Time to rebuild my host spread

[TaoPhoenix]

Site Strategy - Blogs

Intro note - I'm not sure how databaseblogs work. Do I have to load the "component pictures and articles" etc, or does all that get mashed into a database?

Swagbay' notes:

-----------------
Next stop: Blogs. You expressed interest in Wordpress. Wordpress is a user friendly way not only to create a blog, but even a website! It has thousands of User-Made plugins and styles, so, I'd imagine this would be the best option for you. I may also note that the "Vbulletin" I talked about above also has a built in blog engine (if you but the correct licence).

But, if you still want to learn more about some of the other open source blogging applications we offer, please include the name of the application in your email. We offer:

-b2evolution
-Life Type
-Nucleus
-Pixelpost
-Wordpress
-Open Blog
-DotClear
-Pixie
-eggBlog
-Text Pattern
-Serendipity

As far as blogs go, it is more preference than anything (they all do the same thing, some just have built-in Content Management Systems for websites, such as wordpress). I suggest doing a "Google Search" on "Blog Applications".
--------------------------
This one feels tricky because of my lack of experience. I like to try unusual new things, so let's save Wordpress till near the end of the road. P.s. for all these applications try to recommend ones that have good data-export abilities, because I am sorta against "info sinkholes" where it's all fun and candy until you don't like it and then you can't get your data back out (or users getting their posts). I'll think on that a bit.

In a downloadable utility context I have downloaded tons of utilities and apps testing "look and fee" which is at first what will make and break my choice. Unfortunately I am frightened to ask you to install blank copies of each of them! Can we narrow the list down by skipping the ones notorious for being user unfriendly? I do feel you're going to see this kind of user question for new users, because this is asking someone who doesn't know how to ride a horse what breed he wants. ("Uh... really nice, shifts his body to try to keep me from falling off, and has one ferocious burst of speed available to win county races with!")

 

[TaoPhoenix]

Site Stragtegy - Wiki

Swagbay's notes:
----------
Finally, You wanted information on a Wiki. You expressed some concern on managing articles. I recommend Media Wiki. Media Wiki works (and looks) just like Wikipedia. It has a backend admin panel, user management, and is written in PHP.
There are some other mediums out there as far as wikis, but I strongly recommend you use Media Wiki. Other wikis we can host include:

-DokuWiki
-Medis Wiki
-PHP Wiki
-PmWiki
-TikiWiki
-WikkaWiki

Just let me know if you would prefer something other than Media Wiki, and I'd be happy to share the pluses and minuses of each app.

If you have any other questions I failed to answer in this email, feel free to ask.

Thanks,
Jared Welch
Sales Manager
----------------

Well, somehow this doesn't feel as quirky personal, so I'll try MediaWiki! I'm modestly practiced with Wikipedia from the end user side, so let's give MediaWiki a go.

Meanwhile chops to the detailed initial answer!

 

[masterbo]

I offer free hosting to interesting projects.
It would be kind of amusing to offer Web space to you - let me know if you would need it. I am no hoster, of course, I only own much hosting resources - more than I need.

 

[deeplist]

I only own much hosting resources - more than I need.

Then why are you constantly asking for hosting from others? I see request threads from you very often.

 

[oniscorp]

You are relatively new here, so let me explain to you a very important aspect of hosting - It is called service, also known as support. You say that the misunderstanding with Tao had nothing to do with the quality of your Hosting? I'm afraid that it very much so does. When you act hostile and confrontational with a client who requires assistance, the quality of your service, and therefor the quality of your hosting declines tremendously. And the fact that you have a special agreement with Tao about how he is being hosted is no excuse. When you take in client, no matter how you choose to do so, you are staking your reputation as a host that you will provide them with a certain things to the best of your abilities. The fact that you got so hostile about a simple change of subdomain - something that can be done in WHM or DA in under a minute, and can be done via SSH in under 5, sets a very bad precedent about how you will act when there is an actual problem of a larger scale. Just look at Decker Services, are they a great host because they have an exemplary track record of uptime? Yes, but that is only half the story. Decker Services is a great host because deeplist is very patient and helpful when it comes to his clients - often when his clients have done nothing to deserve it. Part of being a great host is being able to deal with people who will be rude, and in this incident Tao hasn't even been rude. He politely made a simple request.

