Gandi Bar - Hosting - Comments

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - vasanti mataji

vasanti mataji — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 17:00:57 +0100

I have registered an email address with you. Now I am wondering if you can host my website as the current host is rather irresponsible in returning communications. We also wish to change the present look of the site.
Please let me know the details in simple English as to what services you provide as a host and what are the charges in US dollars.
Thank you in advance
Vasanti Jayaswal

Friendly reminder on how to renew your hosting account - ngungo

ngungo — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 14:29:00 +0100

My account is not operational for 10 days now due to I/O disk error. Ticket was filed 7 days ago. Except for automatic acknowledgment, there is no answer. No resolved. I just a reminder for account renewal. If I don't here anything today, I will cancel my account.

--ngungo

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - rvb

rvb — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 17:06:29 +0100

Hi again!
I have been thinking about all of these interessant posts. I think the best way is to give them a try, which is, for most of the hosting providers, not really possible. Well, for 1 year, or at least 6 months, this is not a try anymore... Here at Gandi they give 1 month or less... or better is more time to test, without any time-based contract (Stephan, this is a MAJOR move in the online business! Thank you. Thinking of us, poor mobile phone's costumers :'(

So I took one share, and I am discovering the back-end management of Gandi AI (I am fine and full enough with my local FreeBSD server and the CLI/shell without graphic interface. I am not a pure geek ;-). And while I am planing the move from my current hosting provider, I share (it is all about sharing here, isn't it?!!) a migration procedure for the email on the Gandi's groups (no need for Gandi hosting, it is about GandiMail included with domain name services)
http://groups.gandi.net/en/topic/ga...
and I hope to complete the web server migration this week-end. Nobody replies or amends it so far... it can not be perfect, yet. So please have a look and share your points! (@Ryan and @Elliott, no copyrights, even I prefer the GNU Free Documentation Licence GFDL, of course)

Then I will share my experience after the whole move from my current provider to Gandi. No more speculations, but Real Life and back to business!

Sheare... sorry, Cheers

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Zeno

Zeno — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 21:35:49 +0100

I for one think this service is very promising. Gandi has been a reliable registrar, so I put a lot of trust in new offerings from Gandi.

As someone who maintains some servers in a datacenter, I can say that a flexible virtualization-based solution is very welcome. Especially in the lower end of the market, bare hardware servers can be fairly painful. If you grow out of a production server, you can't easily expand its disk space or replace its CPUs. A service that allows you to easily add and expand VMs, and add other resources like disk space is very useful. You can care less about physical hardware and more about deploying your applications. (You don't really want to go to the data center when you are enjoying the night with some friends when a stick of memory dies, and users/customers are calling. Unless you get paid very well ;).)

For all the people who are looking for affordable webhosting: one share with 256 MB RAM and some CPU time can easily serve static websites and websites that do not have high database or web application loads. In contrast to OpenVZ-based solutions or shared hosting, resources isolation is good with Xen (meaning that someone else's heavily-loaded VM won't affect your own VM in any significant way). A very important difference with shared hosting (as somebody mentioned) is that you have full control of the virtual machine, you can administrate it, serve as many domains as you like, add Apache modules, use your favorite database server, etc.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Ryan (gandi)

Ryan (gandi) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 11:15:32 +0100

Hello Berto,

Welcome to the bar!

Gandi's servers are indeed located in France. You can test the latency by pinging, for example, the following 217.70.184.1.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - rvb

rvb — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 16:46:23 +0100

Is there is something wrong with gandibar? I am just asking, sorry to be off-topic (well, it is dotClear and Gandi hosting, usually all works well :-), because there is no new comment here, neither on the French version about Gandi Hosting. Nevertheless I posted yesterday and this morning. Discussions were very interesting that far !-(

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - rvb

rvb — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 12:40:44 +0100

(sorry for maybe double post, but still nothing published since yesterday evening...)
@ Ryan, thanks for your reply and your details about your new offer. It obviously need to be wide explain because Gandi pretend it to be very unlike the other players in the hosting industry.
@ msr, thanks as well, I was talking about annual price indeed. I was not clear enough obviously, as I wanted to write shortly.
I understand very well the advantage of flexibility by adding or removing shares at any time, even for a few hours. I have no problem at all with that, it could be helpful when a higher traffic occurs. But, like anyone running a business, an non profit-organization and even a single person who is passionate with the web (you might have loads of them ;-), it is important to know how much you will pay for a year, at least, for a service. I am talking about budget and prevision, not about expectation. As far I cannot get less than one share, the cost is 72 Euros a year, but more likely 144 Euros a year when Gandi's definitive prices will take place. (Well Stephan, I don't find that way of pricing more fair than other ISPs you point in your posts, if you see what I mean... )
And after an hour reading both offer description pages and gandibar in French (lebardegandi), I still did not find any thing stating the opposite. So maybe we could buy shares at the beta price in advance for at least a year for the initial configuration (maybe with some limits to avoid smarty and “medium” people who know that they won't move to another hosting provider). I am sure it will ease the move from a lot of small websites/servers who will need months to make the most of the “unlimited” possibilities Gandi promises us !!

