Hi Moodlers,
I've a Moodle installation on one of my shared hosting account.
My doubt is, is shared hosting (ie. Hostgator, BlueHost etc.) adequate enough to handle Moodle?
Even with minimal users, I feel that the access speed is slow.
Will shared hosting able to handle even 100 concurrent logins?
Would appreciate feedback from Moodlers who are running on shared hosting.
Or do I need to have a dedicated server instead? Please advise.
Thank you in advance.
Best Regards,
William
If you are using the strict definition of the term "concurrent" (please search for this term in this site for that definition) then definitely shared hosting is not able to do what you propose. If you are talking about using Moodle with 100 students and they will be using Moodle in an average way then yes shared hosting is fine.
Thanks Eric.
So if 100 students with "random" access is okay, what is the "limit" for shared hosting? 500?
If shared hosting "bottleneck" is reached, do we just upgrade to dedicated to solve the problem?
Thank you in advance.
So if 100 students with "random" access is okay, what is the "limit" for shared hosting? 500?
If shared hosting "bottleneck" is reached, do we just upgrade to dedicated to solve the problem?
Thank you in advance.
I suppose that depends on what you are happy with. You mentioned speed. Bluehost regularly puts over 1000 accounts on one server. You might have one or two moodle sites mixed in with that 1000 but you get the picture - the sites won't be super fast. However, I know of moodle sites on bluehost that have 500 users. They are not very active users and so no one complains. Actual schools though... I think if you are not actually using Moodle in the classroom but more for homework / repository means then up to 500 would be OK - slowish but ok.
It is when you want to use it in a computer lab with students in the lab working on material that you start running into problems with shared hosting. Generally if you have more than 20 to 30 in a class at any single moment using shared hosting the chances of the site crashing due to overload increases. That has been my experience in the past. In the last couple of years servers have become more powerful, but since this is what makes you as a teacher look good or terrible, I wouldn't be pushing the limit too hard. (I have experienced looking terrible due to a server crash in class brought on by too many students accessing material at the same time. Not pretty!) That is why I moved to my own dedicated server though I still maintain accounts with shared hosting. Since you can get a very good server these days for less than 1500 dollars, cost wise, it is not that over the top.
Shared hosts do offer different packages but without the dedicated approach it is difficult. Be aware that some hosts say you are getting a "dedicated" server but in actual fact you are getting 50 to 100 accounts on a server instead of 1000!
Good luck with your choice!
It is when you want to use it in a computer lab with students in the lab working on material that you start running into problems with shared hosting. Generally if you have more than 20 to 30 in a class at any single moment using shared hosting the chances of the site crashing due to overload increases. That has been my experience in the past. In the last couple of years servers have become more powerful, but since this is what makes you as a teacher look good or terrible, I wouldn't be pushing the limit too hard. (I have experienced looking terrible due to a server crash in class brought on by too many students accessing material at the same time. Not pretty!) That is why I moved to my own dedicated server though I still maintain accounts with shared hosting. Since you can get a very good server these days for less than 1500 dollars, cost wise, it is not that over the top.
Shared hosts do offer different packages but without the dedicated approach it is difficult. Be aware that some hosts say you are getting a "dedicated" server but in actual fact you are getting 50 to 100 accounts on a server instead of 1000!
Good luck with your choice!
"It is when you want to use it in a computer lab with students in the lab working on material that you start running into problems with shared hosting."
Just a thought: Maybe if one sometimes has that need, one could consider doing those activities on a "well-endowed" local machine on the school LAN. The XAMMP packages are very easy to install and if you adjust some security settings or at least see to it that it is backed up before letting the students in the arena that ought to work.
Just a thought: Maybe if one sometimes has that need, one could consider doing those activities on a "well-endowed" local machine on the school LAN. The XAMMP packages are very easy to install and if you adjust some security settings or at least see to it that it is backed up before letting the students in the arena that ought to work.
Thank you Jeff for your excellent suggestion.
XAMPP didn't cross my mind as my Moodle site is also meant for the public (other than students).
However, due to the slowness of Moodle on shared server, I'd need to look into how to implement that.
Is there a way to "duplicate" or "mirror" the Moodle on a shared server to a local machine with XAMPP?
Meaning, all the administration is done on the shared server and there is a way to duplicate the contents (courseware) to the local machine? Or do I need to manually repeat my content upload to the local XAMPP installation?
XAMPP didn't cross my mind as my Moodle site is also meant for the public (other than students).
However, due to the slowness of Moodle on shared server, I'd need to look into how to implement that.
Is there a way to "duplicate" or "mirror" the Moodle on a shared server to a local machine with XAMPP?
Meaning, all the administration is done on the shared server and there is a way to duplicate the contents (courseware) to the local machine? Or do I need to manually repeat my content upload to the local XAMPP installation?
(I know that you can backup courses (with both users and content) on your public site and restore them to your local moodle and they will work fine starting from the image of the time you made the backup. This way of doing it takes care of the Database content also. So this might be the first thing you should try: make a backup copy of the course you are most interested in trying this way and see how it works.)
I haven't tried but..
I would think that if you have an XAMMP with same version as your public site that you ought to be able to use FTP to update your local versions /uploaddata folder so that you have the same content (all courses). I am not sure what/how you would get the database "aligned". I'm guessing that one could export from the public site MySQL and import to your local one, but I might expect that some things would have to be renamed and I think it would be very difficult to synchronize back to the original database.
If one could somehow set up so the local one would connect to the public database maybe that would be a solution, but I assume that that kind of arrangement would need a lot of security setup (or not even be possible) and maybe might make things even slower than doing everything on the public server. But it might depend on what kind of resources you are using. I'm hoping someone that knows more (than my guesses) will jump in and say if I guessed something crazy
I haven't tried but..
I would think that if you have an XAMMP with same version as your public site that you ought to be able to use FTP to update your local versions /uploaddata folder so that you have the same content (all courses). I am not sure what/how you would get the database "aligned". I'm guessing that one could export from the public site MySQL and import to your local one, but I might expect that some things would have to be renamed and I think it would be very difficult to synchronize back to the original database.
If one could somehow set up so the local one would connect to the public database maybe that would be a solution, but I assume that that kind of arrangement would need a lot of security setup (or not even be possible) and maybe might make things even slower than doing everything on the public server. But it might depend on what kind of resources you are using. I'm hoping someone that knows more (than my guesses) will jump in and say if I guessed something crazy
Thank you very much Eric for sharing your practical experience in using Moodle.
Indeed, I had once let my class of about 30 students to access the Moodle site under Hostgator shared hosting and things like "failure to connect to database" appeared.
Seems like I've to move one of my Moodle site to dedicated as I'm anticipating huge traffic (with random access though) hitting the server when it is launched.
Indeed, I had once let my class of about 30 students to access the Moodle site under Hostgator shared hosting and things like "failure to connect to database" appeared.
Seems like I've to move one of my Moodle site to dedicated as I'm anticipating huge traffic (with random access though) hitting the server when it is launched.
Hi William,
Before going to a dedicated server you may want to check with the Moodle Partners that provide hosting and compare the costs. http://moodle.com/hosting/
Ron
Before going to a dedicated server you may want to check with the Moodle Partners that provide hosting and compare the costs. http://moodle.com/hosting/
Ron