A 4 month old host shouldn't even be making the claim that they are "great". The great hosts are the ones that are there for you every day, year in and year out. Maybe if you can stick around that might be hostalope one day, and this will all just be a bump in the road of experience. There is a reason that there are only 4 hosts on Tao's study page. Too many free hosts come and go, and screw over their clients in the process. Hopefully this won't be you.

Sir, you know very little about the situation between Hostalope and Tao, apparently. No one has acted hostile or confrontational towards him. We also never made the claim to be "great" previously anywhere in this thread, however I will go ahead and say it now: Hostalope is great

Decker Services gets a lot of love here. Besides being around for a while, I'm going to go ahead and guess that they are somehow involved in the origins of this thread, or even have affiliation with the owners/moderators of the forum. That's all well and good, I'm not going to knock anyone's hustle. However, people do need to take one fact into consideration: Decker is offering paid services as well. It is of utmost importance to suck up to anyone you think might be cutting you a check in the future when doing so. Hostalope on the other hand does not offer paid services of any sort. If you require something that is not being freely offered to other clients, then *you* should be the one going out of your way to convince us that it should be done. Do not just tell us to do something for you, that we normally do not do, and expect it to get done. We do not have alterior motives in mind, such as converting the client to paid services, when handling our support tickets. So I guess the moral of the story is: if you want to be pampered and have your feelings cradled, go for someone that also offers paid hosting. If you need quality hosting with no BS, there is nothing better than Hostalope.

We've shown you 4 months of greatness, with years to come. Bet on it.

 

[TaoPhoenix]

Then why are you constantly asking for hosting from others? I see request threads from you very often.

(From elsewhere)

Done. I have bought enough reseller plans I was looking for - thanks to everyone for advice and offers.

So Masterbo you have paid resellers. My project doesn't work right with single-user private hosting, because there's "nowhere for the review to go". Deeplist, he's got the makings of some kind of turnover business, but I don't know the details.

 

[Tyler]

Sir, you know very little about the situation between Hostalope and Tao, apparently. No one has acted hostile or confrontational towards him. We also never made the claim to be "great" previously anywhere in this thread, however I will go ahead and say it now: Hostalope is great

Decker Services gets a lot of love here. Besides being around for a while, I'm going to go ahead and guess that they are somehow involved in the origins of this thread, or even have affiliation with the owners/moderators of the forum. That's all well and good, I'm not going to knock anyone's hustle. However, people do need to take one fact into consideration: Decker is offering paid services as well. It is of utmost importance to suck up to anyone you think might be cutting you a check in the future when doing so. Hostalope on the other hand does not offer paid services of any sort. If you require something that is not being freely offered to other clients, then *you* should be the one going out of your way to convince us that it should be done. Do not just tell us to do something for you, that we normally do not do, and expect it to get done. We do not have alterior motives in mind, such as converting the client to paid services, when handling our support tickets. So I guess the moral of the story is: if you want to be pampered and have your feelings cradled, go for someone that also offers paid hosting. If you need quality hosting with no BS, there is nothing better than Hostalope.

We've shown you 4 months of greatness, with years to come. Bet on it.

No. No. No. And no. Decker is loved here because he's been providing rock solid shared web hosting for over ten years and in that time frame, he has never lost dedication to his clients and is always there to help out when needed. Your argument about "paid hosting" also falls flat because my understand is over half Decker's "clients" are being given free web hosting (could be wrong).

Frankly, your post just reeks of arrogance.

 

[deeplist]

Decker Services gets a lot of love here. Besides being around for a while, I'm going to go ahead and guess that they are somehow involved in the origins of this thread, or even have affiliation with the owners/moderators of the forum.

For the record: I was NOT involved with the origin of this thread in any way shape or form. I was not even involved with Tao's study in the beginning and was only offered an opportunity to jump in mid point. Also, I am in no way affiliated with FWS nor do I have any kind of connection to the staff here either personal or business wise.

