When you are designing and developing sites for your clients, where do you host them?
The host would have to have MySQL capabilities for use with Joomla and wordpress.
What do you do?
Thanks all!
LM,
Look around here, please. Many members have recommended (or panned) various hosts for years.
As for me, I’m currently hosting (for myself and for my clients) with two separate hosts:
• modVPS.com (part of WebHostingZoom.com) currently has my VPS account. I’ve had them for several years (they’re more expensive now when I compare the cost of services) and they’re just a little slow (at least when I’m in a rush) at some responses but, the proof of their services, price and responsiveness is that I still have my account with them.
• WebHostingBuzz has two of my accounts, one an account designed to accommodate the unusually high hardware requirements of a Joomla account and another where I take advantage of an “unlimited” account for client mp3 files. After several years, I have yet to need to contact their support group for a problem - I believe this is EXCELLENT but makes it impossible to compare the speed of support services (with modVPS). In reviewing their VPS, though, it appears that I could save on my monthly bills with a move.
• Others: I’d left Site5 (moved to modVPS) years ago when they suffered from a change of ownership. From what I can tell from a distance, though, Ben (he’s around here occasionally), Site5’s CEO, seems to have corrected the many problems created by the intermediate owners.
• GoDaddy (among others) has a terrible reputation (as a host, not as a registrar - their reputation there is very good) and should be avoided. Ditto any “free hosting” service which will advertise on your website.
FWIW, I’ve posted this “process” I go through before when I need to select a new service but it bears repeating here:
[indent]. Establish your requirements, i.e., Linux, Apache 2.4+, PHP 5.2+, MySQL 5+ and storage and bandwidth requirements. Remember to allocate for log files, databases, e-mail (attachments) and growth.
-
Know what control panels you are willing to use, i.e., WHM/cPanel. cPanel is the standard bearer for Linux systems and Plesk for Windows systems.
-
Know how much CPU time/RAM you need. If you need a lot of processing power (like Zoomla and other CMS’s), this will be a major factor. These, however, are usually specified only for VPS/dedicated accounts and automatically throttled for shared/reseller accounts.
-
Know your target (the Internet is fast but some latency could hurt so the closer your server to your target audience the better) location and try to host as close to your target as possible.
-
SEARCH (using the above parameters) recording each feasible host as well how well it satisfies your requirements and budget. Spreadsheets are good for this as you can assign weighting to the different requirements and how well they were met to generate numerical scores.
-
Create a shortlist based on the database you’ve created in step 5 then SEARCH for comments about the host (avoiding obvious shills and websites which advertise for that host).
-
The last step (other than selection) is to contact each shortlisted host with a question (I’ve used .htaccess and mod_rewrite availability, which services are managed by the host, the availability of IP addresses - you will require one for each SSL you use - or ask to test proprietary control panels - they may make life too difficult for you) and record the response time and your level of satisfaction with the response.
-
Finally, you’ll have enough information to make an intelligent selection.[/indent]
I hope that helps.
Regards,
DK
I apologize; I did a poor job of asking the question.
I am not really looking for a hosting company but…
I am wondering what the processes for developers who develop websites for their clients.
Do you set up a hosting account, say on Godaddy, and then develop the site on that account and then go live? (paying for hosting all the time that the site is in development)
Or do you host the account on a subdomain of your hosting account and then move it to a separate hosting account in the clients name when it is ready to go live?
Or do you host it on a local machine and then upload the files to a hosting account when it is ready to go live…
I am not sure what the best practice is when the clients site is in the development stage… Where to host it so the client can get to it to ok changes but it is not actually live for the general public.
Thanks!
[FONT=Verdana]I think you’re missing the point of the question here. LMedia is asking whether people keep a separate hosting account for sites in development, develop on a local machine, or what. The question isn’t about how to proceed once the site has been completed.
LMedia - I work mostly on small, static sites so I can develop them locally. If I need to upload to a public server for any reason, I use a temporary sub-directory on one of my own sites, blocked in robots.txt so it doesn’t accidentally end up on Google, and delete it again as soon as I’ve finished with it. Works for me. :)[/FONT]
I work on dynamic sites, and I develop them locally as well. I also upload them to a subdirectory of my development site so the client, and only him, can see it.
Like Guido, I host sites I develop in a sub directory on my own server (host) so that my clients can view the site while it’s in development. 
Ok, i understand… The next issue is if i am developing a site in a subdirectory of my site and it involves a database (like worpress or joomla)… how do you tranfer that database with all the correct settings to the new host when it is ready to go live?
I know i am asking a lot of questions but i really appreciate the help…
I almost never transfer a db because most of the data entry happens after my part is done (design and development).
If you do have to transfer a db, then it’d not be much of a problem. You can use some tool like MySQL and generate a MySQL dump (backup) and load that onto your new db on the client’s server. A more thorough explanation can be found here.
When using a CMS, all you’d then need to do is upload the software onto the client’s server, configure it, upload the SQL file into your new db, and you should be fine. Most CMSes have documented on how to transfer a site from one server to another. In the case of WordPress, have a look here.
There are many sites offering free hosting but the speed is less(Which does not matter in your case) so you can use that account, block everything with robots.txt . After the site is done you may take a backup and restore it on your client’s site.
Hi LMedia,
I currently (like others) develop on my local network. I have created a small server that I have jammed full of RAM and a robust RAID 10 configuration. I run Proxmox which is an open source yet rocking Virtual Machine hypervisior. I create a new VM for each customer and configure it with the OS and apache, node.js, php, .NET, SQL, mysql, postgre, or mongo db. I then connect to these VM’s using Eclipse (the open source Java based IDE) it has a rocking remote management suit on it. I create GIT repositories on each VM and I can contect to an PUSH or PULL GIT updates from these VMs (Only if I need to) most time I just exclusively work on refining the setup of these VMs best optimized for a given project. I never mix projects on the same VM, it is too easy to ‘hand-cuff’ yourself by not being able to upgrade apache, PHP or a database (for example) for one application on a mixed-application stack. So I start a new VM for each. When I move customers to production servers I extract any code that I have newly created and add it to my code library and then I decomishing (backup the image) and take it off-line to leave more room for other projects.
I am able to take the server and database configurations and transfer these quite easily to production environments - I basically copy php.ini, httpd.conf, database schemas, .NET framework settings … to the production servers. I am able to install the OS, databases and programming environments so the transfer from my local network to a production one is relatively simple as I am largely dealing with similar configurations for both.
It did not cost an enormous amount to set this separate server about $1500 in all. I don’t need it to have the teeth of a production machine so I could keep costs down. It was more about gaining the knowledge to build the RAID 10 and install/manage Proxmox, but that did not take too long.
This works well for me. Recently I have moved customers to Amazon’s services and I am very happy with the cost versus the server/bandwidth and self management capabilities they offer.
I have a robust PFSense firewall for my local network, Normally I create around 5 - 6 public test urls in my DNS, like : test.mysite.com, test2.mysite.com, test3.mysite.com I then have a small forwarding server (an apache server that sole job is to do redirection to the different I.P.s that are issued by my VMs. This way I can tell my customer to go to test.mysite.com and don’t have to get them into using complicated ports.
Hope this helps.
Regards,
Steve