How many ofy ou out there would not need scripting support with your hosting? And if you do, which ones? (check only the most necessary)

Bro,
I am probably not the average web user but I need everything with my hosting.


The fundimentals:
1. ASP
2. Perl (won't go anywhere that doesn't have it)
Chances are, you won't find anyone who doesn't offer at least Perl scripting
3. Cold Fusion 4.5 or higher
4. Windows Script
5. PHP

What I will require by the end of the year:
1. SQL Server or DB2
2. ASP.NET
3. Cold Fusion 6 or MX as they are calling it.

Deal Makers:
If you have any of the following, chances are you would have my business at the drop of a hat without me even thinking about it. That is, if I was in the market for hosting at the moment, which I'm not.

1. ISAPI
2. C++
3. Jrun
4. Foxpro Server
5. Delphi

Don't feel bad if you don't offer these. I haven't seen a shared host yet that offers any of them (with the exception of Jrun, but even that is scarce). It would still make my day if someone did.

Like I said, you are probably not going to find a thousand guys like me on the planet. But the fact is that my clients tend to be very demanding, and are always asking for new things. In order for me to continue providing my clients with the latest and greatest, my hosting has to stay on top of at least four of the five fundimentals.

I have a motto:
"If business like it... I love it"

and businesses have some weird tastes.


Realistically,
you should probably be fine with the free ones.
Right off the bat, you're looking at Perl and PHP.
But if you offer PHP, you also have to provide a database.
Now the popular one is MySQL, which is a terrible format, but people seem to like it. That's just bare bones.

If you're running windows,
you have more options out of the box. The more options you have, the easier it is going to be to sell your hosting.

Just my two cents.

I'd love to know what's so terrible about mySQL? Although postgres maintains data integrity, most of the time mySQL will be just fine. Don't forget that rescourses on most machines aren't to be wasted, and anybody other than a reasonably serious developer (and most serious developers are onto Oracle by now) will be fine with mySQL. Unless you have incredibly important information, and maintaining data integrity is more than crucial, mySQL will be fine.

Not to mention the fact that most scripts support mySQL (at least perl scripts.)

The average programmer, and even the highly advance programmer, may never learn how to harness the power of any SQL system, and I'd take a good script with a good mySQL data model over that same script with the average postgres data model.

Most programmers who say they're limmited by the system are not telling the truth, as the system has more than enough features to learn ;)

On the other hand:

My necessity is just perl.
Oracle databases would be an "I love you hosting company" type of thing.
Mod_perl would also be an "I love you hosting company" type of thing, but then you'd have to trust me enough to install my modules ;) (why vDedicated servers do so well.)

PHP is not a necessity to me, but I'd say that it is to the majority of user who want to create dynamic sites.

Any database would be necessary, but mySQL is the industry standard.

You can always sacrafice features, in order to give users a better price. Hell, I never use PHP any more, and wouldn't mind it comming off of my server any day (although a phpinfo() is helpful.)


Instead of trying to sacrafice programming languages get into DSO, it's elite (but don't put mod_perl on your server).

That's my advice.

I've just been thinking about this from a LCD (lowest common denominator) position. While a lot of people like myself will say "I need it all", many people online are a long way from being 'power users'. However, to take a few examples of people we host that fall into first time users, a large percentage of them have at least a guestbook, which will need either Perl or PHP. A couple have chatrooms, some more have forums (control panel setup)

Many of these people who install their own guestbook often use flatfile database (text file) and never touch their available databases, or use flash chats that run pretty much like applets.

So while there's many ways around not needing lauguage support (including just using third party services like EZboard or BraveNet), it won't take most people very long to outgrow html only accounts. The one thing I've learnt in my time is those first time users are often the most keen to expand their horizons and try new things. I still remember the first page I made back in '95 and how long I spent reading and learning to get myself from using a free host (WBS.net actually) to now running dedicated servers. Giving customers room to grow is often a very important facet of keeping them.