 

[masterbo]

... Deeplist, he's got the makings of some kind of turnover business, but I don't know the details.

My suggestion is to ask me directly, instead of guessing.

Then why are you constantly asking for hosting from others? I see request threads from you very often.

There may be many reasons, one of it has been provided in one of my last thread you've also replied in.
Also: specific tasks can require specific hosting.

 

[oniscorp]

No. No. No. And no. Decker is loved here because he's been providing rock solid shared web hosting for over ten years and in that time frame, he has never lost dedication to his clients and is always there to help out when needed. Your argument about "paid hosting" also falls flat because my understand is over half Decker's "clients" are being given free web hosting (could be wrong).

Frankly, your post just reeks of arrogance.

Err...why do you sound like a Decker Services spokesman?

 

[deeplist]

Your argument about "paid hosting" also falls flat because my understand is over half Decker's "clients" are being given free web hosting (could be wrong).

Thanks Tyler. And also for the record, as of right now at the time of this post, 28% of my clientele are on some kind of free hosting plan in which I receive no monetary support.

 

[TaoPhoenix]

Service concepts in Free Hosting

Here we go gang, hang on to your hats!

Hostalope, as a quick note, Decker Services is one of my official study hosts, which was open to all who wanted in and completed the basic setup account with standardized elements. Theoretically I could have been crushed with 100 host entries in a free-for-all. I got about 30. Of those, *3* survived. Deeplist collected a "Wildcard" slot from me based on his prior uptime and my judgement call that he would last as long as anyone. I talk up all the winning hosts of my project. That's the 3rd party testimonial that you once mentioned you wanted - they earned it. *That is the fundamental service my project provides* - a third party rating separate from everyone's ad in the ad sections. All of FWS watched while dreams were launched and faded.

But we have a far larger fundamental point arising here, which goes to the heart of all free hosting. It has to do with how much a business wants to become known for stellar custom service, *which generates referrals*. I will absolutely stress that this level of service is nearly standard in the modern host industry, and not "pandering". Of my current finalists, while I'd bet my lunch on Decker Services for raw horsepower and technical skill, Seraphim is who I recommend for exceptional service in custom situations. He's taking me through my first domain and the esoteric mysteries of nameservers and that whole adventure. Why did I pick him to launch a topic that terrifies me? Because he'll do his damndest to dig me out of the trouble I get myself into when the nameservers don't propogate right, etc. It turned out the original reason was compeletely my mistake when I bought the domain I missed the button to release the seller's nameservers ... or something. This is what great hosting is about - clients trying new adventures, scraping knees, and getting a first aid kit from the host. In the same vein, I am hoping that TheSwagBay can take me through the even more blood curdling complexities of blog software, custom private wikis, and open source forums.

This is why it came as a shock to "convince you that something should be done" - and those somethings were low level - a new panel and a subdomain with a couple of corrections. Despite some epic cases of Fly-By-Night, *all thirty* of my entrants gave me my standard setup in about 2 emails of trading details. About 75% had no plans to offer paid. Put the business-school way, your desire to be convinced hinders your service value in my opinion. When fundamental values are at odds, it plays out much as we saw.

Meanwhile, FYI, Tyler is an "Alumni" - he tried the competition himself, did okay for a while, then finally ran into some glitch and got stuck. He has since kept tabs in that fond way that "Been there" creates.

 

[theswagbayorg]

Ok Tao,

I'm really liking the thoroughness of your reviews! Much learned. So, let me start with the terms of use. First, please know these terms of use were adopted mostly for my paid clients with set limits on their accounts. I'm working on a TOU for free clients, and will get that up ASAP. I started by changing Illegal Free Hosting/Payment Information around a bit. The "payment" is the income from the adverts. Like I said, I'm adopting a free hosting TOU, and this will be more clear. Ill also change around some of the illegal free hosting wording. To finish off the TOU, I'll change the system resources limits around. Obviously running gaming servers, torrent trackers, etc is going to have to be against the rules, because it isn't fair to the other clients on the server. I have no real way of monitoring if clients break these rules, nor would I ask them to stop. Its more of a warning, that scares clients intending to build file sharing sites, etc. Like you said, it could be worded differently.

