, part deux.

I have got myself a virtual private server from Redwood Virtual, the
entry-level one for $10 US a month, and have managed to set it up with a
webserver, at katspace.org, and it's basically working.

But...

The VPS is slow and thrashes a lot, since it's only got 64M of memory
(and 64M of swap).  Since the whole dilemma started because I want to
run my own CGI CMS, which needs CPU and memory, this is a problem.

I also have a mirror of the same site, set up on my home machine,
katspace.homelinux.org, which of course has the opposite problem: plenty
of memory and CPU, but a slow (upload) connection.

But if I get the next level up of VPS at Redwood Virtual, that's US$20 a
month -- and for (Australian) $20 a month more than I'm paying now for
my ADSL, I can upgrade to a connection which will give me 256K upload,
which someone else in this thread said was the minimum needed for a
decent upload speed.  So it would boil down to being cheaper to run it
from my own machine.

Thing is, of course, two people on this thread, including you, above,
have said "No, no, don't run your own server in your own house!  Run
away!  Run away!"

But... I've been runing into the *negatives* of running a VPS this past
week, and as far as I can see, running from my own physical machine
would be *less* effort, not more.
- if anything goes wrong, I can always access the machine, because it's
  right here, rather than, say, if I misconfigure something, suddenly I
  lose my ssh connection and I'm stuffed.
- I'd only have to maintain *one* system that's exposed to the internet
  rather than two; my home system is still going to be exposed to the
  internet whether I run a VPS or not, so I'd have to secure it anyway, so
  having a VPS would be doubling the effort.
- I'd only have to deal with one version of Linux (my home system runs
  GenToo, the VPS runs Debian).  If they both ran the same O/S, the
  effort wouldn't be doubled, because one could just set them up in
  basically the same way, but this way, I have to keep on translating
  between the way GenToo does things and the way Debian does things, thus,
  more effort.
- I already have a static IP, so setting up a server is fine.
- Backups should be done anyway.
- I have more choice of ADSL vendors than I do of VPS vendors.
- I'm not going to worry about UPS, blackouts or dropouts -- this is all
  for fun, not profit, and if I temporarily lose my connection, well,
  all my friends can share the pain (pokes out tongue).

Um, so why should I be running away, again?

Kathryn Andersen
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