

Gondor expands its Django hosting to any Python WSGI app - brosner
https://gondor.io/blog/2012/06/19/gondor-11-launched/

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hwiechers
> 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.

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

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

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

~~~
orangethirty
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?

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jtauber
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.

~~~
orangethirty
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.

~~~
chrismsnz
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.

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

~~~
chrismsnz
Not as of yet!

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

~~~
basketcase
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...](http://www.kencochrane.net/blog/2011/06/django-hosting-roundup-who-
wins/) 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!

