Recommend Me a Domain Name Registrar

I didn't really want to start a new thread for this question, and figured this would be the best thread to ask in. Does anybody have a recommended web hosting service? I need to get a website up for a friend (I believe she already has the domain name registered). It will be a fairly small website. I may do it in drupal, or I might use pagemaker to make the pages because it will be so small.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Does anybody have a recommended web hosting service?

I recommend Dreamhost. In part because I hate cPanel and most of the other big shared hosts run cPanel.

I use WinHost. They offer $5 plans that include Windows hosting with PHP/MySQL support, and you get other fun things if you want. I don't recommend 1and1.com though, just to make it clear.

I used to use DreamHost, but after the first year's low prices, they tripled the price on me, so I switched to ASmallOrange. For a tiny website, you can't beat $25/year with shell access.

Everything but ASP.NET/MVC is supported. I've personally run sites there in Rails and Django, but PHP works as well.

I totally forgot about ASmallOrange, as I went the VPS route before I started seeing their name around. But they look really cool.

Legion do your recommendations still hold true for NFS and Dreamhost? I might have the need to register a domain soon and would need a spot to host it.
Also would Google apps be the best way to handle the email side; we use it at work and I love the integration of all the apps with my email.

I'll still recommend NFS.

Tigerbill wrote:

Legion do your recommendations still hold true for NFS and Dreamhost? I might have the need to register a domain soon and would need a spot to host it.
Also would Google apps be the best way to handle the email side; we use it at work and I love the integration of all the apps with my email.

I recommend NFS. I don't really recommend Dreamhost anymore after some recent security issues.

Who would you recommend then?

Tigerbill wrote:

Who would you recommend then?

I really don't know anymore. It's now been years since I've used a shared host.

The only hosting platforms that hold any interest with me are Linode (VPS) and Heroku (cloud-based app platform).

Oh, but with regards to your other question, I use Google Apps at work and on my own domains as well. It's very nice.

Thanks.
The reason I ask is, myself and some friends are looking to start a small consulting/technology business on the side of our day jobs. More about that later once we get things flushed out.

Tigerbill wrote:

Thanks.
The reason I ask is, myself and some friends are looking to start a small consulting/technology business on the side of our day jobs. More about that later once we get things flushed out.

If you're just going to host a static web page, you can do it extremely cheaply on NFS. You can even use them if you're using PHP and MySQL.

By static page, I'm assuming you mean very simple page with just images and text; no forums, store, etc? Yes that is all we would need for a while down the road we might need more as a way to showcase/promote "stuff".

Tigerbill wrote:

By static page, I'm assuming you mean very simple page with just images and text; no forums, store, etc? Yes that is all we would need for a while down the road we might need more as a way to showcase/promote "stuff".

Yes, anything that doesn't use some sort of server-side scripting would fall under static. Just HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and media files (images, video, Flash files, etc).

NFS will charge you just for the space and bandwidth you use, and they won't charge you very much. You'll probably spend pennies per month rather than $10/mo for a shared hosting service whose resources your site won't even begin to fully tap.

Awesome, thank you.

Arise. So I'm looking at starting a blog, and wondering if there are any new recommendations as far as domain name registrars and web hosts go. Is NFS a good option for a Wordpress blog that will most likely never see much traffic? Or should I consider one that Wordpress recommends, Blue Host/Dream Host/Laughing Squid?

I believe Blue Host has gone to the crapper, speed-wise.

After a bit of digging I went with HostGator who is where the cheap and efficient meet for me. Don't care for the stupid Gator being on their pages, but once you're past that you don't see him anymore.

A small orange or Nearly Fear Speech.

The a small orange link is a referral for Clover if you choose to go that way.

Edwin wrote:

A small orange or Nearly Fear Speech.

The a small orange link is a referral for Clover if you choose to go that way.

Nearly "Fear" speech sounds intense... I opened a free account there to check out the features, but I'll explore asmallorange too, see I can throw some referral bonus Clover's way .

I'll give NFS a recommendation for what you need. We've got a small WP blog that we haven't used much, and gets barely any traffic. I think it's cost us about $2.50 over the last 3 years.

Bonus_Eruptus wrote:

I'll give NFS a recommendation for what you need. We've got a small WP blog that we haven't used much, and gets barely any traffic. I think it's cost us about $2.50 over the last 3 years.

When I look at their site, it says I need to pay $0.02 a day for a mySQL process, so how do you end up only paying $2.50 for 3 years?

Beyond that I'm trying to wrap my head around the actual process of installing wordpress, and it seems rather convoluted to my decayed mind.

