State and county hosting for USGenWeb sites

[Denise Wells]

I am very curious as to what states are providing hosting to their coordinators.  I've been discussing this with another project member and I am aware that several of us have spent quite a bit of money providing hosting. 

As many of you know, I set up a hosting site for those needing assistance when RW went down in late 2017.  I still have that site, and I and several on my server have paid for that hosting since January 2018.  However, although I was told that the hosting was unlimited, it is limited by the number of "files" that can be handled by that hosting.  We had a relatively serious issue this past fall.  The OH SC moved most of its counties to another server which helped tremendously; and TX has moved quite a few of.  When I was discussing issues with BlueHost, I was advised that hosting as it was currently set, if I had paid for renewing early, would have been for 3 years $430, which doesn't sound bad; however, it was still at maintaining the same "file" limit. 

I don't know about all of you, but I cannot afford to continue paying out a lot of money for hosting, even with others' contributions.  I'm concerned as to how this is going to be handled moving forward.  We have been very fortunate to not have any issues (at least none that I am aware of) with any serious or concerning issues with this hosting.  I also have not allowed WordPress on this server, which I am told has helped with not having issues. (I know others argue that WordPress is not a problem, but others have told me that it is, and we have not had any issues so far without allowing it on this hosting.) 

My concern is what are we going to do moving forward?  I would love to hear ideas.  Jeff Kemp and Marsha Bryant have assisted me in managing this hosting as they know much more about this part of websites and website management, and I am very appreciative of them.  I am 70 years old now, and I do have concerns about the project as a whole moving forward.  Most of us prefer that our sites NOT be hosted on RW and controlled by Ancestry, who in their small print, allows them in the past to suck up our work and place it generally behind a paywall that material we placed for free and they benefit from that. 

I would like to hear what others think should be done moving forward?  I'm not trying to create a fire storm here, but I have serious concerns for our project.  I haven't checked lately, but I do know that at one time I had somewhere around 500 sites hosted on my server. 

Thoughts? 

--

Denise Wells

SC NJGenWeb | SC FLGenWeb

ASC MSGenWeb | ASC UTGenWeb

[Sandy (Whalen) Bauer]

I have had my own personal domain name since the late 90’s and pay for the iPower Pro Plan which allows unlimited space, unlimited sub-domains and domains to be hosted on my server. I have never had any problems with iPower for hosting my website.

 

I have been setting up sub-domains for IL counties to move to my server and have had no problems.  I currently have 32 gig of file space used on my server with my personal space and all the counties that have moved to my server.  I always renew my domain and hosting account for the longest period they allow.  I am not asking anyone to help  for my costs.  I also plan on paying to renew illinoisgenweb.org domain once Dennis Partridge turns it over to me (since he resigned as SC).

 

This shows how much I’ve paid for the last renewal for domain registration and hosting the last time I renewed:

 

Product

Total

Paid On

Expires On

Order

.org renew - 5 year

whalen-family.org

$84.95

12/25/21

12/25/22

404127281

 

IPowerPro Hosting Plan

$466.20

05/17/20

06/01/23

271602641

 

 

 

Sandy (Whalen) Bauer

IL USGenWeb

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[Conni McDaniel Hall]

IAGenWeb formed a non-profit organization many, many years ago to provide financial support for our server and whatever other costs we may have. I was not around in those days so I'm going on what I've been told and remember. One of the CCs provided the funds and IAGenWeb paid him back over time. Anymore than that, I'm not familiar enough with the facts to share accurately.

http://iagenweb.org/state/friends_of_iagenweb/

Conni McDaniel Hall

IPSC IAGenWeb

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[Karen De Groote]

One thing about Iowa, the Friends of IAGenWeb vote each year to provide server funding for the budgeted figure.  Their project has their own IT department that donates their time to any issues that crop up.  

We are experiencing an issue in MT right now since we cannot contact the fellow who takes care of our server space.  It was donated some time ago but I believe no project should rely on just one person for their server needs as when that one person disappears, their project is in a pickle.  A group of like minded individuals to make sure a project stays online should be preferred. 

Karen

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/state-coord/CADWgLgyzYXukWJy7YQ9LPwOzU6mWwVWuEgGTTv--2RRUwZPMwQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Denise Wells]

Karen:  Wasn't that Dennis Partridge? 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/state-coord/CAOCxt-iu-QtsO5UOYapAkpj-8eVP1%3D4nAhcMkVXSiUfzo5Dwew%40mail.gmail.com.