PS: I mentioned above Stephan/Gandi's comments #101, 109 and 121
www.lebardegandi.net/post/2008/01/02/Beta-publique-de-Gandi-Hebergement-ouverte#c163510
PS2: What about Online.net hosting services? How will you compare to them, if I only have once contact their support service?

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - rvb

rvb — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:40:59 +0100

@ Ryan, thanks for your reply and your details about your new offer. It obviously need to be wide explain because Gandi pretend it to be very unlike the other players in the hosting industry.
@ msr, thanks as well, I was talking about annual price indeed. I was not clear enough obviously, as I wanted to write shortly.
I understand very well the advantage of flexibility by adding or removing shares at any time, even for a few hours. I have no problem at all with that, it could be helpful when a higher traffic occurs. But, like anyone running a business, an non profit-organization and even a single person who is passionate with the web (you might have loads of them ;-), it is important to know how much you will pay for a year, at least, for a service. I am talking about budget and prevision, not about expectation. As far I cannot get less than one share, the cost is 72 Euros a year, but more likely 144 Euros a year when Gandi's definitive prices will take place. (Well Stephan, I don't find that way of pricing more fair than other ISPs you point in your posts, if you see what I mean... )
And after an hour reading both offer description pages and gandibar in French (lebardegandi), I still did not find any thing stating the opposite. So maybe we could buy shares at the beta price in advance for at least a year for the initial configuration (maybe with some limits to avoid smarty and “medium” people who know that they won't move to another hosting provider). I am sure it will ease the move from a lot of small websites/servers who will need months to make the most of the “unlimited” possibilities Gandi promises us !!

PS: I mention above Stephan/Gandi's comments #101, 109 and 121
http://www.lebardegandi.net/post/20...
PS2: what about online.net hosting services? How will you compare to them, if I only have once contact their support service?

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Berto

Berto — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 17:54:09 +0100

I'm in the US and am wondering if there would be any significant latency issues with using Gandi hosting. As I understand all servers will be housed in Europe.

Thanks!

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - thefuture

thefuture — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 10:52:58 +0100

Thanks for taking the time to respond, Ryan.

I think it's fantastic that a European host is pushing the boundaries and, please note, I did not say that we were not going to sign up. I just said that it helps to know the actual/eventual prices of the services you are signing up for. Even if the total is based upon your own settings and consumption.

I think you will find, somewhat contrary to what you say, that people will actually compare services along with prices within the same context: the hosting industry. Even if you call the services apples and oranges, people will then compare apples to oranges and look for similarities along with pros and cons.

Keep in mind too that many have another launch of unproven technology with the promise of scalability (endless bucket provided, pay per GPU as you go) fresh in memory. It is, I think, fair to say that the aforementioned solution still has not proven itself and the flexibility came at the cost of reduced performance. This is not an acceptable trade-off for many.

Hardware resources can never compete without actual server/system performance (what really matters; bang for buck) and the three most important things in hosting: stability, stability and stability. Xen/Virtuozzo VPS packages from quality European providers are already divided along the lines of your shares and you can upgrade/downgrade according to your blling cycle. In addition, extra GBs of HD and bandwidth can be added at a very reasonable cost, paid per GB unit. That's probably acceptable for 99% of users and just leaves the 1% paranoid about the buzzword-compliant digg/slashdot effect.

A new solution, however great, does not void all others. In fact, all scaleable products presented thus far seem to have scaled to an ego set on taking over the entire hosting industry upon launch of the beta ;-). Sign of the times, etc.

Anyways, we look forward to trying it out and, once more, it's great to see this type of thing in data centers within decent ping range.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Ryan

Ryan — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 18:38:16 +0100

Our final price for one share will not exceed 12 euros, but the real question is not there...

It is important to avoid falling into the trap of looking for what may appear to be the best bargain with regards to hosting for a couple of reasons.

First, Gandi has deliberately not chosen to be a discount web host, this is something that we are proud of, and something which should also reassure our customers on several levels. Discount services buy cheap hardware, divide it among as many customers as possible, and sell it with classic deceptive marketing tricks (with full knowledge that only 20% of the customers will take full advantage of the resources...).

