Network Solutions Hosting and Ruby on Rails Implementation

Miguel Ramos, Product Ninja (actually product manager in charge of hosting products at Network Solutions),  my good friend and colleague sent us some information on the Ruby on Rails implementation in Network Solutions hosting. We wanted to share this information with our readers who may be interested-  installs, configures and updates the site also touching in how one accesses the database (MySQL?), what version of RoR you are using, etc.

We support Ruby on Rails on all our UNIX hosting packages. At the moment we offer Ruby on Rails version 2.1.1, but we will be deploying Ruby on Rails version 2.2 on approximately February 19^th. We understand that deploying Ruby on Rails applications is not always easy and have tried to simplify the process as much as possible for our customers. Our Account Manager includes a Ruby on Rails application manager that allows you to do two things quite easily:

• Create a new Ruby on Rails skeleton application.
• Import your own Ruby on Rails application into our system.

You can perform these functions quite easily through our one click interfaces, without having to worry about messing around with the command line. As you develop your application locally, you have the option of uploading a new version of your application via the “import” feature of our Ruby on Rails application manager, or if you feel more comfortable, directly upload your Ruby on Rails files by FTP. The FTP upload feature is possible because our platform is based on Phusion Passenger Ruby on Rails.

I’m including two screenshots to show you what our Ruby on Rails application manager looks like. The first is a screenshot for the “Add” screen. Simply choose an application name and click “ok” and the skeleton will get created. The second illustrate the management options available on each Ruby on Rails application.

As you can see, you can:

• Restart the application (after you’ve made changes, to deploy it)
• Reset the application (if you would like to turn it into a Ruby on Rails skeleton again and restart).
• Export it – if you want to download the current application version to work on it locally, or for backup purposes.
• Import it – to upload an application you have worked on locally, or a downloaded Rails application.

We also have an easy to use Database Manager included in your hosting package that will allow you to easily create and manage a MySQL database that you can easily link to your application.

Once you have created an application you can create  a tarball and “import” it through our Ruby on Rails application manager, _or_ you can upload a single file to your application’s directory on your website via FTP – note, if you upload a single file via FTP, you have to go into the manager to restart the application so that it redeploys.

Also, another nice thing about our Ruby offering is that the Ruby on Rails servers are part of a load balanced cluster – for better uptime.

Convinced that you need to get hosting from Network Solutions ? Go here and enter OFFER00522 and get 25% off hosting today. If you would like more information please comment here and we will get the information even if we have to take Miguel to lunch and torture him with spicy food.

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