[State Coordinator TXGenWeb]

The Texas website is generously hosted by one of our CCs at no charge to TXGenWeb but we have separate server space for counties and we currently host 116 of 254 counties. The staff and some of the CCs occasionally contribute money to the PayPal account that we use to pay for the hosting. We have a Paypal button on the site to make it easy for us to add money and we pay for three years at a time on BlueHost. We haven't had any problems yet but I know Shirley had been paying for server space for a long time and had trouble with hers and finally had to quit but she had at least 4 or 5 hosting accounts for the same "number of files" issues. I take that to mean that you can have 5 100kb files but 100 5kb files causes problems for some reason.

Virus-free. www.avast.com

On Sat, Apr 23, 2022 at 9:20 AM Denise Wells <scnew...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Maureen Mead]

Sandy, Denise,  and all,

I have the same setup on Powweb. Unlimited subdomains. They explained that it was like renting an acre of land—and it didn’t matter if I built 1 house or a dozen or more on it.

For years, I paid approx. $100.00 (including domain registration, including privacy) to host CTGenWeb.org, but when I realized I could put the whole site into my own business hosting service (I am a graphic designer), I moved the whole thing over, pointed the domain to the new folder and it was done.

That was several years ago. Just paid the renewal on the Domain and Privacy and it’s $37.18 together. 

Years ago, I wasn’t happy with the project’s treatment by Ancestry/RW, especially that move years ago to put the USGW “hits” from the search engine behind a paywall, so with the agreement of the others, I peacefully and quietly moved it out.

I use and like Ancestry a lot—but I thought that was a bit of a stumble.

 

I don’t know if Powweb and iPower are part of the same family of small server bizsite solutions, but I develop robust Wordpress and other React/Bootstrap, etc., websites on several single VPS and dedicated server sites—and for a small, economy subscription, I sometimes get FAR *better, personalized customer service, including 24/7 human (mostly Boston-based) phone calls—and I don’t have to say “Mike-Echo-Alpha-Delta-Papa-Oscar-November-Delta-Delta-Echo-Sierra-India-Golf-November-dot-com” before I can get support, LOL.. 

In answer to your comment, Denise, I feel the same. I’ve been in the project, almost from the beginning and 7 years ago was in a life-altering fight that changed my priorities.

As such, I haven’t taken time for granted the way I used to.  :-)

Maureen Mead, 

meadpon...@comcast.net

mmea...@icloud.com

mmea...@aol.com

Temporary SC, CTGenWeb.org a USGenWeb Project

ASC/CC Fairfield Co. CT.

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[Dale]

I have been in the hosting business for over 20 years, and have operated websites for several years before that.

I have found that if a host offers "unlimited" anything, there is small print that you had better read. A host cannot offer "unlimited" anything. There will be a catch somewhere.

Many hosts oversell their servers, and Bluehost is guilty of this. I was on a host that oversold its server and I was unable to add anything to my sites or receive or send emails.

These are some of the hosts that caused me serious problems:

Rootsweb - they once denied me access to a number of my sites for some unexplained reason. I immediately moved them.

Ipower was a problem - they put me on an old machine. When it finally pooped out, I was out of luck. They only offered me space on another machine, but would not give me any specifics about it.

Servint offered great service until they sold out to a company out of the Netherlands. Serious problems arose, and the host was unwilling to correct a number of issues.

I now have a managed dedicated server. I'm the only one on that machine and I can call on experts if I have a problem I can't solve. In 8 years, I have had 4-5 unplanned outages that lasted 2 or 3 minutes.

I host a number of OHGenWeb sites at no cost, and any OHGenWeb CC can receive free hosting. I offer very reasonable rates for others. I will host Wordpress and Joomla sites, but they MUST be secured. On the error logs for every one of my sites, I see someone has tried to access the file wp-login.php. That tells me they're trying to hack a Wordpress site. I have no Wordpress sites. I do have several Joomla sites, and they are secured and haven't been hacked in years.

In the hosting business, biggest is not always the best.

Dale Grimm

OHGenWeb State Coordinator

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/state-coord/CAOCxt-iu-QtsO5UOYapAkpj-8eVP1%3D4nAhcMkVXSiUfzo5Dwew%40mail.gmail.com.

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[Leon Moya]

Hi All,

In a perfect world we would all band together and use the accumulated buying
power to strike a very lucrative deal with a suitable ISP. (wishful thinking)

New Mexico is fortunate in that, we have two of us who have interests in two
genealogy camps, so we are able to share the cost of hosting. One fly in the
ointment with this, is that the account is just in one individuals name, rather than the
combined group. I'm looking both ways every time I cross the street. <G>

Unfortunately, I don't see any one single answer to the dilemma.