All in all, we do want high end clients. We make the money off of adverts on the site, and in exchange you receive "not unlimited, but very high" disk space and bandwidth. Think of it this way: If your site is generating more traffic (using more bandwidth and disk space)...we are making more money off of the adverts. We can then pay for any problems that may arise from bandwidth, disk, cpu, or memory overages. The bottom line is, we are not worried about free clients going over the limits, because, in most cases, we are reimbursed.

Ok, enough of that, everything below this line is going to be coming from me as an owner of a hosting company, Review business aside.
--------------------------------
Tao,
Lets get started with the forums. I received you answers and concerns. For users with zero experience, phpBB is the way to go. It has thousands of user-made plugins and styles, available for download here. phpBB is great for new communities, and if your forums grow to be very large, they have a above-par member management system. PhpBB has a back-end admin panel, and is written in PHP. If you ever need support for phpBB, your covered. PhpBB has a very active support forum, so you can expect help when you need it fast.

As far as slashcode goes, that goes into the category of Other. We can install it, but our support for it would be limited. It is something we are not fluid with, therefor it is "at your own risk", in the sense that we can't provide support for it..

You asked for a subdomain, taophoenix. What application would you like for your main site? By that I mean your forums, blog, or wiki. I will make what you choose your main site and the other two subdomains (Ex: ______.taophoenix)


If you want to try something user-friendly (other than wordpress) for a blog application, why don't we start with dotclear. Its open source and written in PHP. Dotclear is an open-source web publishing software created in 2002. It was a one man's project at first, but Dotclear soon gathered a team comprising different personalities with various backgrounds. The project's purpose is to provide a user-friendly tool allowing anyone to publish on the web, regardless of their technical skills.

This is, in my opinion, the second best, user friendly blog engine out there (behind wordpress). I think it would be a wise choice to go down this road of user friendly blogs.

You said you wanted to save wordpress for last, but for more entry level users, I strongly recommend this. There is better support via their forum and more plugins/styles to choose from. But, that choice is up to you.


Now for the wiki. I can install/configure this as soon as you let me know if it will be installed on your subdomain, or on a subdomain of your subdomain. I will await your reply.

After I receive your reply, I will setup the account, install the requested applications/configure them, and I will send you your acount information VIA EMAIL, to avoid any password theft here.

Thanks so much!
-Scott Murray
Owner

 

[theraptor]

Sir, you know very little about the situation between Hostalope and Tao, apparently. No one has acted hostile or confrontational towards him. We also never made the claim to be "great" previously anywhere in this thread, however I will go ahead and say it now: Hostalope is great

Decker Services gets a lot of love here. Besides being around for a while, I'm going to go ahead and guess that they are somehow involved in the origins of this thread, or even have affiliation with the owners/moderators of the forum. That's all well and good, I'm not going to knock anyone's hustle. However, people do need to take one fact into consideration: Decker is offering paid services as well. It is of utmost importance to suck up to anyone you think might be cutting you a check in the future when doing so. Hostalope on the other hand does not offer paid services of any sort. If you require something that is not being freely offered to other clients, then *you* should be the one going out of your way to convince us that it should be done. Do not just tell us to do something for you, that we normally do not do, and expect it to get done. We do not have alterior motives in mind, such as converting the client to paid services, when handling our support tickets. So I guess the moral of the story is: if you want to be pampered and have your feelings cradled, go for someone that also offers paid hosting. If you need quality hosting with no BS, there is nothing better than Hostalope.

We've shown you 4 months of greatness, with years to come. Bet on it.

