not supported...

[GSXdan]

I am designing a website for a small RV company, and he wants to have his inventory listed w/ search functions, etc. I email his hosting company and find out that they dont support php, mySQL or ASP, so short of changing hosts, is there another way to do the inventory thing?

Thanks ^dan

[doctorgonzo]

What do they support?

Since they don't support mySQL, I would expect that they would support SQL Server, but ASP usually goes along with that and you said they don't support ASP either. Which means they don't support much of anything.

Ask them what the heck they can do. If they confirm that they can't do squat, you may need a new host.

[mairving]

If they don't support PHP, MySQL or ASP, then it is time to get a host that has a clue. Is this a free host?

[GSXdan]

lol thats exactly what i said when i emailed them back. Unfortunetly they are not free and i think he is paying some good money for them. This is why i hate customers who think they know what they need so they buy it w/o consulting someone who knows what they need. Even my $5/month netfirms account has support for php/mySQL/ASP etc.

I will just email and tell him why his host sucks and hopefully he will let me make the decision of what host to get.

but just out of curiosity, is there another way to manage in inventory w/o php and mySQL? possibly cgi(i dont know any, but j/w)?

Thanks

[doctorgonzo]

If you have any serious data, you are going to need a database program like mySQL. I suppose it would be possible to cobble together your own system by storing data in parsable text files, but that isn't feasible for anything, honestly, other than to prove that you can do it. If you care about getting the data out in a meaningful, useful form, you will need a real database app.

[mairving]

Not to mention that it would be very slow and not too secure having those open text files that you will have to search for data.

[glc]

If they don't support those things, what makes you think they will support cgi? They may support it, but only their preconfigured scripts.

$16.95 a month will get you a quality host that will support almost everything under the sun including a shopping cart, give you tons of space, a huge traffic quota, and a bucketload of POP email accounts. $24.95 will get you even more........check out the options. It's Apache on *ix.

http://www.webaxxs.com/whostSE2.html

[mairving]

I just tend to like HostMatters (http://www.hostmatters.com/comparison.html) a bit better. They have better support than Webaxxs/OLM. OLM once charged me $50 to restore a backup of MySQL and took nearly the whole day to do it. About the only thing that is better with OLM is that they resolve a little faster than HM does. Of course, this will vary depending upon where you are located and your ISP. HM also uses CPanel which is much better than what OLM uses. I also had a site hacked on OLM. It was hacked horizontally which means that they came into the server and migrated out to the user directories.

There are many other choices out there too of good hosts.