Web Hosting Advice

[aball65]

I'm looking to move my PHP/MySQL application from my home PC to a web hosting service. Bluehost.com ($100/year) seems to be a popular choice however their servers use different software versions than I'm currently using on my home PC:

OS (I'm running XP on my desktop, host runs Linux)
Apache (I'm running 2.0.55 on my desktop, host running 1.3.33)
PHP (I'm running 5.0 on my desktop, host running 5.0)
MySQL (I'm running 5.0.15 on my desktop, host running 4.1.1.4)

Is this a major issue?

Also, once I get up and running on a hosted server, is it typical to make changes directly on the hosted server or will I need to make changes on my home PC and then port them to the hosted server?

Can anyone recommend a good web hosting service?

Thanks in advance.

[moberemk]

Hmm... well, when i go from a PHP4 to a PHP5 server, things go screwy quite a bit with includes. MySQL also loses funtionality when you go between those two versions. Personally, I would try to find a more up-to-date host, if you want to have a cutting-edge site. Behavior can change majorly between versions, so you need to beware of that.

[SharkBait]

Take a look over at www.webhostingtalk.com. They have numerous posts about various providers and the pros/cons between them.

It also is a forum for Webhosts to talk about stuff and various other topics too.

At work we use Rackspace.com, based in Texas. But we pay $350/month for 100GB, 7 IP addresses and our own server.

Though we have never had the server go down, even during hurricane or tornado season. Its been 2 years so far. Their Fanatical Service plan is awsome, but you pay kinda high for that as well. So its not good unless you have the money to spend.

[steelmanronald06]

[!--sizeo:2--][span style=\"font-size:10pt;line-height:100%\"][!--/sizeo--][a href=\"http://www.webhostfreaks.com\" target=\"_blank\"]http://www.webhostfreaks.com[/a]

[!--sizec--][/span][!--/sizec--][!--sizeo:2--][span style=\"font-size:10pt;line-height:100%\"][!--/sizeo--][a href=\"http://www.serverpowered.com\" target=\"_blank\"]http://www.serverpowered.com[/a][!--sizec--][/span][!--/sizec--]

Both places have EXCELLENT hosting from webhosting to VPS, Dedicated, and Reseller. I would recommend them above all other hostings environments. Not only that, but they will work to meet YOUR needs. If their system configurations don't meet your requriments you can contact them and they will set up a system that does. Not only that but they provide FREE Server Migration. They will Migrate everything from your current server to theirs in a quick painless process.

[moberemk]

Should've seen that coming, seeing as to who owns this place...

[neylitalo]

You may want to develop with MySQL 4 for a few months until 5 becomes popular - it's going to be a slooow transition. I have not seen one web host that has MySQL 5. The Apache 2 thing should be easy to find, but that's not as crucial as the PHP or MySQL. Sure you'll be able to find a host that does Apache 2 and PHP 5, but you may as well give up looking for a good, relatively cheap host with MySQL 5.

One (sorta) easy way to do it would be to get a VPS, as steelmanronald06 said. Granted, you have to know a bit (ok, a lot :D ) of Unix/Linux and be willing to do everything yourself, but then... you get to do everything yourself. And then you can have whatever versions of whatever software you want.

And to answer your other question, you'll most likely be making changes on your home computer and uploading them to your web server via FTP. Unless you get a VPS (or dedicated server), in which case you could SSH into it and use Vim or nano or your favorite command line text editor to edit the files directly.

I personally [a href=\"http://www.ace-host.net\" target=\"_blank\"]http://www.ace-host.net[/a] for hosting - excellent deals, and when I had a problem (only once) they were very prompt and helpful in solving it. It's not one of the usual names that pops up, but I'm hosted on their servers and it's excellent.

[sylvester]

hello,

let me tell you something....for us we have only one option to choose a good host..where as any cheap web hosting companies..jst tap these customers...but when it comes to satisfaction...they failed to do that...i would reccomend you to go for something that is the best for you.because if the  customer is satisfied...the company is satified...

so all the best if you still havent chosen any..

sylvester

[steelmanronald06]

Get a VPS.  ServerPowered.com is real good at setting it up as a web server, so you don't have to do anything to it.  And they do free migration from server to server.  So they would migrate your site from your home server to your new VPS. If you have to set something up, PM me. I will do it for free.  I have a 2 VPS, and I am thinking about getting another...plus I run Gentoo linux on my home computer....P.S. Get CENTOS for your OS on the VPS.