Now I presume this would be as an addition to more fully featured accounts? It's a good idea (having said all that above), but I'd expect there might be a lot of chopping and changing as people grow quickly to needing scripting support. I can't imagine too many would stay with a straight vanilla html account. Of course I might be wrong too :)

Greg Moore

Originally posted by sam.moses
Bro,
1. ASP
2. Perl
3. Cold Fusion 4.5 or higher
4. Windows Script
5. PHP
1. SQL Server or DB2
2. ASP.NET
3. Cold Fusion 6 or MX as they are calling it.
1. ISAPI
2. C++
3. Jrun
4. Foxpro Server
5. Delphi

If you're running windows,
you have more options out of the box. The more options you have, the easier it is going to be to sell your hosting.


Wrong! If somebody is going to offer all of those features, he will go out of business very soon. With all features like that, the price need to be at least $50-120 per month or so for entry level account. For that price, it is better to go for a vdedicated or dedicated server. Nobody is going to buy it, except you, maybe :). And with all those features you will have a lot less clients per server.

Plus, it is Windows, a well known support headache and the source of problems, even without those bells and whistles :). So, I don't think there would be somebody insane enough to offer it :)

...Delphi ...ISAPI

For Delphi, you don't need anything special at all: it generates Windows CGI executables or ISAPI DLLs.

Database suport is more of an issue: what works well is a database engine that compiles into the app, such as ODBC Express, Topaz, Flashfiler...

Not many people will support the Borland Database Engine (BDE): it's a dog that is past it's sell-by date! Interbase (or Firebird, the free version) is good but again little supported.

(We run The Delphi Magazine BTW, so have some experience with these beauties:D )

ISAPI DLLs are more difficult to get hosted because they can need IIS restarted when you want to update the DLL -- but you can get over this by using an ISAPI management utility. Other than that you need to ensure your ISAPI is fully debugged and stable -- no memory leaks or crashes!

Originally posted by priyadi


Wrong! If somebody is going to offer all of those features, he will go out of business very soon. With all features like that, the price need to be at least $50-120 per month or so for entry level account. For that price, it is better to go for a vdedicated or dedicated server. Nobody is going to buy it, except you, maybe :). And with all those features you will have a lot less clients per server.

Plus, it is Windows, a well known support headache and the source of problems, even without those bells and whistles :). So, I don't think there would be somebody insane enough to offer it :)

Don't misquote me.
All I said I needed was

1. ASP
2. Perl
3. Cold Fusion 4.5 or higher
4. Windows Script
5. PHP

The rest would be optional.
I'm sorry windows is a support headache, but I didn't write the OS. All I really care about is that you have it. The only time I ever need tech support is when your server brakes, which you should be on top of anyway, and linux varients tend to break often.

That aside...

Perl, nothing wrong with Perl, it's the bread and butter of the industry. I like Perl, it's straight forward and pretty simple.

MySQL is an okay format.
I didn't say it was bad, I said it was infirior.
I guess it's a preference thing.

My thought is that it just doesn't match up to other products on the market like (in a unix instance)
1. Pervasive (not free but a good cheap format)
2. Postgres (and this one is free too!)
3. Dbase ( I really like Dbase, sometimes free)
4. Oracle (expensive, but not as bad as it used to be)
5. DB2 (don't know, never priced it. I like the usability of it though)

My personal thought after doing this on and off for awhile is:

If you want high end clients that pay more and cause fewer problems, install more stuff. High end clients really cost you a lot less in the long run because (and here's the key) they know what they are doing. Someone who has invested $70 a month into your system is a lot less likely to go in and write bad scripts, attempt to install chatrooms, vids, warez, and an allotment of other problems you are going to see with the smaller guys. Not to mention liability. Either way, you need a rock solid TOS.

Again, properly targeted ads are everything. To attract high end clients, you do have to invest in good ad space. Don't pay over $15 CPM (ad Jargon: cost per thousand) as a rule. No space is worth more than that.

If you want lots of low end clients that are going be nothing but a headache, you can get by with almost anything.
In fact,
if you offer flat space for five dollars a month, you could create a response quick enough. It's not really in what you offer, but how you offer it. E-zines are handy that way. Lots of low end clients in the webmaster rags.

That's all for me.
Have a nice weekend all.