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  1. #1
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    * Ruby on Rails CPanel Plugin

    Hello,

    I created a custom plugin for cpanel which manages ruby on rails applications, as well as gem installs. I wanted to get a feel from other hosting companies on if any other hosting companies would find this useful. The major reason I created it was that I found fastcgi to be annoying to say the least, so we migrated to a mongrel cluster which is much more stable for ruby apps. The main reason I ask is because I am considering in the future making it either a pay for plugin or opensourcing it to the hosting industry.
    Last edited by DimensionServers; 01-01-2007 at 07:17 PM.
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  2. #2
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    Quote Originally Posted by jmcallister
    Hello,

    I created a custom plugin for cpanel which manages ruby on rails applications, as well as gem installs. I wanted to get a feel from other hosting companies on if any other hosting companies would find this useful. The major reason I created it was that I found fastcgi to be annoying to say the least, so we migrated to a mongrel cluster which is much more stable for ruby apps. The main reason I ask is because I am considering in the future making it either a pay for plugin or opensourcing it to the hosting industry.
    My team would be very interested, as we have been looking at FastCGI for a while, and implmenting Ruby on our production servers. If we could be of any assistence, let me know.



    Regards,

  3. #3
    I'd be interested in testing/providing feedback on the plugin too. It would be nice to have RoR support/management directly from within cPanel/WHM

  4. #4
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    great. I will update this thread when the plug-in is finished
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  5. #5
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    Just wanted to add another for interest. I have had a couple requests for it but we don't have enough demand to put extra staff time on it. However, we'd be willing to deploy a RoR box for RoR customers, if there was a plug-in.

    One of the complaints I keep reading on SitePoint is how RoR developers can't find hosts which are offering the platform. They begrudge the fact that we aren't more open to deploying it widely. Unfortunately we are stuck with things like paying bills and very costly staff hours ... funny enough these same developers apparently don't have enough money on hand to pay for their own dedicated servers to develop their stuff on. I don't mean it as a slam, just ironic that we hosts are supposed to seize new technologies and their start-up costs right out of the box (as if we are hoarding all the money trees) when the developers don't have the money to set up their own boxes either.

    My point being that a plug-in like this would, IMO, go a long way toward bridging regular hosts with the RoR development community. There is a very wide, very deep chasm there right now, and a plug-in would be an incredibly helpful bridge.

    Kudos to you for stepping up to the call. It's really awesome.

    Bailey
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  6. #6
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    Will you post on here if you are going to be selling this plugin after testing is through?
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  7. #7
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    Yes I will make sure to post it on here. I am about 90% done with the rails plugin. So far the plugin does have a couple of requirements:

    - The Rails delivery method must be a localized mod_proxy through apache 1.3 or 2.0 with then forwards off to a mongrel cluster (I would be willing to configure this per client).

    - cPanel / WHM for management.


    Pretty soon I will need beta testers for this, as it is about 90% done right now. Beta testers would get a free copy of the plug-in. Would anyone be interested in beta testing it? Please drop me a line:

    admin@dimensionservers.com
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  8. #8
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    I am interested in this plugin and will happily give beta feedback.

  9. #9
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    I'm not sure what the use of this will be when it's done. Looking at some cPanel servers I'm seeing a /scripts/installruby . Now if it works who knows but it is there so I imagine cPanel plans on having it available in the near future.
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  10. #10
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    It currently is very buggy and only works on certain os's , but its on Cpanel's list of to do's, noth sure when that will be though.

    For anyone wanting to install ruby in the meantime I recomend this tut

    http://wiki.rubyonrails.com/rails/pa...nRailsOnCpanel

  11. #11
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    This plugin will not work with a fastcgi install. It is mongrel based. The goal of this plugin is not to actually install ruby but manage rails applications frameworks and such directly in cpanel. I dont belive cpanel will be offering that functionality any time soon. Also it will handle gem installs from clients on demand so more of an app manager than a hosting ruby sites config app.
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  12. #12
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    This sounds great. I have RoR running with FastCGI and will be moving over to mongrel this weekend. To be able to admin ruby from cpanel sounds great. I am interested in this and you can count me in for feedback.

