I realize a request for a storage solution has been up before in this forum, but what I would like to see is something along the lines of Rackspace Cloud Files: A cloud storage solution that scales automatically and doesn't use the concept of a server/VPS - and at the same time is coupled with a CDN such as Limelight (which is what Rackspace Cloud Files uses). Is that something you've considered offering?

I could easily use Rackspace Cloud Files with Linode, but there are two problems with that (just tested it yesterday):

1. Speed: With a Newark Linode and the Rackspace Cloud Files solution, there is a considerable lag when accessing files in the cloud. This lag is smaller if I use a VPS at Rackspace.

2. Two control panels (Rackspace and Linode) instead of just one.

If you were to offer a cloud storage solution, we'd have high-speed access to our files in the cloud, the excellent Linode support, and one control panel to administer everything.

Bump! I completely agree.

Well, getting a 'big' CDN as a partner is not as easy as you think.
I am sure it took Rackspace a lot of work to partner with LimeLight Networks, (mt) time to partner with Edgecast etc.

Also keep in mind what happend with SimpleCDN and VPS.Net:

Suddenly the provider for the servers of SimpleCDN canceled their service immediately without any warning - their customers had to change the CDN
(most went to MaxCDN due to their rescuing project).

VPS.Net wanted to partner with Akamai but the negotiations failed somehow so they had to go with Level3's CDN.

This is no 'safe' and reliable business which would mean that the crew at Linode had much, much more work administrating this.
Neither it's reliable nor is the 'real' business in Linode's hands.

I personally don't feel the problem with many administration dashboards.
I have Linode's, maxCDN's and server monitoring dashboard(s) - no problem for me.

Speaking of dashboards, my laptop is my dashboard, all my linodes can be controlled through lish/shell, only time I need to sign in is...well for billing since I can update DNS via my linode.

I use S3 as a cdn, again easy to control through desktop apps, server monitoring, the linodes monitor each other and pingdom is there just in case, not that I ever need to log into pingdom since it emails me if there's an issue. You get the picture.

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Since Rackspace is ditching Limelight in favor of Akamai, maybe Limelight would appreciate the new business.

I recently started using Amazon CloudFront to serve static content. I forego S3 in favor of using custom local origin (my server). Much easier to set headers that way, as CloudFront honors htaccess. Easy to unset Etags, go cookieless and set cache. It's only been a week or so, so cannot comment on performance.

I would love to hear other CloudFront users experience.

Interesting, I think personally I'd only use this for files the browser won't cache itself, for most static files I rely on browser caching (which works pretty well I've found and is freeeeeeeee).

_________________
Paid support
How to ask for help
1. Give details of your problem
2. Post any errors
3. Post relevant logs.
4. Don't hide details i.e. your domain, it just makes things harder
5. Be polite or you'll be eaten by a grue