I've used Force 9 aka PlusNet for about 8 years as my ISP, then also to register and host my domains. However, since I now get broadband access paid for by my employer, I don't really need an ISP. (As it happens this broadband access is via the very same PlusNet at my suggestion). So, I only need somewhere to host my domains and my email. My domains are now at 1 and 1, because they offer domains at below cost price with no strings attached and full control of the DNS. But I still need somewhere to actually host webspace and email. I don't know about you, but whenever I've looked this sort of thing in the past, it always seems that these companies are aiming themselves squarely at the business market, rather than the 'geek' market. So there's an entry level which gives you some webspace and some mailboxes. But if you want all the toys (shell access, cron jobs, cgi-bin scripts, mySQL databases etc etc) you have to buy one of the high end accounts which give you acres of disk space and vast amounts of bandwidth and cost an arm and a leg. Some of you (or perhaps both of my regular blog readers...) are probably saying "do it yourself!" at this point. But I really don't want to have to run machines in my house connected to the net 24/7 and worry about administering the damn thing. I'm a programmer, not a sysadmin! To cut a long story short, I'm moving to Textdrive having heard good things in the Ruby community, including here, here and here. They give you all the toys you could possibly want, starting from the cheapest hosting package and they seem to know what they are doing. You've got to love the quote on the front page of the website: We have no photographs of our CEO strutting past server racks, or of women in telephone headsets ready to take your call, but we hope youâll consider joining us all the same. One of these days I may get round to moving this blog too...
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