Ask HN: Is there an easy way non-tech users can self-host apps on a server? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Is there an easy way non-tech users can self-host apps on a server?

Software like Sandstorm or Cloudron try to tackle the self-hosting problem. However, they require technical expertise to setup the software before non-technical users can use the software - that means few hosting providers provide Sandstorm or Cloudron as options.

Other options like Docker or typing lots of command-line commands are not easy or simple for non-technical users.

Has anyone successfully got non-technical users or customers to install/self-host a web/SaaS app on a web server by themselves?

(Example: provide a custom OS image with a pre-configured web app - a user installs this on a VPS. Too complicated?)

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"Self Hosting" usually requires some level of understanding of servers, command line, databases etc. There already are "1 click" apps available on VPS like DigitalOcean etc. That is the best for non technical users I would say. But those come preconfigured with defaults that may/may not work for you.

Personally I think some things are technical and self-hosting is one of those things. The main thing that makes it technical isn't the actual set up, that could be scripted so that it's as simple to set up as installing an app.

The technical aspect of self-hosting is understanding the risks and implications of what you're doing. E.g. what are you exposing to third parties, what do you need to do to keep it secure, what sort of backup process is suitable.

The problem starts here: What is your tech stack for the app? The complexity will depend on that.

I fiddle around with web development using Wt(https://webtoolkit.eu) because I am comfortable with C++. For the deployment part of that project, it is just updating the Linux based OS on the hosting server with required libraries and setting up a reverse proxy. The rest just works. Here is the Wt reference guide: https://www.webtoolkit.eu/wt/doc/reference/html

The only hard part is knowing C++ :)

There is no complex script to run or gazillion amounts of not required "modules" to download etc. All the dependencies are already provided by the Linux distros.

I feel like this is a paradox. If it's simple enough for a non-tech user, I assume it's basically self installing and self managing. That basically sounds like managed hosting.

Even if the install is automatic, self hosting requires the ability to debug issues if they ever popup. If you can't install it yourself, you definitely can't debug it.

There were lots of tools to do this back in the days of "everybody has shared hosting" - for instance, this Cpanel plugin:

https://applications.cpanel.net/listings/view/Installatron-A...

But those all depend on the hosting company as a technical backstop, and historically had some security headaches (from users keeping default passwords to being hard to upgrade).

What do you mean by non tech people? someone who has no idea what selfhosting means or what a server means? Someone who cannot use the cli? I think they would just use SaaS.

Also, I saw cloudron on DO and AWS marketplaces.

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