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Is there such a thing as a managed VPS with root/shell access?
AverageGuy
Member
in Requests
I'd like to have someone else responsible for applying updates (security mostly), doing backups, etc. But I need root access for installing new software. Is anyone aware of a provider in the US doing that?
Thanks,
Jim.
Comments
There are plenty of providers like WiredTree, KnownHost, LiquidWeb (just to name few more known) who offer fully managed VPS service, but this usually come way above low end budget price.
There are - lots of different management plans, but just be aware it's harder to support you this way as it's harder to draw the line on who did what without extensive agreements on responsibility.
Yep, this leads to arguments like: you broke it, fix it as it was when was working! and the poor engineer has no idea people deleted various system folders to make more space or pasted various commands for the wrong distro/release which messed things up.
what specs are you interested in? just updates/backups, or fully managed with install/config etc ?
Thanks to the others that responded. I'm fully capable of performing all the sys admin duties, but don't want to. I'm retired and have a sailboat on the Atlantic side and don't always have access to the internet for days at a time. This site is a community service type of site so they're not very flush. It's a web server and quite static. Changes are very infrequent except for a little mysql activity. I'm really only looking for someone to monitor backups and install updates when something critical needs backing up and rarely if ever do anything else. There are only a couple of people that will have root access and once the site is up and running, there won't be any root activity unless something goes awry. We're currently running on a donated system (just a VMware container) and one of the sysadmins at the site takes care of us. Recently the company has changed hands and management has become less friendly. I'm looking 'cause I suspect we'll be told to leave one of these days. The sys admin is also afraid he'll be let go.
Jim.
FYI it's currently running on a Ubuntu server with 1 Gb. Clamd is the only thing that's using any memory to speak of so I suspect it'll run fine on 0.5 Mb. Bandwidth is negligible. I'm sure google bot and the others are 95% of the use. Main apps are Apache and Mysql. I see postgres is also running but I'm not sure why. Some mail originates on the system but there aren't any active mail users. Current disk space is 7 Gb and doesn't grow a lot. I'd disable clamd, if I were running it.
I've used both WiredTree and KnownHost in the past and there were not such agreements. There might have been something buried in the TOS but I don't remember. Essentially, if you used root you had to either know what you were doing or expect that if you broke something, they would help but obviously there was the potential for an outage if you really messed things up.
I had the impression that most of their customers were people who primarily used cPanel. You can still break things with cPanel but it's harder to get into a "why is that rm -rf command taking so long" situations.
I think @Francisco is launching some sort of managed VPS service that is nearer lowendpricing, but as @Spirit pointed out you won't find managed (at least, that is worth anything) in the low end space.
I'm happy to provide basic management on my 1GB plan ($10/m)
Thanks, I'll let the powers know. I suspect they will agree. Would that include space for backups?
Jim.
I think you should specify what's in the "basic" part of that. Many managed VPS providers (WT, KnownHost, etc.) will do everything for you, including setting up web sites, backups, monitoring, installing cpanel and add ons, configuring DNS, figuring out why your forum is slow, configuring your security, setting up your firewall, etc. with 24x7 support including phone support. WT and KH also load CSF, mod_security, and a variety of additional security tools in their standard config.
I suspect for $10/mo your offering is more basic. Nothing wrong with that but it's best that expectations are the same on both sides.
yep, already asked that. here's the answer:
yes, backups are stored via FTP to a backup node. daily backups of the whole VPS
Yes, in fact we offer managed VPS with root access.
@raindog308 did a nice summary of this, so I'm not going to belabor the point. Suffice it to say that users unknowingly messing up their own VPS is simply part of the business
I don't need all that. I've been administering Unix flavor machines since about 1986. I booted Linux the first time in 1991. All I need is someone to look out for critical software updates, be sure the backups run and make sure the system is still running. I'm reasonably sure I can install and configure the necessary software including the OS. I do software development and have 6 physical systems, three of which have a variety of VPS software and a bunch of containers in my home. None of which are critical to anyone except me. On the other hand, as I explained, I have need to put up a system that is critical to others, hence the query.
Thanks,
Jim.
Sure there is, now you can get a vps for say 5 dollars, or you can get a managed server for 50 dollars, and you can order server management for 50 dollars so you spend 100 dollars per month. Hope that helps
In my personal view. You don't need a Managed system because I can see that you're very good with Linux. Why spending 90% additional money for such small tasks as you've described.
As I said earlier, I like to sail offshore and am not always available if the system goes down, if there's a need for a critical security patch to be installed, or if the disk crashes and the backups have to be restored.
It simply makes sense, some people can afford to pay other people to take care of the systems they sell to others, it is economy of scale, if your indian support guy can install 20k patches a month, 10 more wont matter, while if you have to come home or struggle on a satellite connection in the middle of the ocean, that is a completely different thing.
How about a good shared hosting. It will keep you out of many troubles. (Pardon me if your website needs special configurations)
@AverageGuy - @Bruce is an upstanding guy and runs a professional, well organised operation. He'll do a great job.