Jason Staten

This past week has been a terrible experience for both me and my website. It was nearing time for my domain to expire, so I decided that I would transfer away from the evil that is GoDaddy (I moved the hosting several months ago). Little did I know that they would attempt one last strike at me before letting me slip away for good. I initiated the domain transfer on the 23rd, and I received an email making claim that it would take approximately 3 days to complete. I could handle that.

On the 25th, I go to my website only to find that it has been replaced with a GoDaddy landing page. I nearly flipped. I was supposed to be moving away from them, not having them take over. I put it off for a day, hoping that it would be a very short term deal. The next day, I see that it’s still there and I want to get this squared away. So I give GoDaddy a call to wind up listening to hold music for nearly a half hour before I decide that I’m sick of wasting my cellphone minutes.

On Saturday, the 28th the problem still remained and since I have free weekends, I gave them another phone call. 20 minutes into hold I get an answer from some guy. I explained to him about what my situation was and asked him to check out my domain to make sure everything was okay. He checked it out, said it was all good and out of their hands.

Today, I found out that GoDaddy had in fact CANCELLED the transfer because the domain was “locked.” Of course, I went to GD’s site to check this out, and it was marked as “unlocked” just as I had set it before doing the transfer. I contacted my registrar to ask them to try again today, and was able to have the site up within about 2 hours. My domain’s no longer listed through GoDaddy, and I am thrilled to never have to deal with them again.

My recommendation to anyone reading is DO NOT do any sort of business with GoDaddy. Even if they have low prices and scantly clad women in their commercials, it’s just not worth it.

500 Songs To Freedom Song 238

This is Rockband like you’ve always seen it before, except it doesn’t end. These guys are just a bit on the crazy side. In honor of their attempt to complete 539 Rockband songs in a single sitting (excluding 15 minute breaks for food/bathroom every 8 hours), I give you the link to watch them live. Currently they’re about 24 hours in. I give them props, just because it’s pretty much a world record. Play on Cameron. Play on Jarret.

So if you were thinking my blog was dead, you’re wrong. Finals week and the holidays have just managed to get in my way for a bit. In honor of my new Rebel XS (1000D), I’m establishing a Photography Friday post where I’ll place a picture I’ve taken that week. Let’s get this started off right…

This picture comes from a day I stepped outside to take some test shots of the Salt Lake Valley’s mountains, more specifically in the Draper area. After playing with settings a bit, I think I got it right. Any thoughts?

My blog lives once again! This time without lame GoDaddy hosting. I’m trying out somewhere new, and so far I’m really fond of them.  They’ve got 24/7 live chat support that actually works. Two times, I got the answer I needed and went onward with my setup. Also, when first logging in, I was met with a pleasant screen.

Dashboard

Welcome to the Plesk Dashboard where a bunch of tasks are just a click away, and instantly completed (no need to wait 5 minutes for database creation). Although my exposure to it has been short, I’ve already put it to use for creating this subdomain, the wordpress database, and setting up email. All of these task have been simple enough to do quickly, but also are configurable to the point where I don’t feel like I’m stripped of my privileges.

Email

The email configuration is simple as well. It comes with some features like virus scanning (on incoming/outgoing/both), groups, and mailing lists that could be useful in the future. The webmail client itself is a bit ugly, but that’s not specifically Plesk, so there’s no need to bash on it too much.

Secure Shell

When I came across this feature, I was pleasantly surprised. At first it would kick me as soon as I logged in, but with a brief message to customer support, I was back in business. SSH really gives me a feel of control of my site, and I’m definitely going to be playing with this often.

Flaws

The largest flaw I’ve come across with Plesk thus far is the disabling of php safe_mode. The option was unavailable to me, and was giving me quite the hassle when it came to uploading photos via wordpress. But if you notice the photos displaying in this post, I did manage to get the problem taken care of with yet another 3 minutes with support.

Conclusions

With what limited exposure I have with Plesk, I’ve got to say that I like it. It’s far from perfect in all areas, but good enough for many common tasks. If you’re looking for something that simplifies the process of setting up a real website and allows you to worry more about the content, Plesk is worth a look.