Category: Technology

I’ve been struggling with my email setup for a while now, figuring out how I want my email to work for me. This is a simple post about what I have settled on for the time being.

No surprise here, I use Apple’s Mail application as the central hub for my email activity. I keep all of my accounts in here that I use from day-to-day and the same goes on my mobile devices as well (an iPhone and iPad). The updates in Lion were very welcome and I have a pretty decent system down for how to work with Google Apps.

However, what accounts do I have?

I used to use a generic Gmail account I’ve had around for years, but I was leery of keeping that as my main address not because I don’t like Gmail (even though I have my complaints), but because I liked the idea of having my own personal domain host my main email account.

So I have settled on Google Apps (Free) to host the email for bobmartens.net. However, that’s the only thing I host here: email. I have disabled Docs, Calendar, Chat, etc. and am running with only Mail and Contacts on this domain. I keep my actual Contacts and Calendar in iCloud.

I was going to move all of my Google services over to my own Google Apps account, but it became a hassle when Google Plus is not enabled for Google Apps accounts and what if I would want to move my email address to another service provider? Then I’d lose all of my Google stuff as well. Not ideal.

I have a similar setup for Deck78.

Martin Luther College moved to Google Apps for Education about a year ago, and that is what I use at work during the day. I have a single Google Calendar as well because that works best for me at the moment. I also use Google Chat on this domain as well because everyone else does and sometimes people will get a hold of me through it.

I had toyed with hosting email at home with Lion Server, but I scrapped that idea in favor of the simplest solution for the moment because I would really like to have a static IP address to do that, but it would cost me at least twice as much per month in order to get that service through Comcast, which I really can’t afford at the moment.

Ultimately, this gives me the flexibility that I require for the future (if I would switch my domains to my own server) while provided some features I need/want right now (like mobile push email). If Apple would open up iCloud to hosted domains, I’d entertain the idea of switching to that, but I’m satisfied with this at the moment.

So, a recap:

• Google Apps for bobmartens.net – email
• Google Apps for deck78.com – email
• Google Apps for mlc-wels.edu – email, calendar, docs, etc.
• Gmail Account – docs, calendar, reader, groups, etc.

I’ll see how long I stick with this setup.

UPDATE: I forgot to add that I am forwarding my old Gmail address to my new personal Google Apps one. That way it is easier for everyone and I don’t miss any important email.

This is nothing more than a short follow up on my earlier post.

Not much has been done over the past “while”. I’m still hosting with Rackspace Cloud, and that looks to be where I am going to stay for the time being. Moving stuff at the moment would be a huge hassle, and it is just not a priority at the moment. The extra bandwidth and middle-RAM step would be nice over at Linode, but for now I will not be moving.

I also am keeping my email hosted over with Google Apps. I’ve been looking at paying for Google Apps for Business, but I cannot justify the cost for what I use the accounts for (mainly email). I would love to be able to host my own little Mac mini with Lion Server and run my mail from there, but it would require me to pay twice as much for Comcast Business Class Internet so I could get the static IPs. Not going to happen any time soon.

I was looking at Atmail Cloud as well, and I like their offering, but can’t afford to pay $40/month to get 10 user accounts, of which I need only two (that’s the minimum that provides ActiveSync for push mail to my iOS devices). If anyone finds an Atmail provider that does a per-user fee for hosted email (with own domain), let me know.

So, that’s the update. Staying put, but plans are in the works to double the RAM in the current server to alleviate some issues with low resources. Apache + PHP will do that to you.

I’ve had the fortune of hosting some extra sites on my little Rackspace Cloud Server over the past couple of months, and now I’m starting to run into the limitations of running many sites on a single VPS. Bandwidth has now doubled for the past two months, and it is time to look for something a little better.

So, I thought I’d take some time to look around and see what is available. I first started looking at other VPS providers to see who else was out there after being with Rackspace and have settled on Linode as my next provider if I go the route of switching to a larger VPS to handle the new demand.

However, I’ve always had the idea of hosting my own stuff on real servers (as opposed to the virtual goodness of VPSs). For that, I have really two options: co-location or hosting at home.

To start, I’m fully aware of the problems that can arise from hosting only my own bare-metal hardware. We do it at work, so I have a little experience doing it, even though Mr. Spike happens to handle most/all of the sysadmin duties on campus. So it comes down to these factors:

• price
• service level
• distance for emergencies

Co-location

This can get expensive, especially when I’m only looking at hosting maybe a server or two for a while. It becomes less of an issue when you are talking about someone at the size of 37signals working to get the most out of their applications, but that’s a laughable idea at this stage. I’m just trying to host some websites on a server, not serve hundreds of thousands of customers each day … yet (cue laughter).

How expensive? For a 5 Mbps dedicated connection for 1/3 rack (14U, lockable) I’m looking at about $715/month.

Right.

That’s not going to work at all. That price is currently WAY out of my league, even if I hope to get there one day. Add to the fact that the closest place I can get space at is over a half-hour away, and it becomes a little more of an issue.

There are huge advantages, like redundant connections to the world wide web, an actual data center where the rack is stored, 24/7 staffing at the facility, etc. However, as of right now, it is way to much to pay.

Maybe one day.

Home Hosting

Probably the craziest idea, but one the DIYer in me likes the most. I have to temper that part of me so that I don’t make any rash decisions.

Price per month is a little more realistic, even if the initial costs would be MUCH higher. Here is just a basic list of what I would need to find before I could even begin:

• server rack
• UPS
• network switch
• firewall

That doesn’t include running cable through my basement for purchasing the server hardware. Needless to say, I’d be on the hook for quite a bit of money just to get started.

The connection would not be redundant, but at about $100/month I can have a 22 Mbps down/5 Mbps up connection to my house. Granted, that connection would (at least at the beginning) be shared between the hosting network and my home private network, but that would mostly affect the down speeds (but is something to be aware of).

However, no raised floors here, no 24/7 staffing (since I work full time away from home), and no industrial strength fire suppression system, climate control, or power failover.

However, per month cost is about 1/5 that of co-location. That’s a major difference. Even on the high end of providing what I need to get started, after just three months I’ve already made up the difference in startup costs between co-location and home hosting.

The other major advantage would be the distance I need to travel. It would be my basement. On any normal day, I’m no more than 5 minutes away for an emergency. However, when I’m away from home, there is no one else on-call to come and fix things.

All things to think about.

So what’s the decision?

For now, I’m sticking with VPSs. The plan, for now, is to switch to Linode before the end of the year and then move up over there. As the bandwidth usage increases, Linode becomes more and more reasonable in comparison to Rackspace (they are comparable otherwise, if even a little cheaper to start).

The reasons? Money. I don’t have the money to get home hosting started, and not nearly the customers I would need to justify the $700+/month price to co-locate my servers in a data center. So, I’ll run with a VPS for now and see what the future holds.

Along with that, I still plan on contacting my ISP to ask if I can get a static IP or two to just use for a test server at home and maybe an email server as well. If they don’t allow that, oh well, no love lost, but it is worth a shot.

I’ll hopefully have more to post on that in the future because it also relates to my backup situation as well.