As best I can tell, the steps go something like this, using NFS has an example:

1. register account on NFS
2. deposit some funds
3. Register a domain name
4. For webhosting, there's no limit you just pay for what you use in terms of storage and bandwidth, correct?
5. open a mySQL process
6. download wordpress
7. download putty
8. run putty, connect via ssh to my... website?
9. do all the stuff quoted below, from putty I assume.

At the SSH command line (replace the examples with the info for the database and user you created above):

wp core config --dbhost=example.db --dbname=exampledb --dbuser=exampledbuser --dbpass=dbpassword
chmod 644 wp-config.php
Run the WordPress installation

At the SSH command line (replace the examples with the info you want for your new blog):

wp core install --url=example.nfshost.com --title="Example Blog Title" --admin_name=exampleadmin --admin_password=adminpassword --admin_email=[email protected]
The exampleadmin and adminpassword combination is what you will use to log in to your blog, post to it, and manage it.

Note: Don't use your member login password or the database password you created above for the adminpassword value. Yup, you need a third, distinct password. This may be a good time to set up something like 1Password or LastPass if you haven't already.

Enable file uploading

In your main WordPress installation folder enter the following SSH commands:

cd wp-content
mkdir uploads
chgrp web uploads/
chmod 775 uploads/
Themes: Installing, activating, updating and deleting

We do not recommend using FTP to allow WordPress to update itself. It is much more secure to use WP-CLI, through which you may install, update and delete themes using the following commands via SSH; where mentioned below, the "theme-slug" is a unique identifier (with hyphens replacing any spaces) that is usually the name of the theme you wish to install:

wp theme install [theme-slug | zip | URL]
wp theme activate [theme-slug]
wp theme update [theme-slug]
wp theme delete [theme-slug]
To view a list of installed themes:

wp theme list
In addition to using external sources, you can search for and preview themes from within the WordPress dashboard under Appearance > Themes > Install themes. You can preview installed themes (and, if you prefer to do it this way, activate them) at Appearance > Themes > Manage Themes.

Plugins: Installing, activating, deactivating, updating and deleting

As with themes, you can securely install, update, activate, deactivate and delete plugins using simple WP-CLI commands:

wp plugin install [plugin-name | zip | URL]
wp plugin update [plugin-name]
wp plugin activate [plugin-name]
wp plugin deactivate [plugin-name]
wp plugin delete [plugin-name]
To view a list of installed plugins:

wp plugin list
In addition to using external sources, you can search for plugins from within the WordPress dashboard under Plugins > Add new.

I think I'm following this so far. One question I have is about the use of this program called wp-cli. NFS says this is the best way to maintain a wordpress site, and that FTP is not recommended. But wp-cli is linux/unix only, so what do I do on a windows machine if I want to upload themes or do other stuff securely? Or can that all be done from the wordpress dashboard?

Anything I'm missing?

edit: duh, one thing is missing is actually installing wordpress to the site. The NFS instructions don't even tell you where/how to do that.

NFS is great, but it's not for people that aren't comfortable with UNIX.

Is your service easy to use?

No.

Compared to the endless parade of hosts that provide tons of "one-click installs," one-size-fits-all web site templates, unlimited toll-free telephone support, and cookie-cutter control panels, our service is arcane and complex. We consider this a positive.

Our service is designed for people who are comfortable with Unix-based web hosting, including manipulating MySQL and files using command line tools. To get good results for nontrivial sites, our members need to understand how Unix file permissions and ownership work, and how they apply in a secure web hosting environment.

If you're just hosting static pages, it's pretty easy, which is why I do tend to recommend them for hosting static sites on the super-cheap, even for people that aren't UNIX users. You're mostly just dumping HTML files into a folder.

But if you're wanting to host dynamic sites, you want to know UNIX. Otherwise, I'd suggest a different provider. There are a ton that automate much of the task of installing Wordpress.

*Legion* wrote:

NFS is great, but it's not for people that aren't comfortable with UNIX.

Is your service easy to use?

No.

Compared to the endless parade of hosts that provide tons of "one-click installs," one-size-fits-all web site templates, unlimited toll-free telephone support, and cookie-cutter control panels, our service is arcane and complex. We consider this a positive.

Our service is designed for people who are comfortable with Unix-based web hosting, including manipulating MySQL and files using command line tools. To get good results for nontrivial sites, our members need to understand how Unix file permissions and ownership work, and how they apply in a secure web hosting environment.

If you're just hosting static pages, it's pretty easy, which is why I do tend to recommend them for hosting static sites on the super-cheap, even for people that aren't UNIX users. You're mostly just dumping HTML files into a folder.

But if you're wanting to host dynamic sites, you want to know UNIX. Otherwise, I'd suggest a different provider. There are a ton that automate much of the task of installing Wordpress.

Yeah, starting to get that feeling.

NFS also seems to be very against using FTP to install wordpress, but it does seem like FTPing would be much easier and it does have an option to enable FTP. Is it that risky to use FTP instead of SSH?

