I think that's very pertinent -
I only set up a PAYG site about 5 weeks ago and tripped up, albeit briefly.

So yes a more detailed user guide would seem a good idea

Similar points to the post by Be3G.

Will all current customers have to move over to the new web hosting services?

And what about customers who use MS Frontpage extensions? Will you still be able to keep using the current hosting or will these cease?

One of the attractions of choosing and staying with PlusNet was the bundled hosting, but reducing the current 7-8Gb data transfer per month to only 1.5Gb on the Residential Option would make it uncompetitive for smaller users that just have a simple HTML website.

For example on the BYW Option 2 at £15 offers me good value for both my broadband connection and hosting. But if the hosting data transfer goes down to 1.5Gb a month then I would be better off going elsewhere. Even the extra £2.50 a month for 0.5Gb is uncompetitive.

I can get broadband with a higher usage quota with SKY for £5 a month, and hosting at £5 a month for considerably more bandwidth than 1.5Gb.

Loyalty has kept me with PlusNet and their customer service, but with other providers starting to get better customer service the price starts to come more into the equation.

I am probably only one of a small number of people that uses the web hosting that is more than just a few pages hosting some pictures or other files, but not big enough to fit into the Business Options.

Can we have some clarification on the plans for next year.

After the trial, are you planning for the new platform to phase out just the CCGI servers, or both the CCGI & the HTTP servers?

I am seeking comments from the users of this forum, as to whether sub-forums might be helpful in segregating the knowledge about the different platforms. Poll & Thread here:-
http://community.plus.net...ex.php/topic,69401.0.html

The final plan for when the CCGI is decommissioned might impinge on the decisions there. Maybe someone can comment (both here and there) on whether or whether not the HTTP servers plan to be decommissioned, or left in service.

I think I read somewhere that the Frontpage servers will probably be phased out, but can't find where I read that, so could be making that up. You can continue to use Frontpage as your webdesign software, as long as you don't use any Frontpage extensions. This would rule out Frontpage specific page counters & guestbooks etc, but these can all be done using off the shelf scripts form elsewhere anyway... and Frontpage extensions really are an idea that is outdated now. Frontpage is no longer sold, and the web has moved on.

Mike

At the end of his blog News for Plusnet Webmasters Ian Wild said:


'Homepages' is the basic HTTP server. It is users of the advanced hosting CCGI service who are affected by the current proposal.

Deleted

If you have a website with your ISP you are inclined to stay with it out of inertia if the service okay
I have sites with webhosting that is reasonable so had thought I would move the site I have hosted with plusnet to that if I needed more options.
It has been okay here and it has been convenient but the changes are complicated.
So I am thinking now of transferring my website out .
The changes are unsettling because you have to make decisions about what you are likely to want and paid hosting seems easier and  with plusnet we are going to have to pay if we want those options.

Cameron

Spraxyt

Thanks for that....

Mike

The new servers are great, I really welcome these updates. However I have a couple questions: why disallow SSH (is it a just a limitation with Plesk) and how quickly will you upgrade to Debian lenny once it's officially a stable release?

Hi Guys,

Let me try and answer as many questions as I can in this thread:


New threads would be better. I've suggested marking new threads with a subject [PAYH] if they are about the general service, and [Preview] in the subject if they relate specifically to the preview.


You read right that this service is hosted on the CGI platform. You are also correct in saying that this should only effect frontpage extensions, and not the ability to create a normal site and upload it by FTP using Frontpage. This one is out of our hands, and Frontpage extension support was going to have to go at some point because support itself for the software that runs the webserver side has been withdrawn by Microsoft.


We can look at this some more before the formal launch next year, and for existing Plusnet customers we might be in a position where we can make some exceptions. Out of interest, what is your site used for and what drives the traffic? We may be able to suggest a reasonable alternative to sort this. The problem we have is that our costs are governed by current use of the platform and revenue we generate. As that changes, there is opportunity for us to change the default number we give to customers. As I said in the announcement too, we won't arbitrarily cut you off when you reach a limit like this - we will want to work with you to find a solution.


It sounds like a perfect topic for the new community library section which is on the Beta community site right now. I'll find out when we plan to launch it.


I know it's a pain, but the networks guys have very good reason for asking us not to enable this for customers. I do however feel that it's worthy of more discussion because I see in cases like this why it could be useful. I also believe the Plesk method of SSH via a web based interface limits risk somewhat, and is less likely to be abused. It may be that we could offer this on a temporary basis, perhaps for a deposit payment or similar. I won't have an answer quickly, but I will keep exploring for one.

For what I've missed, please start new threads.

Ian

@ Ian,
thanks for the feedback and answers.


@A.

You might also be able to do what you want to achieve with SSH access using CRON. I've put together a guide to unpacking tar.gz install files using Cron, and also a generic guide for converting any other commands you might want to use from a shell access command prompt. Find them in this post
This might help you work around the problem until such time as shell access or SSH is granted.
Hope this helps.


Mike

I am currently using about 130MB per day (~4GB per month) out of my daily 250MB business limit. This is nearly all from the Homepages server. I assume that the 250MB per day limit on the Homepages server will be unaffected as the new hosting announcement says
Can I have some clarity on this please? I may have to look at other ISPs if you are reducing from about 7.5GB down to 3GB as my current usage would not fit into that amount. Even the extra cost option is less than I have now and uncomfortably close to my current usage.

For the moment you can certainly maintain both accounts side by side. We may review that in the future, but it won't be a quick decision (as in watch this space till the new year) and you're certainly fine at the moment. I'll confess that on one of my sites, I use one server to host the cool functionality, but the files are served from elsewhere. 

Ian

I just signed up for the trial and transferred my sites from the ccgi server. It's a real shame there no shell access, on the old server it was easy to tar up files for backup and to extract zip archives. Now it's a nightmare.

-Andy.

The Cron method for untar posted elsewhere in this forum is a bit of a pain, but it's not quite a nightmare - have you seen that?

Certainly as I say, this feedback is welcome and I'll make sure it gets discussed.

Ian

Thanks I'll take a look at using cron next time.

I do have another issue, I used my application (Gallery) to create some files, but the permissions are rw-r--r-- and the owner/group is www-data:www-data, my problem is I cannot remove these files via the plesk file manager utility because I don't have permission. Is there any other way I can delete files with these perms?

-Andy.

Have you checked ownership and permissions on the directory. This sounds like a problem there.

David