This is the blog of Vinaganda (a tiny web design studio in Ha Noi-Viet Nam) where we are discussing about things around what we are doing without playing the web gurus.
Subscribe to Vinaganda by EmailWeb server in Vietnam or not? or Thoughts about web server and design process
By Fred on 04/08/2010 |
2 | Tags: company, Design, usability | Share:
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When it comes to server options we in the web business tend to propose to clients host servers that are trusted and that we are familiar with. Because of current local factors these host servers are in most cases based outside Vietnam. Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe we overlook the most important people in the internet equation: the users/visitors to our sites. In advising our clients we focus on our design choices to ensure the best look and feel, but when it comes time to choose a host server, our advice is not always logical.
Before we start giving advice about design we should be getting to grips with the client’s user base, in other words, who is the target audience and where is it located? If 80% of the visitors come from Vietnam, what is the point to put the website in the US, for example? By putting it in Vietnam, you can dramatically reduce the page loading. And by having the server near your visitors, you can be much more adventurous with your design elements
Web server in Vietnam or not
I raise this subject because I myself made a mistake when choosing a host server for this very website. The choice of a host in the US when more than 80% of my visitors are based in Vietnam was not a good one. Loading and downloading take longer than they would if the host was situated in this country and services don’t come cheap when your host is half way around the world. So I considered getting a host closer to home.
I settled on a CDN (content delivery network), in my case Amazon Cloudstore, and opened a bucket in Singapore. I can really say that I finally see a speed difference.
And I expect the monthly cost to be significantly lower than what I was paying the overseas host. The downside to this change? Well, I guess visitors to my site from other parts of the world have to wait longer to see it in all its splendour, but the majority of people who log on can get the message in no time at all. And that in the web business is good business.
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Legally speaking
Whether you are a citizen, a legal resident or an entrepreneur, if you have a website it must have a Vietnamese domain name and a Vietnamese host . If one day the government decides to make Vietnamese host service providers rich, then all it would have to do is block websites hosted by foreign servers. It is unlikely but not impossible. Better to be safe than sorry!
One more thing!
Don’t forget that we published a really quick and simple poll with 2 questions: 1/ What is your primary browser? 2/ What is your secondary browser?
Fred: Serving as Web Chief cook and Chief Dishwasher Executive at Vinaganda Co. A tiny design studio in Ha Noi that helps companies and individuals to maximize their impact on the web.
“Open Source Tool To Backup Gmail Accounts: Gmvault
Interesting topic, I’ve been going through the very same scenarios to find out what’s best in Vietnam. I really liked FPT as a hosting provider, they seemed to be very professional and reliably, unfortunately also rather expensive. I would still try to end up in the region and if not Vietnam, then also Singapore. Amazon made that really attractive recently. One more determining factor whether hosting in Vietnam is feasible or not is what technology stack you want to be hosted. If it’s PHP, you’ve got lots of choices, if you need to host a Java stack (like we do) you choices are much smaller. That’s the same everywhere in the world you would say, but in Vietnam it’s not a question of having either 1000 (for PHP) or 100 (for Java) choices, but having 20 (PHP) or 2 (Java). And a choice among 2 is obviously not really a choice
Thanks for sharing your thoughts about this topic! I hope to see more options coming up soon, including a cloud Made in Vietnam…
Cheers
Hendrik
Thanks for the reminder: Of course you are right about the technology.
As my main target is the small and medium businesses (so 80% of the local companies), I was thinking about how I can improve the server choices for my future clients. We need to realize that these kind of clients are not whiling to put more than 10$/month in the hosting, so no need to talk to them about a dedicated server.
One one project, they put they site on a shared hosting (Linux) in Hanoi at 150,000 VND/month. And we had really good results. Ok the server don’ t allow you to create a bunch of subdomains and databases. So the speed was amazing. Excepted that some visitors in Europe complained about the loading time. So here comes the CDN solution: Everybody happy. And the client still has his server under10$.