> Maybe for a few months. When you run a server for 2 or 3 years the distro goes out of support, software upgrades are getting behind, before you know it you are compiling patches from source, ...

You can get 5 years security updates support with Ubuntu Server LTS and you can set up safe unattended updates[1] with email notification if anything ever requires your attention. If you set your backups right as well, you can get away even with catastrophic hardware failures.

Remember, this is not some gigantic scale, it shouldn't be that difficult.

[1] https://help.ubuntu.com/10.04/serverguide/C/automatic-update...

"...it shouldn't be that difficult"

Famous last words...

I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm just saying that my experience has been different. Another example, I used to have my own installation for our websites and bug tracking and time sheet management software, on a locally-hosted machine with apache and mysql and a bunch of other software. The number of hours I've spend migrating data between versions, tweaking mod_rewrite rules, setting up backups for various databases and other data, making usage statistics etc. - I don't even want to think about it.

Recently I moved to a shared hosting server. The yearly cost of that is covered with one hours of my hourly rate (and I'm not even expensive). I can set up 50 or so different applications with a few clicks in a web UI, and upgrades are handled by it, too. Backups are taken care of, I have a web ui for dns, ssl, everything. It was like a breath of fresh air.

To each his own and each situation is different, of course. But there's something to be said for division of labor.

> The number of hours I've spend migrating data between versions,

It seems (from prev. post as well) like you were trying to stay on the cutting edge functionality wise. OTOH I was arguing for running stable and maintained Linux distribution.

I'd certainly agree that the initial investment is pretty big—not only it takes some time, but you need non-trivial specific knowledge about Linux administration—and for that reason alone I'd advocate using maintained hosting. My only beef with your comment was that, in theory (and in my experience), a properly configured VPS running stable software shouldn't require nowhere near the level of maintenance you seem to be suggesting.

Absolutely a matter of scale - it depends on the app, the audience, your budget, your workflow....

A one-man operation doing sysadmin, development, everything? I'd be looking for hosted solutions too for my clients - it makes my life easier.

But as a company, with a development and operations staff? I'd be wary.

Sure, but I figured we were talking about small organizations. One-man shop to maybe 10 people or so, or even more, anything too small to have a dedicated sysadmin.

Sorry, but there is no such thing as "safe unattended updates" when you have anything more complex than your home desktop box. There's way too much that can and will go wrong to be that naive.

Safe unattended means no configuration files are altered and those updates are not adding new functionality in the first place anyway. It's only Package X.Y with security patch applied.

Actually your home desktop box should be much more difficult to upgrade than a simple generic server box with generic virtualized hardware drivers.

There are valid reasons to use service providers or maintained hosting but properly configured (and backed up) VPS running stable (& maintained) software can get you a long way.

there is if you're only using your vps for git over ssh which was my point that started this whole thing.

easy.

1) get a distro with 5 years support.

2) when it's out of date, buy a new $20/month vps, install git and ssh. Move your repo and turn off the old server. This might take 2 hours, every 5 years. Not a big deal.