Wordpress hosting

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m1013828

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#191429 3-Feb-2016 22:54

Who are people using for wordpress hosting? I have a site on wordpress.com, and need more customization, so am looking to migrate it to wordpress.org setup, and need suggestions on hosting, would prefer NZ based, but the few I looked at seemed dodgy based on reviews etc.

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meow
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#1484889 3-Feb-2016 23:48

I am currently hosting my site off my home server (https://murfy.nz) but it all depends on how much traffic your site generates, your skills with Linux etc since you're then responsible for the full security of your site. I also host another Wordpress site I helped with on a $10 per month Linode (http://charlimarie.com) with Cloudflare in front of it.

If your Linux-Fu isn't that good then MediaTemple seem good, but somewhat expensive: https://mediatemple.net/webhosting/wordpress/

If you're OK with Linux then either Linode (affl link, multiple locations) or Sitehost (NZ Based) are awesome VPS providers to get you started.

Really, needing more information to go by. With the likes of Cloudflare you can host your site with lets say Linode in the US (Fremont) (and use their Wordpress stackscript here: https://www.linode.com/stackscripts/view/12) and achieve a very quick site for $10US per month and learn Linux at the same time. Personally, I wouldn't go with a shared hosting platform and would rather spend the extra money on a VPS I control but this all depends on you.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
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ZollyMonsta

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#1484955 4-Feb-2016 07:54

Was using Go Daddy until they blocked my own IP address from ftp to my site.
I transferred to 2mHost.com on their OZ servers. No issues. Have found their chat support and email responses to be very quick.

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As per the usual std disclaimer.. "All thoughts typed here are my own."

timmmay

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#1484960 4-Feb-2016 07:56

I've come to the conclusion that all of the relatively cheap web hosting companies (< $20/month I guess) are compromises. HostGator, DreamHost, BlueHost, etc, etc. The main failing is service, they can take two days to respond to "my website is down", and what can you expect when you pay $5 to $20 a month?

I've recently moved my Wordpress websites to Amazon AWS. Performance is better, I do my own support, but it's really not for people who don't know how to set up, secure, and maintain an operating system. I'm about to release a tutorial in the next couple of weeks how to host Wordpress on AWS.

AWS has free micro instances for the first year, which are more than enough to run moderate traffic websites, if you set up your caching properly. This is doubly true with CloudFlare acting as CDN.

Tockly

353 posts

Ultimate Geek
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#1484962 4-Feb-2016 08:09

I have used 1stDomains for both my DNS and hosting of some site(s) I have built. $99 a year for hosting and it has never gone down. NZ based which is great also.

Currently running my own WP site on a Ubuntu server from home, mainly to see how good UFB is for hosting things.

jnimmo

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#1484964 4-Feb-2016 08:13

Setting up a VPS is quite fun, and should give you a better level of service than you would get from a shared hosting provider.

I use a Vultr VPS hosted in Sydney, so nice low latency and high bandwidth to NZ. This is $5USD a month so works out about $7.50/month at the moment. AWS and Azure could also achieve similar with hosting in Australia but perhaps slightly more complicated to set up? For NZ based VPS would second Sitehost.

Setup an Ubuntu 14.04 x64 instance, connect to the terminal. The easiest way in my opinion to setup and manage the server is with EasyEngine, https://easyengine.io/docs/install/ a script which takes care of installing the required packages, handling updates and security etc. Specifically designed for setting up an optimised Wordpress install.

After that is done you just need to setup a firewall (UFW), change your SSH port to something random.

My favourite command, which creates the site, installs Wordpress with Nginx and caching, and sets up a free SSL certificate to protect logging into the site etc.

ee site create example.com --wpfc --letsencrypt

Then once a month or so it is just ee update to update any packages.

solival

160 posts

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#1484965 4-Feb-2016 08:13

Just a bit of offtopic, but taking wordpress to your hosting (from wordpress.org) and installing new themes/plugins makes you solo responsible for all security issues, backups (not all hosters automatically backup your data) and other problems. That's bigger issue than you might think. I witnessed several cases (and fixed couple of them) of "zombifing" servers and using them for DDOS which lead to site outages, blocking by hoster and increased bills for hosting.

Also, be aware that wordpress has severe security issues with 3rd party plugins (as well as joomla/drupal and, I believe, silver stripe). Some of plugins (especially free themes on third party sites) has built in security holes that could be used when required.

