Gondor expands its Django hosting to any Python WSGI app | Hacker News Reader

Gondor expands its Django hosting to any Python WSGI app

gondor.io

114 pointsbrosner16 comments

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> Gondor 1.1 is an optional upgrade, but we will force everyone to upgrade by the end of September.

So then it's not optional.

It is optional, but it won't be at some point in the future.

Good catch. This was overlooked. I've removed that bit and modified the upgrade section with the correct information.

The service seems to be kind of expensive for what it is.

Compared to what? Remember it's managed hosting, not a VPS (see https://gondor.io/blog/2011/12/20/why-pay-more-gondor-rather... for an explanation of some of the differences)

Thank you for the link. It makes a clear point: I'm not their demographic. They are going after businesses and not individuals. I still wonder how they compare proce wise vs heroku?

Actually, the majority of Gondor users are individuals, just individuals who want to spend more time developing and less time configuring and running servers. Heroku has a free tier which makes them cheaper for starting out but for various setups, Gondor can be cheaper.

I build flask apps, and I'm currently shopping for a VPS. Leaning towards Linode, even though their security proved to be less than stellar. My aim is to have a platform where I will not be limited to what I can and can't ship in terms of libraries, db's, and the like. Could gondor provide me with such freedom? Or do I have to open up supports tickets in order to ask for a library to be installed and made available? This is how web hosts operate and it is a huge time waster. Rather thanked writiing pip install whatever, I have to wait for someone to do it.

Check out webfaction, their virtualenv support is a _little_ wonky but the python environment is per-app so you don't really need it.

I run half a dozen Django apps for less than $10/mo but they support any WSGI system, postgres or MySQL and their platform also handles your mail & DNS.

Thank you for the tip. I will explore their offerings. Have you had any problem with installing anything that you may need?

Not as of yet!

I use linode for flask apps. A lot of configuration at first though, managed servers are easier and let you get to coding faster.

I like to play with Server stuff though.

If it's pip installable, it should work on Gondor without our intervention. If you need something else installed then, yes, you'd need to put in a support request. That's definitely the trade-off you get with managed hosting.

That is the feature I'm looking for. I did not see that information in the website. If its not there, you should really consider putting it, because having the pip command is really an important fact in the buying decision.

I'm going to check your service out. Thanks for the support.

Any first hand review of Gondor ? I have consider it for my app few times but never tried it.

TL;DR == They're awesome!

Longer:

I signed up a couple of weeks ago to try them out.

A preface:

My requirements:

Django==1.4 PIL==1.1.7 distribute==0.6.24 django-crispy-forms==1.1.4 psycopg2==2.4.5

I also knew for my next project I'd need Redis support for sorl-thumbnails.

FWIW, PIL requires some C libraries for image handling.

I found this http://www.kencochrane.net/blog/2011/06/django-hosting-round... and sort of went from there. I even looked at GoDaddy and Dreamhost. Found NOTHING on Dreamhost's site regarding Django, even though I stumbled upon a coupon on the web. And I'm one of those who don't like GoDaddy...

The short list : Heroku WebFraction Gondor

Why not Heroku? - A free tier exists and I REALLY wanted to use this -- Free only goes so far. Add Postgres/Upgraded Redis == $$ - No local storage - No indication of support for PIL (multiple attempts to reach support resulted in 0 results) - AWS

Why not Webfraction? I fear the cheapest thing(s). I believe you get what you pay for. No, that does not mean the most expensive thing is the most valuable, but I feared over-selling. - Web searches resulted in mixed reviews/issues with deployment. I personally know someone who was on WebFraction. She seemed happy/content.

Gondor (Initial Impressions) - I had never heard of them before! WHY had I never heard of them before. This made me apprehensive! - They're on Rackspace! - By all accounts they only do Django (or did only Django). I believe do one thing and do it well. - SSL Support

(First Impressions) It "just works" Support is nothing short of AMAZING! Brian and Pat both have taken their own personal time to school my n00b @$$ on Django/best-practices and what not. I've learned more from them than anyone else in the short time that I've been in the Django community. I've been able to find someone in IRC most weekdays between 8AM PST and 10PM PST. Outside those hours, e-mail works and a response exists first thing in the morning (no, I don't think there is 24x7 support short of them receiving an alert -- but I host nothing that is 24x7 business critical (yet)).

(Gripes/Issues) Their deployment is as simple as 'gondor deploy <instance> <branch>' -- BUT their deployment tar's up the repository locally, transfers it over, unpacks it, etc. etc. This puts your site in a '503 Maintenance' mode, so deployments WILL take down your site. My gripe that exists here is that if I make a simple change to CSS, I shouldn't have to tar the local repository, transfer it all over, etc. etc. I should be able to just upload the CSS file and Gondor can reload Nginx as necessary/needed. I read somewhere that indicates they will be releasing a zero-downtime deployment.

It's not clear what allocations exist as far as bandwidth, storage, backups, etc. I don't want to stream a 5GB video and find out the hard way, but perhaps it's my only option. :P With that, there are means to import/export DB exports, and that'll likely be my DB backups. Local/Remote git repository exists so that covers my Django project. Now I just need local (user-content uploads) -- TBD.

I am running on a dedicated instance because I need SSL support (static IP) and I also have plans on running a second site on the host. It is about 2.5x what my VPS costs me, BUT like the blog posted above. I no longer have to care about Updating/Patching Ubuntu/Postgresql/Nginx. FWIW, I did spend about 3 days in my spare time and have a working model/scripts necessary to deploy Ubuntu/Postgresql/Nginx should the need arise....but I don't want to, which is why I started down the path of looking for Django-only hosting. I also don't know ANYTHING about Postgres short of what Django tutorials exist telling me how to get Postgres & Django to work. I'd rather leave this to the "experts".

It's only been about two weeks...site will hopefully go live at the end of the month. Good or bad, you'll hear about it.

My advice, try it! I haven't been this happy about a web host in years!

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