python-friendly web hosts: buyer beware

Rob Andrews rob
Thu May 23 10:36:46 EDT 2002


As webmaster of Useless Python, I went on the hunt some months back for 
python-frienly web hosting services for the site itself and to recommend 
to users of the site. This has proven to be more of an adventure than I 
had anticipated. In the quest, I have encountered a range of different 
organizations, from the Python-enthusiastic tummy.com to a few more 
dubious situations.

Since Python is growing in popularity at what appears to be a rather 
vigorous pace, some hosts are advertising Python without really meaning 
much by it. I've been finding this out the hard way. Useless Python is 
currently hosted by valueweb.net, which advertises Python as an "Advanced 
Feature", but if we seriously plan to use Python "under the hood", for 
CGI, etc., we will have to do something else.

(http://valueweb.net/products/enterprise_hosting.html proudly advertises 
Python as an "Advanced Feature" of their $299.00/month Enterprise Hosting 
package.)

Their support database lists the install directory as 
/usr/local/bin/python although it turns out to be /usr/bin/python and the 
installed version is Python 1.4! When I asked tech support about 
upgrading Python on the server, the response was "Well, unfortunately it 
likely will not be, out of 350,000 domains in service about 5 accounts 
use it. you may email comments at valueweb.net concernignthe issue." and 
"Python is at usr/bin/python. Other than that we do not provide support 
for it."

Although I have a doubt or two about the numbers he cited in that quote, 
of course few would be interested in using a version of Python so out-of-
date to power their websites.

Moral of the story: Python is apparently becoming popular enough for some 
companies to consider using "Python" as a marketing buzz-word without 
putting any real resources behind it.

this-is-shorter-than-the-message-I-just-sent-them-ly yours,

Rob Andrews,
http://uselesspython.com



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