I concur with Nate in regards of working with the IT department. I had to make a recommendation with our provost in order for us to have our own web server because our IT department wasn't helpful in what we wanted.
The concerns of our own IT department were mostly in the realms of security, back-ups, and OS upgrades/maintenance. We persuaded them that if they could help us with technical things such as hardware installation, getting the box on the network, and configuring the IPs, we would maintain our own server.
Personally, I would prefer to have our server on campus under our own firewall, rather than having a hosting company potentially going through our files. I know it's unlikely, but it's a risk I don't want to take.
Junior Tidal
Assistant Professor
Web Services and Multimedia Librarian
New York City College of Technology, CUNY
300 Jay Street
Brooklyn, NY 11210
718.260.5481
http://library.citytech.cuny.edu
>>> Nate Vack <[log in to unmask]> 6/4/2010 3:49 PM >>>
On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 2:02 PM, Jill Ellern <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I know we can put this open source software on a PC...and we've done that but this isn't a solution for a production level web service
>
> What is the average cost of hosting a drupal server out there in the cloud? Are there things we should know? Would you recommend anyone that does this for libraries?
It all depends on what "production level web service" means to you --
do you get lots of traffic? A little? Do you want to call someone on
the phone when it goes pear-shaped? Even if the problem is with a
customization you're making? How much downtime is OK? How snappy does
it need to be?
It sounds a bit like your IT department is trying to give you a
brush-off ("This sounds like a pain. Let's make them use a dedicated
server, and say it'll cost INFINITY DOLLARS.") Sitting down with
someone, being very clear with your expectations for support, and
finding out what their major concerns are might help.
Generally, hosting will run something like $5-10/month for cheap
shared hosting, and maybe $30-40/month for a small VPS.
-n
