If I decided to make wine in the same manner as starting this blog, I would have begun by learning how to blow glass.
My skill set is indeed technical as I am software developer by profession, I have started by investigating the possibilities for the infrastructure. A more reasonable start would have been to start with gathering topics, polishing my writing skills or even speaking with other bloggers. The task was made larger by choosing to host everything myself.
- blogging software
- server
- web server
- additional tools
- backup and recovery
Choosing WordPress was pretty easy both due to the cost as well as the maturity and configurability of the product. It was possible to start with WordPress and if for any reason it doesn’t satisfy my needs I can go get something else. Besides, depending on whose statistics you believe at least half the bloggers use that platform.
The server was a no brainer due to using Unix at work and Linux at home. The main reason is because of my familiarity, many useful programs and good scripting solutions. Making these first few choices does limit some of my choices later.
Choosing Linux pretty much eliminates using Internet Information Services (IIS) from Microsoft, which pretty much leaves Apache. Tomcat is also a server but is designed for java servlets, leaving Apache as the web server. This is not a consolation prize. Apache server has been a market leader for years.
The additional tools that come into play is the database required for WordPress. There is no other choice other than MySQL at the moment. This last statement is not entirely true. MariaDB is another database that can be used as it was designed to be a drop-in replacement for MySQL. Other databases may be supported in the future but not at the moment
There are various utilities do exist for backup and recovery of MySQL, however, in my opinion simple command line tools that are bundled with MySQL are the best choice. They also provide the opportunity for scripting and automation.
The trials and tribulations as well as the howto’s will all be explained as things get rolling.