So limitations on wordpress.org is done for a reason, and when you want to used some plugin/theme, please have a look into source code for "exec", "eval", "system", "popen", "`", "pcntl_exec", "preg_replace" with /e modifier, "create_function", and "include*" or "require*" calls with variables that could have url to another server. Alternatively, use only widely accepted plugins supported on official wordpress forums.

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timmmay

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#1484971 4-Feb-2016 08:26

jnimmo:

My favourite command, which creates the site, installs Wordpress with Nginx and caching, and sets up a free SSL certificate to protect logging into the site etc.
ee site create example.com --wpfc --letsencrypt 

I just spent six weeks, on and off, setting that up manually that can be done in one command. Actually was quite a lot more complicated originally, with Wordpres Multisite, importing sites, security, performance, etc, and learning bits of Unix. I specifically wanted to understand how everything worked though, because of something goes wrong I want to know how to fix it. I learned heaps, but that would be great for someone who wants an easy option :)

jnimmo

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#1484978 4-Feb-2016 08:42

timmmay:

I just spent six weeks, on and off, setting that up manually that can be done in one command. Actually was quite a lot more complicated originally, with Wordpres Multisite, importing sites, security, performance, etc, and learning bits of Unix. I specifically wanted to understand how everything worked though, because of something goes wrong I want to know how to fix it. I learned heaps, but that would be great for someone who wants an easy option :)

There is a command for Multisite too :) But importing sites definitely complicates things, and of course still takes time to tweak and verify performance etc. I had started setting it up by hand using tutorials but being on the clock for that project needed a quicker way of doing it so was lucky to find EE.

ee site create example.com --wpsubdom --wpfc # install wpmu-subdomain + nginx fastcgi_cache

m1013828

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#1484984 4-Feb-2016 08:56

Crikey, this is putting me off, I agree on the comments about dreamhost, openhost etc, have had people make poor business decisions and use dreamhost for email, years of hilarity and blacklisting ensued. I'm comfortable with wordpress, we have a charity website but I quickly discovered that iframes plugins, specifically for a give a little fundraiser, cant be inserted into wordpress.com So if the jump wasn't too much, was looking at the move away, I definitely don't have the time to manage a VM security wise etc, just want to focus solely on the business end of wordpress etc.

Shane Le Brun MCSA 08R2
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timmmay

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#1484986 4-Feb-2016 09:00

WPEngine could be an option, but probably not cheap. Or just get a middling to high end NZ host and you should be ok.

m1013828

35 posts

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#1485010 4-Feb-2016 09:16

timmmay:

WPEngine could be an option, but probably not cheap. Or just get a middling to high end NZ host and you should be ok.

the personal one at $29 USD a month is doable, although double triple the price effectively of what wordpress.com costs on an annual basis, all to get access to iframes....

Shane Le Brun MCSA 08R2
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danfaulknor

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#1485013 4-Feb-2016 09:19

We're an NZ based company that does (only) Wordpress hosting with support if that helps!

they/them

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WebOps/DevOps, Managed IT, Hosting and Internet/WAN.

jnimmo

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#1485014 4-Feb-2016 09:20

Ah I've been thinking for a long time I need to setup some low cost good quality Wordpress hosting for charities. I have two charities hosted with LightningBase (aff link, $99 USD/year) which has been very solid. Includes CDN services and automatic wordpress updates etc. They have a server in Melbourne and CDN, Varnish caching etc so pretty good speed. I can send you URLs if you want to test.

m1013828

35 posts

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#1485040 4-Feb-2016 09:40

Thanks, I will look at emailing you in the next couple of days, always keen to support a local business.

Shane Le Brun MCSA 08R2
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chewster

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#1491124 12-Feb-2016 13:34

Plenty of well-priced VPS solutions now. A really simple option to pre-configure a server is serverpilot.io. They just need the SSH password from an untouched Ubuntu configuration running on linode, digitalocean AWS etc. Then they install Apache/Nginx, PHP (can change version easily), MySQL, and even WordPress for you. All server patches, firewalls and security strengthening is automated. SFTP access for file upload is done. SSH keys are super easy to install (paid version $10USD).

I setup Digitalocean cheap tier ($5USD/mo) + serverpilot.io (free features are plentiful) + Cloudflare (free for basic tier) + mailgun (free up to limit for email redirection) just recently for a simple Wordpress site for a friend.

Nice thing about digital ocean is you can pay an extra $1/month and get weekly backups (without any downtime) - so you can just rollback at any point should something go haywire.

If my post helped you, consider my referrals (: Sharesies $5 referral code, Skinny 4GB buddy code, Contact Energy $100 promo code

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