I need to move 3 different domains out from under my own personal web hosting. We need the 3 to have a separate domain to a managed Wordpress site and under one of those domains I need to implement a discourse forum.
The non-profit doesn’t have a big budget, I’ve been providing the hosting of the Wordpress stuff and domains for free but need to move it out so that the Association can take over.
I usually use GoDaddy but they are more expensive and their managed Discourse SW is not up to par. I can get multiple wordpress installations there but we have to implement a forum too and Discourse seems to be the one most folks would prefer.
A quick google search gives me many options for managed wordpress and Discourse can handle forum but not in one place.
Do they need to be with the same host? MPU is hosted on Digital Ocean and Automators is hosted on Linode, both have good and affordable plans. I know NameCheap offers managed WP hosting and it seems affordable.
I use DigitalOcean for a personal Discourse site I use for notes. I set it up myself which was easy, but DO has since created a One-Click app for deploying Discourse. I use the $5 droplet for mine, but I think with a lot of users you would want the $10 a month droplet.
DO also has a WordPress One-Click install, which I use for a few sites, all of which are on individual $5 droplets.
2 years ago, I moved a majority of my domains out of GoDaddy and into Google Domains. I will usually purchase bulk domains or use a coupon for GoDaddy and then at renewal time switch them to Google.
For hosting, I found it easiest to use a Cloudways server. Easy to use, setup, deploy.
Echoing @RosemaryOrchard, no need to be in same place, just adjust the DNS.
I use Discourse mainly because of cross platform (online), extensibility, attachments, inline previews, and sharing. One of my favorite things, is to find a video and pop the URL into a draft in Drafts then run a script action that sends the title and URL to my Discourse site with tags set. Later when I am clearing out my Inbox (a category like Tech Support here) I can watch the video without leaving.
Categories I use like folders, tags are tags. I can either edit the same note (post) over and over again, or sometimes I will reply to the original post with a second version or more information that I want to keep separate. The use of attachments allows me to keep a broad variety of files in Discourse for my own personal notes, such as screenshots or PDF manuals.
The last thing I’ll mention is my favorite. If I need to share a group of notes with some one for a period of time, I can add the notes to a category then in the Settings of Discourse send the person an invitation link and limit their logon to only access that category. When we are done, I disable their account and their access it removed.
It’s ridiculously powerful and I got the idea from @joebuhlig over on Productivity Guild. Definitely worth taking a look at if you are looking for a note system.
Be aware it is online, so if you are in areas where online service isn’t great or at work if they block a lot of sites, you might be better off with an offline solution.
For all 3, Would you create different WordPress websites or multi website? If you are looking for managed hosting then the best option is Cloudways, I am using them for my 5 websites in which 1 is non profit, It costs me monthly around $20 with DigitalOcean server, You would have option to choose any provider like AWS, GCE, DO, Linode and Vultr.
I find Siteground very good for Wordpress hosting. Fast sites and an optimisation plugin which enables you to fine tune for performance e.g. cache settings etc.
3 different wordpress sites but a single combined Discourse forum. Got the 3 sites moved but still searching for a way to have a forum with a url like forum.welshmountainsheep.net
If you want a good feature to price ratio — I’ve been very happy with Ahead-Hosting for years. I purchased a “lifetime” account via a reseller. Dragify is selling one for $99 now (July 2019). I wouldn’t expect Ahead-Hosting to last forever but so far so good. I host several low bandwidth Wordpress sites using the built-in cPanel and Softaculous.
FYI a friend asked me today about Yahoo’s Small Business hosting, and I said I knew nothing about it. But looking into it briefly, it seems really price-competitive and supports Wordpress, Drupal, and Joomla.
I think if you are looking for the good wordpress hosting Honestly speaking there is a lot of best hostings in the market but you should go with the quality things like bluehost, Siteground etc.