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by jmcallister
    Hello,

    I created a custom plugin for cpanel which manages ruby on rails applications, as well as gem installs. I wanted to get a feel from other hosting companies on if any other hosting companies would find this useful. The major reason I created it was that I found fastcgi to be annoying to say the least, so we migrated to a mongrel cluster which is much more stable for ruby apps. The main reason I ask is because I am considering in the future making it either a pay for plugin or opensourcing it to the hosting industry.
    I'm new to Ruby, so I apologize for my ignorance, but why do you dislike fastcgi?
    -Robert Norton
    www.SophMedia.com

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by jmcallister
    - The Rails delivery method must be a localized mod_proxy through apache 1.3 or 2.0 with then forwards off to a mongrel cluster (I would be willing to configure this per client).
    Does this set up the Mongrel cluster and proxy configuration?
    Former owner of A Small Orange
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  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by timdorr
    Does this set up the Mongrel cluster and proxy configuration?
    Yes, at least that is my interpretation of it. I am going to play with this on my cPanel box later, and I should be able to come up with something that automates the mod_proxy + mongrels + ror.

  16. #16
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    The plug-in is for end users to be able to manage thier Rails application without need to give commandline shell access. It is also designed to improve the speed at which the end user can deploy their apps. Mongrel right now is not recommended by the rails community for shared hosting simply because of the lines that need to be manually entered into apache's httpd.conf file everytime a user wants to install or remove a rails application. The goal of this plug-in is to make shared hosting and Mongrel rails play nicely. A lot of people have mentioned that CPanel is developing their next release to handle rails. From what I have heard this will only be the install of fastcgi. Fastcgi by nature is a slow and unpredictable method for serving rails apps. This ne CPanel plugin is currently in testing phases locally on our company to our customers. When that is finished we will be offering this plugin for sale. What price does the WHT community feel is fair for this plugin?
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  17. #17
    What are you using to load balance between your mongrel servers with Apache 1.3?

    We have also been developing some mongrel scripts/apps to run mongrel with cPanel. Currently we have only concentrated on the server admin side for the development, e.g. a way to manage all configured mongrel clusters, monitor the mongrel servers for memory usage, etc..

    We have not yet built any of the customer facing tools, such as editing the apache config, Nginx config or automating the cluster setup. This is all done manually at the moment. I would be interested in your talking with you about your setup and experiences.

  18. #18
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    It would be great to see such a cool plugin, the price? not sure

  19. #19
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    The plugin has been finished. And is pretty stable. There are some tweaks I would like to implement on it namely a custom mongrel_rails start script which checks the known port against the cpanel rails host manager port assigned so that people cant use rogue ports. But otherwise its looking good. We are selling it now on a per customer basis pricing at 100$ per server one time.
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  20. #20
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    Quote Originally Posted by jmcallister
    The major reason I created it was that I found fastcgi to be annoying to say the least, so we migrated to a mongrel cluster which is much more stable for ruby apps.
    What problems did you experience with fastcgi ? We've been using it on our Developer Cpanel hosting ramge for a while and not encountered any problems yet - be interested in knowing what switching to mongrel solved for you.
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  21. #21
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    Quote Originally Posted by othellotech
    What problems did you experience with fastcgi ? We've been using it on our Developer Cpanel hosting ramge for a while and not encountered any problems yet - be interested in knowing what switching to mongrel solved for you.
    Mongrel is much faster than fcgi, for one.

  22. #22
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    id be very interested as well
    CMC Design

  23. #23
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    For those interested in it you can contact me on MSN at admin [@] dminensionservers.com
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  24. #24
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    Isn't it pretty hard to use RoR without shell access though, i read something about a symbolic link, but got confused and drew a picture of a cat.

    Anyway, it sounds good, I know a few hosts who would love to have a plug in like that.

    It's funny how people always think fastcgi is fast because of the name, it may have been fast a few years ago.
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