I know more than you think, I've Tao has informed me about the whole situation via PM. You have disregarded the free advice I gave you entirely (advice, coincidentally, that most companies have to pay me for) regarding the importance of good service in this industry, free or paid. Your actions have consistently proved that you are not great, merely average. You haven't even passed the magic 7 month mark. Service isn't BS, it is an essential part of this industry. So, rather than getting all pissy and defensive, you should listen to the people here who know what they are talking about and who have given you some very important advice. You wonder at why deeplist is thought so well of here? Its something called respect. Deeplist has earned the respect of most people here, both as a person and as a corporation, through his consistent actions over a long period of time. Maybe if you take a good hard look at how you've been representing yourself, you could have that respect someday too.

 

[TaoPhoenix]

phpBB

Tao,
Lets get started with the forums. I received you answers and concerns. For users with zero experience, phpBB is the way to go. It has thousands of user-made plugins and styles, available for download here. phpBB is great for new communities, and if your forums grow to be very large, they have a above-par member management system. PhpBB has a back-end admin panel, and is written in PHP. If you ever need support for phpBB, your covered. PhpBB has a very active support forum, so you can expect help when you need it fast.

As far as slashcode goes, that goes into the category of Other. We can install it, but our support for it would be limited. It is something we are not fluid with, therefor it is "at your own risk", in the sense that we can't provide support for it..

You asked for a subdomain, taophoenix. What application would you like for your main site? By that I mean your forums, blog, or wiki. I will make what you choose your main site and the other two subdomains (Ex: ______.taophoenix)
...

Thanks so much!
-Scott Murray
Owner

Okay then! Let us go with phpBB!

Please do an install for me, and I have selected some of the addons that look fun. I will probably do more at some point, but I don't want to exhaust you guys all at once!

Here is a list of the addons I would like. The basic theme is making things a little easier for users and just a dash of fun.

Full Quick Reply Editor
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/full_quick_reply_editor/

Avatar on Memberlist
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/avatar_on_memberlist/

NV advanced last topic titles
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/last_post_topic_title/

Preserve Post Spaces
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/preserve_post_spaces/

Forum prune move
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/forum_prune_move/

Warning Reasons
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/warning_reasons/

Edit profile link
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/edit_profile_link_2/

phpBB Statistics
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/phpbb_statistics/

(phpBB3) Super Quick Reply
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/(phpbb3)_super_quick_reply/

Prime Trash Bin
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/prime_trash_bin/

Latest Topic Title
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/latest_topic_title_2/

 

[TaoPhoenix]

dotclear

You asked for a subdomain, taophoenix. What application would you like for your main site? By that I mean your forums, blog, or wiki. I will make what you choose your main site and the other two subdomains (Ex: ______.taophoenix)


If you want to try something user-friendly (other than wordpress) for a blog application, why don't we start with dotclear. Its open source and written in PHP. Dotclear is an open-source web publishing software created in 2002. It was a one man's project at first, but Dotclear soon gathered a team comprising different personalities with various backgrounds. The project's purpose is to provide a user-friendly tool allowing anyone to publish on the web, regardless of their technical skills.

This is, in my opinion, the second best, user friendly blog engine out there (behind wordpress). I think it would be a wise choice to go down this road of user friendly blogs.

You said you wanted to save wordpress for last, but for more entry level users, I strongly recommend this. There is better support via their forum and more plugins/styles to choose from. But, that choice is up to you.


Thanks so much!
-Scott Murray
Owner

So dotclear it is! I'll live with proprietary software when necessary, but sometime it is useful to start with things like the open source program because of the ideology, and then if absolutely necessary, going proprietary. (I reluctantly did that with cPanel because of the file manager situation.)

I'll live with the "second best user friendly engine" if the only contender is Wordpress vs ideology! So let's try dotclear.

 

[TaoPhoenix]

Wiki

Ok Tao,

I'm really liking the thoroughness of your reviews! Much learned.

You asked for a subdomain, taophoenix. What application would you like for your main site? By that I mean your forums, blog, or wiki. I will make what you choose your main site and the other two subdomains (Ex: ______.taophoenix)


Now for the wiki. I can install/configure this as soon as you let me know if it will be installed on your subdomain, or on a subdomain of your subdomain. I will await your reply.