Good health to all,

Leon

State Coordinator - NMGenWeb
<s...@nmgenweb.us>

[Sandy (Whalen) Bauer]

I think it’s too much for one person to handle hosting all USGenWeb websites.

 

You would have one person very busy setting up the subdomains and username and passwords for each website hosted on your server. I can already see how much work is involved in just setting up the hosting for the counties and sites I am doing now.  Of course, once they are set up, there’s not much maintenance after that (except for people forgetting their username and passwords).

 

Sandy (Whalen) Bauer

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[Cheryl Rothwell]

Depending on what state you are in, it might be feasible to set up an organization to own domains, emails, etc. and can share, not dependent upon one person. This is separate from a nonprofit which, in some states, is prohibitively expensive and buries you in paperwork.

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[Denise Wells]

It's good to hear from everyone.  I'm looking forward to hearing from more. states.  

[Jeffrey Kemp]

Hi All 

I am State Coordinator 5 States.

2 are on my own personal hosting account (if they were elsewhere cost would be at least $250 per year each), 1 I pay $803 per year, 1 I pay roughly $295 per year and the last one is on usgenwebsites.org graciously funded by Denise!

Of all the states I am SC and pay the hosting for, I attempt every year by notifying the CC’s my costs and asking for contributions.

This year I received contributions of $130 total for all 4 states. 

So I paid out roughly $1600 and received $130 back in contributions. 🙁

Through the years I have heard numerous reasons for not contributing. 

Such as your in charge you should pay, I can’t afford it, I’m on a budget and a hundred more.

Even from CC’s that are SC’s and ASC’s in other states, those that answer the email request and state I send money next week, but it never arrives.

I do know that I one day me & others like me won’t be here to continue supporting this project, what happens then???

Worried!!

Jeff Kemp

On Apr 24, 2022, at 1:58 PM, Denise Wells <scnew...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Bob Sullivan]

I registered a domain for New York and have funded the hosting since 2008, with occasional contributions.

We use HostPapa (formerly Lunarpages) and the 3-year renewal in 2022 was $323.64.  We have had very few issues.

I didn't feel having it intertwined with my own domain was a good long term strategy; when I need to pass it on it will be simpler with this arrangement.

Bob Sullivan

NYGenWeb

[Leon Moya]

On 23 Apr 2022 at 23:06, Sandy (Whalen) Bauer wrote:

> I think it´s too much for one person to handle hosting all USGenWeb
> websites.

But .... "in a perfect world"

1. Each State would have it's own domain (xxgenweb.genealogy) and the ISP
would allow multiple domains per a single account.

2. Each State administrator would have access to the control panel for only that
state(s). No one would be doing more that they are doing now.

3. USGenWeb would have a benefactor who would finance all of the hosting
and domain registration fees, *with no strings attached*.

I could go on But hey; this is my day dream.

Leon

[Sandy Whlaen Bauer]

Annual renewal fees for each county domain in every state could really add up for states like TX with so many counties. You sure gave a good idea of how it could work for web hosting companies like IPOWER who I use. Let me calculate what the costs might be for TX and get back to you. Even using CPanel takes a bit of technical expertise so I don’t know that we could ever have enough county coordinators with the skills to handle that.

Sandy

> On Apr 24, 2022, at 9:41 PM, Leon Moya <s...@nmgenweb.us> wrote:

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[Sandy (Whalen) Bauer]

Ok, so for Texas, based upon what I am paying now for my own domain and
hosting from iPower, the annual costs for TX would be as follows:

Annual Domain Registration for 254 counties: $12.98/yr = $3,296.92

Annual Website Hosting: $12.95/month = $155.40

So total cost for the state of TX, with each county having their own
domain, would be $3,452.32.

Do you think each state would find a benefactor for this amount? I
doubt there is another other state with this many counties.
For example, IL has 102 counties.

Sandy (Whalen) Bauer

[Timothy Stowell]

Why would you need to domain register every county?  The states I'm involved with only have state domain, counties are subdomains - which are free.

Tim Stowell

NY ASC

MN SC

[Carla Clifton]

Every county in Texas would not need their own domain.  Using a subdomain off the main site would be fine.  For example, the main counties site we have set up is txgenwebcounties.org 

We could and do use subdomains like txgenwebcounties.org/bell

The problem we have run into is the file limit companies like GoDaddy subjects us to.   Unlimited hosting doesn't mean unlimited.  We changed to BlueHost from GoDaddy to get away from that, but it sounds like BlueHost may be doing the same thing by limiting the number of files hosted if I understand Denise correctly.

