Hello there. First off, I would like to applaud Linode for the great service it provides. Because of that, I would not pass up Linode's service for any other VPS provider, except in certain circumstances where it is necessary. For example, some VPS providers offer different locations that Linode does not have, as well as managed VPS packages.

My questions are just that. It is actually nice to see that Linode is beginning to expand into new locations, such as the recent transition to London, UK. Does that mean we will start to see more locations now? I would love to see Chicago some day.

Secondly, is there any chance that Linode will ever offer managed packages? I'm not too good at Linux, although I'm trying to learn but there just doesn't seem to be any good places to learn or people interested in teaching. The farthest most will go is answering a question, but not actually explain the whats, why's, when's, how's, etc.. Because of this, my security and maintaining of a Linux system knowledge is poor. I really don't know the first step in optimizing the environment for my needs, managing all the important things that make a stable and high performance environment. My knowledge only allows me to perform basic administration tasks (installing and running applications, etc). So, is there any chance of managed packages being offered in the future?

Finally, I can see that there are a certain amount of each VPS plan available in each datacenter. For example, the Linode 2880 plan currently only has 14 available. Lets say that I am going to need 10 of those right now. Suddenly without expecting it, the traffic I get requires that I need 20 more. Linode only has 14 available, 10 of which I took. It would hurt me to not be able to get 20 more of those plans right away. As a result, I would not be able to grow. Is this something that will ever be resolved in the future here at Linode?

I thank you in advance for taking the time to answer these questions of mine.

If you needed 30x2880s, you'd have to either be handling hundreds of millions of pageviews per day, or have an extremely resource-intensive application... You'd also be spending ~58k per year with Linode. You'd be a really big customer who could likely ask Linode to bring additional capacity online for you specifically. Companies tend to treat large customers differently than small customers; if a large customer says to a company the size of Linode "I want to buy another $3,200 per month of capacity", they tend to go out of their way to make it happen.

What sort of service could require that kind of power? You can handle millions of pageviews per day off a single Linode 360 or 540, so it's rare that anybody would need thirty 2880s. If you need the bandwidth (thirty 2880s comes with 48TB/mth, or about 153Mbps), you're probably better off with a smaller number of Linodes and a CDN service, who usually charge less for bandwidth than Linode. For example, The Onion uses Linode as a back-end behind a CDN.

I suspect you're grossly overestimating your requirements, although obviously I don't know what your application is. Can you give us any more information about what your needs are?

On the subject of managed Linodes, that's the kind of service that it makes a lot of sense for resellers to offer. As in, Linode provides the environment, so someone can come along and resell Linodes whilst adding management service as part of the deal. I'm sure there is somebody already offering such a service.

It would be beneficial to everyone if Linode would create a page or even a sub-forum dedicated to people posting advertisements offering managed reselling or just the occasional pay as you go help. This question seems to come up over and over and the answer is usually "someone out there probably provides this service." Without a clear place to go to for finding this information, the question is just going to be asked over and over again.

We always have more capacity than is reported on the website -- it just doesn't make sense to list it all there. This also allows us to adjust to demand as needed.

Most customers that need that kind of capacity are able to communicate their needs to us in advance to ensure the capacity will be there when it is needed. Even so, we're usually able to accommodate on a short notice.

-Tom

That is an interesting thought. I'm also interested in moving my website to Linode but am clueless about linux although I have experience with cpanel and plesk. Fortunately, my website is a simple, static, and maintenance-free website. Perhaps, I could pay someone to setup my Linode and install a control panel like virtualmin GPL?

[quote="jsr"][quote="Guspaz"]On the subject of managed Linodes, that's the kind of service that it makes a lot of sense for resellers to offer. As in, Linode provides the environment, so someone can come along and resell Linodes whilst adding management service as part of the deal. I'm sure there is somebody already offering such a service.[/quote]

It would be beneficial to everyone if Linode would create a page or even a sub-forum dedicated to people posting advertisements offering managed reselling or just the occasional pay as you go help. This question seems to come up over and over and the answer is usually "someone out there probably provides this service." Without a clear place to go to for finding this information, the question is just going to be asked over and over again.[/quote]

This is not that bad idea with one or two drawbacks.

I would sometimes be willing to help and earn few dollars but nothing regular and so it is not worth being part of some reseller agency and I am sure I am not alone in this. There must be plenty of qualified administrators on this board willing to occasionally help with setup.

However one should be aware of security issues. It is said that when you are root, station is yours. And since this is public forum I can imagine some spammers would also be willing to help with setup (open relays). We are of course generally known to Linode (those who own Linode) and can be legally prosecuted, yet it would require Linode LLC to cooperate and that could put load of unpleasant communication on them.

Second thing is responsibility. It is not that hard to overlook one directive and consequences may be dire (under normal circumstances, such error would be corrected during updates checks, patches but when qualified person does not run Linode on daily basis, these bugs can evade for long time).