NearlyFreeSpeech.NET: Difference between revisions

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NearlyFreeSpeech.NET is a pay-what-you-use shared hosting service based in the USA. It offers domain registration, DNS, and SSH/shell access with over 25 programming languages, making it a cheap and DIY-friendly environment but not ideal for absolute beginners.

Services

Instead of bundled plans, users are charged for the services they use: Services and pricing summary.

• shared web hosting for multiple sites
  • "non-production" – strictly non-income-generating but may be suitable for resource-light "production" sites
  • "production"
  • "critical"
• SFTP and SSH with access to bash, zsh, and fish shells
• the programming languages link on the home page links to a dynamically updated list of available languages and versions
• version control systems: git, mercurial, subversion ...
• domain registration with optional privacy
• DNS
• Let's Encrypt
• email forwarding
• PHP and other languages are supported
• MySQL databases are also supported.

Cost

For hosting static websites, they charge as little as $0.01 per day, making them ideally suited for very small sites.

• They have a pricing estimator on their website: https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/estimate

Advantages

• only pay for what you need/use – can be very cheap for low-traffic and low-resource-intensive sites
• pre-paying means you don't get a bill shock due to an unexpected traffic spike (the Reddit/Slashdot effect)
• provides shell access and programming languages (more than many other shared hosting providers) and encourages learning and experimentation

Disadvantages

• no one-click/turnkey solutions - users are expected to have the skills to set up their own site or be willing to learn
• pre-paying for individual services means you don't have a predictable monthly bill

How to

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How to get started with NearlyFreeSpeech

Getting started and FAQ

A user can have only one membership but may have multiple websites and accounts (funding sources).

• register as a member
• pre-pay into a funding account (see pricing summary and estimator)
• create a website
• register/transfer or bring your own domain
• set up DNS for your domain or use sitename.nfshost.com
• transfer files over SFTP or login to a shell with SSH – authenticate with an SSH key or your member password

How to setup email aliases

If your domain's DNS is hosted on nearlyfreespeech and you do not have external MX records, you can enable email forwarding from the domains section of the control panel. You can create individual email aliases and/or a catch-all address for your domain.

IndieWeb Examples

IndieWeb community members who use nearlyfreespeech:

• Ethan Yoo publishes his static site, ethanyoo.com, with nearlyfreespeech
  • 2020-11-02 Why I chose NearlyFreeSpeech.NET
• Template:Gregmakes.xyz hosts their Hugo site (gregmakes.xyz) on NearlyFreeSpeech
• claudinec has hosted the current incarnation of her Hugo site https://www.claudinec.net/ on NearlyFreeSpeech since June 2023
• Dr. Matt Lee is using them to host a static copy of a defunct local newspaper's WordPress website
• Add yourself here… (see this for more details)

See Also

• web hosting