On March 23 I inquired:
I'm looking for linux-based shared web hosting and email for possible use
by a community group I'm helping. I use dedicated or virtual hosting
myself, but that is beyond their needs and capabilities. Right now they
are planning to use godaddy, but I'm not sure that will work for even
their basic email requirements.
Goes anyone have actual experience with a hoster that is reliable and
ideally:
* has servers physically in Canada
* has ssh access (for MY ease of setup ;-)
* has some SA-type spam tagging and RBL type filtering on their MTA?
I previously inquired here (above) about shared hosting. Thanks to Martin,
Glenn and Bart for responses.
I wanted to share my findings back, now that the migration of the
community association's site has been complete for a few weeks.
After checking out the referrals and a few others, I chose
CanadianWebHosting.com
They are HQd in Vancouver and have servers there and at 151 Front Street
in Toronto.
I chose the CA Pro package, which had ssh (and a dedicated IP and SSL).
The ssh was, as expected, very helpful in allowing me to rsync the old
site right to the new server without having to do a ping pong FTP
transfer. ssh was also helpful in helping me easily access and merge old
new config files for SquirrelMail, etc. and doing a required
format change from mbox to maildir for transferred archived mail.
CWH's spam filtering works well. They pass mail through with full SA
tagging so end-filtering can be tuned.
What has impressed me most was CanadianWebHosting.com's consistently
friendly, prompt and knowledgeable level of tech support. I had some more
advanced questions, and their in quality of response was far beyond what I
would have expected for tech support for a shared hosting service. Their
tech support staff also had a positive, 'we will find out' attitude when
required.
If you go to their company page, you'll see:
http://www.canadianwebhosting.com/aboutus.asp
where the president and co-founder states
"I have been doing web hosting for over 11 years and have a wonderful staff
who cares about our customers as I do...
If for any reason you are not satisfied with our service or if you are
not able to resolve an issue, please email me personally or leave me a
message and I will make sure you are taken care of and any problems
resolved. If I am not able to make it work for you, I will refund you the
money that was paid with our money back guarantee policy."
Tony Chu"
That the president acknowledges his staff right away and posted his photo
and contact info with this pledge said a lot to me. In my experience so
far I've been able to see these are not hollow words. It's a pleasure to
use a Canadian hosting service with fair pricing and excellent service.
They also offer Linux-based VPS, but I have no experience with those, yet.
Based on my one month experience with CanadianWebHosting.com, I would
definitely recommend them.
Brett