ForumCloud

[Dan Cryer]

Hi all

I wanted to write a quick post to introduce my new project to you. It's called ForumCloud and it's a new hosting platform specifically designed for running forums (we don't, and have no plan to start, hosting standard web sites.)

You're probably already sceptical, and I understand that. Hosting companies are a dime a dozen, but hopefully we've got something that'll appeal to you.

Here's what we're planning:

• The platform is optimised for XenForo (and IP.Board) - from the database, to the server software.
• The web servers are nginx and PHP-FPM (with APC caching,) so they're fast.
• We're going to offer CloudFlare as part of the package, so you get all of the benefits of that.
• There's no overhead from cPanel, WHM, Plesk or anything like that. We'll have a control panel, but it'll be simple, lightweight and hosted separately.
• Each forum sits in its own little container on the servers (in terms of PHP, web server, etc), protecting both you and everyone else on the server from exploits (and snooping!)

If that sounds like something of interest, you can sign up on the site and we'll let you know when we're almost ready to launch.

Any feedback you might have is also much appreciated.

 

[majdi]

Is it based on CL or BL ?

 

[Dan Cryer]

I'm not sure what you mean?

 

[majdi]

Cloudlinux or Betterlinux or something else ?

 

[Dan Cryer]

Ah, no not presently. CloudLinux is an option we're looking at.

 

[majdi]

• There's no overhead from cPanel, WHM, Plesk or anything like that. We'll have a control panel, but it'll be simple, lightweight and hosted separately.
• Each forum sits in its own little container on the servers (in terms of PHP, web server, etc), protecting both you and everyone else on the server from exploits (and snooping!)

Which technologies or software do you use to provide these 2 features ?

 

[Dan Cryer]

There's no overhead from cPanel, WHM, Plesk or anything like that. We'll have a control panel, but it'll be simple, lightweight and hosted separately.

The great thing about knowing exactly what you're going to be hosting (forums) is that you know in advance exactly what you're going to need, meaning that the vast majority of the options in cPanel are redundant.

We've got our own (albeit very basic, currently) central control panel that knows which server each account is on, and simply uses SSH to do its work. The primary reason for this was practical, in that databases aren't going to be hosted on the same server, some packages will run across more than one web server, etc. However, there's also the added benefit that it doesn't have to run a bunch of extra processes just to handle the control panel.

Each forum sits in its own little container on the servers (in terms of PHP, web server, etc), protecting both you and everyone else on the server from exploits (and snooping!)

At the moment, we've kept it as simple as possible. Accounts run their own pool of PHP-FPM workers, open_basedir is enabled in PHP, user permissions are locked down so that files are only readable by that one user account, and so on.

Over time, we're looking at doing more (like CloudLinux with its more fine grained account sandboxing.)

 

[Dan Cryer]

For anyone interested in giving it a test run, I've set up a test XenForo installation here:

http://xenforodemo.forumcloud.co.uk/

Let me know how it performs for you. You are of course welcomed to register and post to try that out too.

I'm seeing full page loads taking <500ms (PHP having completed in 0.09 seconds).

 

[Dan Cryer]

We're ready to take our first signups!

Plans and pricing information is now available on the site.