Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#1

Post by Mister_Y » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 1:44 PM UTC

I'm not looking for anything super fancy, but I want it to be reliable and I'm completely lost on this, if you could help me I'd be forever granted :)

Edit: We used css and html

The thing is that I'm not sure about the amount of people that will land on the page will depend on the success of the marketing/crowdfunding campaign.

Also, the type of application is an easy concept for booking (via online form) vacation experiences, so it has terms and conditions, explanations of our service, cities in which we're offering it and not much more

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#2

Post by sirrele » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 1:55 PM UTC

If you are just doing an html5 site, then just throw your project in AWS's s3. Its easy, and not much to think about. If you are connected to a DB and have users I would say get an EC2 up and configure it with your needs.

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#3

Post by dirktheman » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 2:06 PM UTC

sirrele wrote: post #2

If you are just doing an html5 site, then just throw your project in AWS's s3. Its easy, and not much to think about. If you are connected to a DB and have users I would say get an EC2 up and configure it with your needs.

I'm a huge fan (and user) of AWS, but I would not recommend it if all you want to do is host an MVP website. There's quite a learning curve before you have something reliable up and running and it will cost you a lot of time before you have figured everything out... If you have the time to learn about using AWS it's totally worth it, but if all you need is to host your website somewhere I'd look for something like the smallest Linode plan and scale it up when necessary.

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#4

Post by fiftyacorn » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 2:13 PM UTC

if its just css and html use gitlab

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#5

Post by GFischer » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 2:18 PM UTC

I'm using Azure, with the bonus if that if you want you can apply to BizSpark and get 3 years of free software and servers. Uploading an MVP should be easy.

It's an amazing service for startups, and it's gotten more Linux and OSS-friendly.

https://bizspark.microsoft.com/

Some resources:

https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/msgulfcommunity/2013/04/08/...

https://cmatskas.com/getting-started-with-microsoft-azure-ru...

Edit: that said, for basic HTML it's probably overkill, I haven't tried Gitlab or similar but it should do.

For a proof of concept, maybe a landing page generator like Unbounce? http://unbounce.com/

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#6

Post by dtnewman » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 2:54 PM UTC

dirktheman wrote: post #3

sirrele wrote: post #2

If you are just doing an html5 site, then just throw your project in AWS's s3. Its easy, and not much to think about. If you are connected to a DB and have users I would say get an EC2 up and configure it with your needs.

I'm a huge fan (and user) of AWS, but I would not recommend it if all you want to do is host an MVP website. There's quite a learning curve before you have something reliable up and running and it will cost you a lot of time before you have figured everything out... If you have the time to learn about using AWS it's totally worth it, but if all you need is to host your website somewhere I'd look for something like th…

I agree with dirktheman here if we're talking about hosting a non-static website. Getting setup with EC2 is a huge pain if you don't know what you are doing. I really like Heroku for simple apps, but something like Linode makes a lot of sense if you wanna have more control over the server.

But I also agree with the parent comment about AWS S3 for static website. If you are setting up a static website with just HTML and CSS, S3 is the way to go. I do this for my homepage and it was very easy to setup and costs me about $0.52/month.

Added benefits are that you can use Cloudfront for CDN which also offers HTTPS. Some guides:

Example: Setting Up a Static Website Using a Custom Domain http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/dev/website-hosti...

Using CloudFront with Amazon S3 http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudFront/latest/Developer...

Using HTTPS with CloudFront http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudFront/latest/Developer...

To the OP, I'm not sure what your experience level is, but if you consider yourself a beginner and you don't know what any of these terms mean, feel free to ping me if you have any questions!

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#7

Post by atmosx » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 2:59 PM UTC

You have to provider at least some information (what kind of application, expected traffic, design, what level of HA is required, what's the probable bottleneck, etc.)

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#8

Post by dirktheman » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 3:06 PM UTC

dtnewman wrote: post #6

dirktheman wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a huge fan (and user) of AWS, but I would not recommend it if all you want to do is host an MVP website. There's quite a learning curve before you have something reliable up and running and it will cost you a lot of time before you have figured everything out... If you have the time to learn about using AWS it's totally worth it, but if all you need is to host your website somewhere I'd look for something like th…

I agree with dirktheman here if we're talking about hosting a non-static website. Getting setup with EC2 is a huge pain if you don't know what you are doing. I really like Heroku for simple apps, but something like Linode makes a lot of sense if you wanna have more control over the server. But I also agree with the parent comment about AWS S3 for static website. If you are setting up a static website with just HTML a…

Yeah, I run my blog on S3 with Jekyll. That's what got me into the other AWS offerings. Consider it a gateway drug :)

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#9

Post by Mister_Y » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 3:14 PM UTC

atmosx wrote: post #7

You have to provider at least some information (what kind of application, expected traffic, design, what level of HA is required, what's the probable bottleneck, etc.)

You're completely right, the thing is that I'm not sure about that as the amount of people that will land on the page will depend on the success of the marketing/crowdfunding campaign.

Also, the type of application is an easy concept for booking (via online form) vacation experiences, so it has terms and conditions, explanations of our service, cities in which we're offering it and not much more

Re: Ask HN: What server would you recommend for a first MVP website?

#10

Post by dtnewman » Wed, Jan 11, 2017, 3:41 PM UTC

Mister_Y wrote: post #9

atmosx wrote: post #7

You have to provider at least some information (what kind of application, expected traffic, design, what level of HA is required, what's the probable bottleneck, etc.)

You're completely right, the thing is that I'm not sure about that as the amount of people that will land on the page will depend on the success of the marketing/crowdfunding campaign. Also, the type of application is an easy concept for booking (via online form) vacation experiences, so it has terms and conditions, explanations of our service, cities in which we're offering it and not much more

Is this a static website? When you fill out and submit the form, what code do you have that receives and processes said form? You indicated that you built this with CSS and HTML, but those aren't server languages. Is there something else that you are using to process the submitted form? Do you use some third party service to do that? What would be helpful is a technical explanation of what you are trying to do.