

Show HN: Please review my new Server-Side JavaScript/CoffeeScript servers - ilaksh
http://cure.willsave.me/

======
VMG
From the page

> Everything is pre-installed and pre-configured. n* d., nginx already running
> in front of ExpressJS (site is live when you get the initial build email),
> mongodb, mongoskin, couchdb, running ExpressJS app, example RailwayJS blog
> sample already generated, redis installed (for RailwayJS), CoffeeScript
> installed, VIM support for CoffeeScript installed, psmisc package installed
> (includes commands like 'killall'), ssh port reassigned, example
> CoffeeScript code to access MongoDB, example CoffeeScript ExpressJS app, the
> most popular/recommended NPM/JavaScript packages like Vows, Async,
> Socket.IO, Backbone.JS, Knockout.JS.

This sentence is difficult to parse. What is n* d? Which technologies belong
to what part of your product?

I'd rather have this explained with a bullet list or better yet a nice info
graphic.

~~~
ilaksh
nod. is N_dJS.. you're right, difficult to parse. Probably can improve that. I
did put a bullet list on the features page. Graphics are a great idea thanks.

------
meta
Personally I didn't like your main text introduction: "Don't waste hours, days
or weeks researching server-side JavaScript, cloud providers and NoSQL, and
then compiling, configuring and deploying the systems from scratch. Get a
preconfigured virtual server with a running sample application powered by
Express.JS."

Primarily the first sentence was a huge turn-off for me. Researching your
technology and understanding it is never a waste of time. And Server-Side
JavaScript is not some magic bullet where you need to know nothing but can
write amazing applications. It is a tricky environment with some great power
and massive 'gotchas'.

Personally I think you should either remove reference to research or fully
embrace the word. A sales point could be more along the lines of: "Popular
server-side JavaScript frameworks already connected and configured to allow
you to jump directly into a working example. Great for bootstrapping your
research project or spinning up servers for your already written application!"
But, I have no silver-tongue so take my wording advice with caution. ;)

~~~
ilaksh
Wow I really appreciate that! Do you want a link somewhere crediting you with
writing that copy?

~~~
meta
heh, no, that is fine. It cost me nothing and I am passing the savings onto
you. ;)

------
TrevorBurnham
Page design feedback: You should make the "Free Trial" link more prominent
(make it a button with a bright background). Bump up the line-height on all
the text; it looks too crowded.

Features list needs to give more specifics about RAM, disk space, bandwidth,
etc., not just a list of pre-installed software (especially things like
Express and Backbone that are trivial for me to bundle with my app when I
upload it).

The bullet point about "We don't make you go through a proxy" is useful. You
could also brag that WebSockets work—last I checked, this is a big drawback on
Heroku.

Is there a reason you refer to Node as "n*d." on the front page, and "nod." on
the features page?

~~~
ilaksh
Joyent wants a signed license agreement to say "N_de.JS" anywhere unless they
decide your use of the trademark is "nominative" which is subject to their
interpretation. They are giving out free licenses now but assuming revenue for
the N_de.JS market increases to be more significant, one has to assume that
there will be more and more pressure to extract a greater share of the
revenues by using these license agreements to either stifle competition or to
pull in fees. Especially since one of their main businesses seems to be
directly competing with many of those services. So I'm not in a rush to sign a
license with them and therefore just avoid using the term for now. It does
look silly though so I may have to rethink that and consider this free (for
now?) license thing.

Also thanks a lot for checking it out and the feedback. I made the
CoffeeScript logo link to your book page.

~~~
felixge
IANAL, but you can use node.js as long as you make it clear you are not
associated with the project and joyent holds the trademark.

------
paisible
I can see this being valuable for developers who aren't interested in learning
how to configure / tweak a VPS themselves (and I do know a few of those); not
sure how big that market is, but there's definitely a market. Out of
curiosity, is there any open-source solution out there (i.e: configurable
script) to automatically pre-configure a blank VPS out-of-the box with a list
of frameworks / libraries - something like EC2 images, but for a vanilla
ubuntu server for example ?

~~~
ilaksh
I know nodejitsu has some stuff along those lines, but I don't think its
anywhere near as convenient as my image.

I also think, although I would have to check, that Linode probably has some
kind of N_deJS stackscripts that someone made. Again, I doubt that it is as
fully configured or as convenient as my service, and that will cost you almost
twice as much, since Linode only has 512MB instances (which for many sites and
applications I think is way more than you need with N_de) which cost
$19.95/mo. Also that won't give you any kind of DNS setup which I am doing for
you just by typing the machine name in (probably not a big deal for a lot of
people but it does make it simpler).

Also, I am actually hoping people who know their way around a shell terminal
_will_ want this. The idea is to avoid always having to build Node and
configure Nginx and reassign ssh and some things that you really don't
need/want to do from scratch every time unless you feel like you need to prove
you know how or something.

------
ilaksh
Question: I see a lot of people typing in machine names, for example, someone
typed in jesus(.willsave.me), but most of those people did not actually sign
up. Did you change your mind for some reason?

I really appreciate everyone's feedback so far.

I think if no one takes jesus.willsave.me I may set that up myself tomorrow or
something. LOL.

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iambot
on your features page you've mispelt node, "nod v0.6.2 (via git)"

Edit: just noticed comments below about licencing of N_de etc etc, so I assume
this is the reason

------
dho
I'm missing some contact information.

~~~
ilaksh
Can you contact me through the orange button in the upper right? I thought
that would simplify things for everyone.

~~~
dho
Sorry, my bad, ghostery removed the button.

