[Novalug] "Favorite" Hosting site??

[Peter S. May]

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Matt Good wrote:
> On Sat, 2006-11-18 at 18:43 -0500, Rich Goodwin wrote:
>> OK - my 1and1 Professional Preview account is going to expire "soon" [I
>> like how they won't tell me up front when this will happen .... ;-) ]
>> So I am interested in knowing what the favorite hosting providers are
>> amongst our group.
>>
(snip)
> 
> I've been happy with my Dreamhost service which I've had for a year now.
> They're pretty geek-friendly and use Debian boxes with SSH access and
> support for Python, Ruby and FastCGI if you want to host something other
> than PHP.  They've also got the best rates I've seen.  They give you a
> free .com/net/org/info domain registration, but you should also be able
> to use your existing domain.  They also seem like pretty "normal" geeks,
> not the typical faceless business, as their about page shows:
> https://dreamhost.com/aboutus.html

I second this idea, with details and caveats:

Pros:
* You can host as many domains as you want without paying more for the
hosting (though the registration itself costs the same--my system of
using GoDaddy to register domains and Dreamhost to host them works nicely).
* These guys will let you compile virtually anything you want as long as
you're not abusing the privilege.  gcc 3.3.5 is standard (on my host)
and you could probably compile a new gcc if you needed something else.
This is handy if you need something other than their stock Perl, for
example.
* It's not the stock cPanel or whatever other cheap automatic virtual
hosting consoles are out there--they actually write their own, and this
means not only are they flexible, but they know what they're doing.
* The support is pretty responsive.
* You'll get more drive space and bandwidth than you'll know what to do
with.
* They host Jabber for your domain, if you're into that sort of thing.
* Their PHP5 has register_globals turned off FTW.

Cons:
* Their system, I suppose in the interest of user-friendliness, sends
you any passwords you set in the panel.  This truly bugs me, but there
is _some_ mitigation available:  After the initial setup, you can set
your mail client for SSL for the mailbox you have on their server, then
set the panel to only send to your address hosted by them.  The e-mail
still isn't end-to-end secure, but at least it doesn't leave their
server farm except over SSL.  Regardless, I would be leery of hosting a
business there.
* When your mail is set for SSL, be prepared to click through a hostname
mismatch dialog every single time.  It's a minor flaw I got used to
quickly, but it bears mentioning.
* The phpMyAdmin system they implement doesn't go over SSL, and after
many attempts I've still never gotten it to work over SSH tunnels
(there's black magic going on involving redirections).  If you're
worried about passwords going over in the clear, know how to use the
console version of mysql over SSH.  If neither of those sound good, a
unique IP is $5 extra a month, and with that you get to use HTTPS on the
server you're hosting on that IP--then you can install your own PMA.

Another glorious 2 cents.  Good luck.
PSM
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