Chairman_Mao wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

NFS is great, but it's not for people that aren't comfortable with UNIX.

Is your service easy to use?

No.

Compared to the endless parade of hosts that provide tons of "one-click installs," one-size-fits-all web site templates, unlimited toll-free telephone support, and cookie-cutter control panels, our service is arcane and complex. We consider this a positive.

Our service is designed for people who are comfortable with Unix-based web hosting, including manipulating MySQL and files using command line tools. To get good results for nontrivial sites, our members need to understand how Unix file permissions and ownership work, and how they apply in a secure web hosting environment.

If you're just hosting static pages, it's pretty easy, which is why I do tend to recommend them for hosting static sites on the super-cheap, even for people that aren't UNIX users. You're mostly just dumping HTML files into a folder.

But if you're wanting to host dynamic sites, you want to know UNIX. Otherwise, I'd suggest a different provider. There are a ton that automate much of the task of installing Wordpress.

Yeah, starting to get that feeling.

NFS also seems to be very against using FTP to install wordpress, but it does seem like FTPing would be much easier and it does have an option to enable FTP. Is it that risky to use FTP instead of SSH?

You should be able to use SFTP if you've got SSH access.

Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Chairman_Mao wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

NFS is great, but it's not for people that aren't comfortable with UNIX.

Is your service easy to use?

No.

Compared to the endless parade of hosts that provide tons of "one-click installs," one-size-fits-all web site templates, unlimited toll-free telephone support, and cookie-cutter control panels, our service is arcane and complex. We consider this a positive.

Our service is designed for people who are comfortable with Unix-based web hosting, including manipulating MySQL and files using command line tools. To get good results for nontrivial sites, our members need to understand how Unix file permissions and ownership work, and how they apply in a secure web hosting environment.

If you're just hosting static pages, it's pretty easy, which is why I do tend to recommend them for hosting static sites on the super-cheap, even for people that aren't UNIX users. You're mostly just dumping HTML files into a folder.

But if you're wanting to host dynamic sites, you want to know UNIX. Otherwise, I'd suggest a different provider. There are a ton that automate much of the task of installing Wordpress.

Yeah, starting to get that feeling.

NFS also seems to be very against using FTP to install wordpress, but it does seem like FTPing would be much easier and it does have an option to enable FTP. Is it that risky to use FTP instead of SSH?

You should be able to use SFTP if you've got SSH access.

Cool, I'll look into that. I've got some time to tinker, so...

I didn't overwhelmingly like Dreamhost when I was there, because they drive their infrastructure really hard: everything is under significant load, all the time. But they had a really good set of automated setup tools, some pretty wizardly scripting. If you're just getting started, it might be easier to learn on their systems, and then if their load issues become a problem, transition somewhere else.

Chairman_Mao wrote:
Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Chairman_Mao wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

NFS is great, but it's not for people that aren't comfortable with UNIX.

Is your service easy to use?

No.

Compared to the endless parade of hosts that provide tons of "one-click installs," one-size-fits-all web site templates, unlimited toll-free telephone support, and cookie-cutter control panels, our service is arcane and complex. We consider this a positive.

Our service is designed for people who are comfortable with Unix-based web hosting, including manipulating MySQL and files using command line tools. To get good results for nontrivial sites, our members need to understand how Unix file permissions and ownership work, and how they apply in a secure web hosting environment.

If you're just hosting static pages, it's pretty easy, which is why I do tend to recommend them for hosting static sites on the super-cheap, even for people that aren't UNIX users. You're mostly just dumping HTML files into a folder.

But if you're wanting to host dynamic sites, you want to know UNIX. Otherwise, I'd suggest a different provider. There are a ton that automate much of the task of installing Wordpress.

Yeah, starting to get that feeling.

NFS also seems to be very against using FTP to install wordpress, but it does seem like FTPing would be much easier and it does have an option to enable FTP. Is it that risky to use FTP instead of SSH?

You should be able to use SFTP if you've got SSH access.

Cool, I'll look into that. I've got some time to tinker, so...

If I'm the only one that needs remote access, I just use FileZilla to FTP over SSH and it works brilliantly, without having to manage anything else.

The guys at Idle thumbs heartily recommend https://www.hover.com/ for their domain stuff, I've no idea about any of it but they say it's super simple and easy to use.

Pretty sure you can still use promo code: Remo for 10% off
Chris Remo is a host on idle thumbs

Thanks everyone. I went with NFS after all, and it was fun (well educational, at least) figuring out how to manually install Wordpress. Site's functional, just need to start getting content into it. I'll link it in my sig if or whenever that happens.

I looked at Hover recently but went with NameCheap instead. Everything I want, ok interface and only $10 per domain.