After I receive your reply, I will setup the account, install the requested applications/configure them, and I will send you your acount information VIA EMAIL, to avoid any password theft here.

Thanks so much!
-Scott Murray
Owner

By a subdomain, I typically use taophoenix._____.___/______ where the first two dashes are your company url and the last is SomeFile.html etc.

So because at the moment these are all "equal value" let's install them as

taophoenix._____.___/wiki
taophoenix._____.___/forum
taophoenix._____.___/blog

and whatever file extension stuff is necessary. I don't really plan to mod the wiki much yet.

 

[Seraphim]

Oniscorp, Deeplist was not involved with the origins of this thread at all. In fact, he didn't even join until a few months ago when he slipped under the closing bell for the final round of entries. And to date there has been no evidence of unfair connections or conspiracies around him explaining his popularity. He's just that good that everyone likes him, and I hope that in time I will be able to gather a similar reputation for my own services. I'm working on it, but trust is something that has to be hard won and is easily lost.

He's well earned his position as the top host on this spread, and I'm going to make sure he has to keep working at it if he intends to stay there. I've rebounded from dead last in the past 6 months, and am never giving up on retaking the lead as I continue to improve with experience and time.

However you really should take a closer look at the marketplace conditions. Right now, there are some hundreds of thousands of free hosts all of which are as capable of hosting a given site as any other. One of the few places where a free host can possibly make a real difference for their clients and for their reputation is in customer service quality. Free hosting is your job, your boss is your clients. If they want something that you can reasonably provide them without risking security or the stability of your business, you should make every effort to give it to them. Otherwise they'll not be satisfied with your service, and not only will they not refer others to you but they would be far more likely to go find someone else that shows they care about their clients.

Paid hosting isn't really some magically higher level of quality either. What you are paying for is the resources you consume when you go paid- a free host instead pays for these by displaying ads on the client site or using a post2host arrangement to cover the operating expenses. That's all it really is at it's core is that the client compensates the host in money directly instead of through ad revenue or posts. The quality of service should be near-identical, and the only other advantage is the possibility of getting larger site capabilities or extra features only available to paid clients- usually intended as an incentive to go paid.

 

[theswagbayorg]

I have installed each app under the requested directories. I am now installing the prescribed mods onto the forums. As soon as that is complete, I will PM you your login details for each app.

Your domain is located at http://taophoenix.hostmything.com. You may see your site at any time during the installation process.

NOTE TO TAO: I did change my name from theswagbay to HostMyThing.com, and am setting up HostMyThing.com as my hosting site. I hope this isn't a problem, as you said people get mad here when hosts decide to change their name...xD.
-Scott

 

[oniscorp]

I know more than you think, I've Tao has informed me about the whole situation via PM. You have disregarded the free advice I gave you entirely (advice, coincidentally, that most companies have to pay me for) regarding the importance of good service in this industry, free or paid. Your actions have consistently proved that you are not great, merely average. You haven't even passed the magic 7 month mark. Service isn't BS, it is an essential part of this industry. So, rather than getting all pissy and defensive, you should listen to the people here who know what they are talking about and who have given you some very important advice. You wonder at why deeplist is thought so well of here? Its something called respect. Deeplist has earned the respect of most people here, both as a person and as a corporation, through his consistent actions over a long period of time. Maybe if you take a good hard look at how you've been representing yourself, you could have that respect someday too.

Again, twisting words. Is it that you simply cannot read, or do you always have to be such a kaniving person? Who called service 'BS'? No one, it was implied by you. Previously you also accused us of calling ourselves great, which we again did *not* do except in mocking the situation. You can't take people's sentences and mix them around however you want...you might as well have a conversation with yourself.

Good customer service is important, and that is what we have always provided. We do not bend over backwards to give everyone everything they desire; if you want this, find a paid host because they have money to take from you and therefore incentive to put up with anything you throw at them. What we do is provide a small number of users with free services they can use to reach out the world. We keep the websites up pretty much 24 hours per day and provide technical support on the same schedule. Our support staff is very accommodating and have yet to see anyone else disappointed.