Gandi, on the other hand, has purchased extremely high-quality equipment (with all the security that comes with that), maintains multiple data centers at different locations, and provides free customer support. These are not things of little consequence Also, one of the major points of Gandi's hosting service is the *flexibility* that you have - which is why the whole discussion of price must be taken into a different context.

Because you can add and remove shares in real time, and without any contractual obligation in terms of time, as your need for power changes, you determine how many shares you actually need. This is the key to understanding Gandi's web hosting service.

Our service lets the customer (You!) decide how much power they need. Consequently, our customers consume better over time and in a real-life environment and therefore, less! For example, you can start your project with one share, and then if you find that you need more power, then add another, or another...or remove one...or add more disk space...or more disks...etc.

You are also the one that decides how much disk space your server has...and when. You can create and add a disk of 250 GB if you need more disk space...or make a more modest disk of just 1 GB...or 6 GB...or remove an unused 10 GB disk from one server and attach it to another, or remove disk space that you purchased that (as it turns out) you may not have needed in the end. You can change your server as your needs change... We don't tell you what to do and what you can do; even with our services, you tell us what you want.

The whole notion of a fixed cost per year, or even per month, no longer exists with web hosting. It is very important to steer the discussion away from simple price comparisons, and towards a discussion on how to best manage your resources in real time so as to provide the best and most intelligent services - to YOUR customers or web visitors

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - thefuture

thefuture — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 16:27:26 +0100

For the benefit of other English speakers, the French version of the blog operates with a price of E12 per share/month. Apart from RAM, that's a little high for the specs (only 5 GB disk). Good to know before signing up.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - thefuture

thefuture — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 12:47:14 +0100

Your hosting solution looks great. However, without knowing what it will eventually cost, it makes no sense to pay (a reduced price for an unspecified time) for beta testing. Seriously, why pay to test something that in the end may not be competitive with other Xen/Virtuozzo VPS packages? It's a waste of time. Publish your actual prices and get a solid and loyal customer base from the start, or not.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - msr

msr — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 19:20:15 +0100

Hi.

Probably, RVB were thinking in the price of a full year for one share: 6 * 12 = 72 (excl. VAT).

But. That price is for the Beta "Gandi Hosting". What about the price when in full production? Do you know the final price?

Thanks. (and Good job, as always).

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Ryan (gandi)

Ryan (gandi) — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 14:21:22 +0100

Hello rvb,

Happy new year to you too!

I need to correct one figure you quote in your post: our Beta price is *6 euros* a share (not 72 euros). And of course it is necessary to stress that our hosting service and domain name service are totally separate...

As Gandi provides virtual dedicated servers, the question of sharing resources with different domains does not enter in to the equation - you have much, much more flexibility with Gandi's hosting service. For example, you can host as many websites on your server if you want, by simply creating virtual hosts in your Apache http server, or by configuring your server's resources as needed (you just need to point your domain's A record to your server's IP address so your domain knows where to find your server...).

The possibilities are limitless indeed, and very flexible. This is unlike any shared hosting solution which only give you "X domains per hosting package" or "X services". Gandi's service adapts to *your* needs, and not the other way around.

Our customer support would be pleased to answer any questions you have about our service - we look forward to hearing from you!

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - rvb

rvb — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 21:17:54 +0100

Happy New Year !!

Well, I was really on the way to move all from my hosting provider (email and a few static files), and for my wife as well, and... it is pretty above my current 30 Euros excl. VAT a year
Your offer looks revolutionary indeed, but 72 Euros for one share + domain name 12 E, I am not sure if it will equal my current basic hosting (of course, not with your beautiful customer service with no need to ask any support (FTP and I am done).

Anyway, thank you to try something new. I really want to use more your services, for my peace of mind !!

A question: could I, with one share, share hard drive for 2 different domains (both register at Gandi of course)?

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - NB

NB — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 17:37:25 +0100

Congratulations, it looks really good. Well done!

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - tenzo

tenzo — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 15:39:36 +0100

Thank Ryan

Now I'm getting on...

Why have you decided to propose the "General terms and conditions of domain name registration" in the contract step ? I've just chosen to create a server with 1 part!

I'm reading the "Hosting terms and conditions"...

I'll be back soon!

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - Ryan (gandi)

Ryan (gandi) — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 15:02:03 +0100

@tenzo

Happy new year to you too!

We are under fire by the huge number of simultaneous connections that we are getting at this time, so the front-end is suffering a bit. This will calm down soon, however.

Gandi Hosting in public beta is open! - tenzo

tenzo — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 14:58:02 +0100

Happy new year Sosso, Steph & Co !

I'm running the new web hosting service in an effort to get...

...and I come to the "Please come back later"...

How should I deal with this ?

Help appreciated !