Carla Clifton

TXGenWeb ASC

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From: Sandy (Whalen) Bauer <sa...@whalen-family.org>
Sent: Monday, April 25, 2022, 7:14 AM
To: state...@googlegroups.com <state...@googlegroups.com>
Cc: Leon Moya <s...@nmgenweb.us>

Subject: Re: [SC-USGWg] State and county hosting for USGenWeb sites

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[Timothy Stowell]

Ah yes, GoDaddy - where MNGenWeb is hosted - only allows 50 FTP accounts, which is worked around with the SC / ASC using the main password to get to their counties of which there are multiple, thus getting around the limitation, but it is an aggrevation.

As Bob stated yesterday, the site NYGenWeb uses does not put that limitation on but says unlimited along with other unlimited features.  I believe the years my sites have been there, there have been two outages - mostly in the middle of the night.

Tim Stowell

[Timothy Stowell]

As previously stated, MNGenWeb is hosted by GoDaddy.  The domain is $20.17 a year, hosting $143.88 a year.  I cover the costs for both, as included in the hosting plan are a couple of domains I have - one personal, one genealogy related for sites not in USGenWeb.

One thing to mention when it came up for renewal, was that MNGenWeb is a not-for-profit entity, which got us a discount on regular hosting.

Another thought for state's or folks who offer said options for others, is to have a backup plan in place, if perchance, you, as the only person on the account, meets the proverbial bus one day at an inopportune time.

It might be your ASC or perhaps better yet the NC, which would hopefully be passed on to future NCs.

Just something to think about and act on.

Tim Stowell

SC MNGenWeb

[Sandy Whlaen Bauer]

Carla your example is not a sub-domain.  A sub-domain would have county name.statename.org. Or something like that. You just have sub-directories in you file system for your counties the way you typed the county example. 

Sandy

On Apr 25, 2022, at 10:24 AM, Timothy Stowell <tim...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Leon Moya]

> Annual renewal fees for each county domain in every state could really

> add up for states like TX with so many counties.

I *am very* sorry for the confusion but it must be my Australian accent that's causing the problem. No where in my post did I mention "County" domains and I pretty sure it says "Each State would have it's own domain (xxgenweb.genealogy)"

I know I'm getting close to my "Use by Date" but please, give me a little credit for having some common sense.

State Coordinator: NMGenWeb Project

<s...@nmgenweb.us>

Webmaster and Systems Administrator: NMGenWeb Project

<webm...@nmgenweb.us>

[Carla Clifton]

Yes, you are correct, Sandy.   That is what I meant.  I was trying to type from my phone.  LOL

Thank you for the correct terminology.

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[webmaster]

Here are some rough but realistic numbers to think about.

---------------

3006 US counties + 50 states + DC = 3057 individual websites. This does not include the unknown number of town sites, Special Projects, USGenWeb website, or the special hosting need for EC Oversight and voting software.

When you first open a new hosting account you get a deeply discounted rate and a 3-year option, usually with 1 free domain name for 1 year. After that first 3 years, you have to renew at the regular hosting rate (whatever that is at the time) and the domain name renewals begin in year 2.

Example: A new 3-year plan that costs $200 for the entire first 3 years, with 1 free domain name for 1 year, and a $25/year domain name renewal cost. With a max of 100 sites per server account, that would be 31 server accounts. We never want too many sites all in one place, regardless of hosting limits, because we stand to lose too much if something happens to it.

Years 1-3 for new hosting:

$200 * 31 accounts = $6200 paid in advance

$25 * 31 domain names = $775 * 2 years = $1550 (year 1 is free)

$6200 + $1550 = $7750 for the first 3 years paid (avg of $2584/yr)

Years 4-6: The hosting renewal is offered at $150 per year

$150 * 31 accounts = $4650 * 3 years = $13,950 paid in advance

$25 * 31 domain names = $775 * 3 years = $2325

$13,950+ $2325 = $16,275 for years 4-6 (avg if $5425/yr)

Every three years you can guarantee the costs will increase. Web presence is big business.

Linda K. Lewis

National Coordinator

The USGenWeb℠ Project

Free Genealogy for 25 Years

www.usgenweb.org

[Sandy (Whalen) Bauer]

Great analysis Linda. Thanks.

 

Sandy (Whalen) Bauer

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