Coming in 2013: More Open Source Hosting Options!
ON THE FIFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS… TENDENCI’S GIFT TO YOU: Real Choices for hosting your open source Tendenci website yourself!
This past year has been exciting and fast paced for the Tendenci team with the release of our open source software. We’re breaking new grounds in nonprofit, open source technology, and we’re focusing more of our efforts in 2013 on ease of use for you and your staff.
One major to-do we’re finally able to check off our list is simplifying the installation process so you can set-up and manage a Tendenci website on the hosting provider of your choosing. We’ve been testing Tendenci open source installations on different hosting providers and documenting the steps for you.
We’ve currently written documentation for Rackspace and Linode cloud hosting installation instructions:
Tendenci Open Source Hosting Requirements
Tendenci Installation Instructions on Rackspace OpenStack Cloud Platform
Tendenci Installation Instructions on Linode.com
We’ll be documenting additional hosting providers in the coming weeks, and we’re interested in finding out what hosting provider you want to use with Tendenci. We’ll test and document the installation process for your preferred hosting vendors. Suggest a vendor as a Comment below or email us to ‘toss’ your cloud host’s name in the ‘hat’.
3 Questions to Ask Before You Select Your Hosting Partner
We believe that website management shouldn’t be a struggle for Associations. Managing both Members and Content on your website is a complex process that Tendenci was specifically designed to help manage, enabling you to focus on your cause. Just like you need a website platform specifically developed for your nonprofit, you also need a hosting partner that understands the unique technology requirements that associations and nonprofits have.
Here’s three questions you definitely should ask potential hosting providers to make sure you get a good fit!
1) What extra services and products does your hosting provider offer?
Often, people think that their association’s staff email addresses come from the same company that they paid for the custom domain URL, or they think that things like back-ups, security updates and monitoring are included in that $6.99 monthly hosting plan. In most cases, the cheapest hosting plans out there aren’t intended to support the kind of traffic and User activity that a nonprofit or association website is going to require.
Make sure that your hosting provider offers a package that includes the type of options your association will require. For example, with Tendenci websites – you’ll need to make sure you find a hosting partner with VPS (virtual private server) root access.
2) What level of support does the hosting company offer?
It’s great if you have an experienced IT staff to manage your website’s critical maintenance tasks like back-ups, security updates, and plugin management. If your association doesn’t have someone on staff to manage your IT and website hosting services, then you’ll want to find a hosting provider with a strong support department who can be your external IT team.
Make an honest evaluation of your association’s ability to provide the time and expertise required to ensure your website receives the ongoing maintenance, back-ups, and security updates required to run smoothly. Find a hosting provider with services that compliment your association’s IT capabilities.
3) How will the hosting provider manage an unpredictable spike in traffic to your site?
Imagine your nonprofit gets a lucky break and your Executive Director is going to be on the Today Show! Suddenly, tens of thousands of people are trying to access your website – and you’ve never had more than a hundred visitors at one time before. Will your site go down because you have limits on your platform?
Probably – most sites who experience a massive spike in traffic experience a short period of downtime. That downtime can range from a few minutes to several hours, depending on the level of support your receiving from your hosting provider. How fast can your hosting provider get your site back up and live when traffic spikes? Can they get you up before your live Today Show interview is over? Or will you be down until later in the evening, when viewers earlier have forgotten and moved on to other priorities with their families and dinner?
These are all important questions to consider and I hope they help you select the right website host for your association!
History of Open Source
Here’s a great infographic that shares some fun history facts about open source software via SourceNinja.com!
Open Source Management by SourceNinja
MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM TENDENCI!
We’re celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas with daily previews of the all new Tendenci Features coming to your association website in 2013! Join us each day to “open new gifts” filled with feature updates for your website!
Visit our Twelve Days of Christmas Main Page to find new gifts for each day from now until January 5th!
We love to hear your questions and comments about Tendenci, the open source CMS for Association’s – leave a reply below in our comments section or send us your thoughts via email to support@tendenci.com.