[anon56]

I have some questions:

If I understood correctly, this service only allows managed hosting from a curated list of services/apps? I assume that I cannot run my own docker containers. There are a lot of Run Your Own links/text, which made me think first that I could run my own, but instead it seems that I can choose what can be run for me.

Assuming this is OCI based, how are the containers isolated? Is it with cgroups and namespaces (because of rootless), but still sharing the kernel or are users placed inside separate VMs?

What about storage/disk/volume encryption? If I get allocated 10GB of data from the disk, does it have readable, but deleted data from a previous user? How is my data secured on the disk?

I currently have a usage pattern with Jitsi, which I host when I need to have a meeting. I use it a few hours a week and a minute/hour based cloud pricing from many providers are ideal for this. It is relatively cheap to launch even a beefy instance for only a couple of hours at a time.

I didn't see Jitsi on the list, but also the pricing is only listed as monthly. Is there more granular pricing?

What about more closed source software containers, like game servers? I didn't see those on the list. I'm pretty sure Minecraft, Valheim, Satisfactory etc. servers would bring more customers and make the service more popular.

What about managed databases?

I also saw Gitea, but not Gitlab.

Your offering seems to target somewhat similar audience to Linode's Marketplace. Linode calls them "one click apps": https://www.linode.com/marketplace/

Your pricing seems cheaper than Linode's, but is there any other advantage to use your service over theirs? Linode can even manage and configure DNS settings for custom domains automatically for you for their one click apps.

I like your website and it works well on mobile. This service also seems at glance like a great idea. I wish there was a bit more information to help me understand what this service does exactly and how it differs from the competition.

[m3nu]

> sharing the kernel or are users placed inside separate VMs?

The isolation is with users and SELinux. There are no VMs as those are pretty heavy.

> the pricing is only listed as monthly. Is there more granular pricing?

Pricing is with hourly granularity, but shown as monthly for simplicity.

> What about storage/disk/volume encryption?

We run only bare-metal servers, so this is less of a concern unless you expect the whole server to be stolen. Data still needs to be accessible all the time.

> What about managed databases?

It's more focused on end users, rather than devs. So trying not to go overboard with very technical apps.

> I also saw Gitea, but not Gitlab. > What about more closed source software containers, like game servers?

Still many apps to be added. I also try not to compete with hosting offered by FOSS authors, unless they push other options themselves. Added a note on Gitlab on our feedback tracker: https://feedback.pikapods.com/

> Your pricing seems cheaper than Linode's, but is there any other advantage to use your service over theirs?

Linode seems to use VMs and asks you to make an install script. So it will be heavier than simple containers I use.

Hope I covered a few questions. There was a lot in this comment...

[anon56]

>> What about storage/disk/volume encryption?

> We run only bare-metal servers, so this is less of a concern unless you expect the whole server to be stolen. Data still needs to be accessible all the time.

So, when I delete a file and it is marked as deleted in the file system and it becomes empty space, then when this same space gets allocated for someone else, they can just read my file from the allocated empty space. This doesn't require the server to be stolen or physical access, just someone else reusing the same physical/bare-metal hardware after me. Encrypting files/volumes/storage per user solves this problem. Leaving it unencrypted exposes my data to all other users of the system.

Here is some ideas on how Google handles this: https://cloud.google.com/docs/security/encryption/default-en...

I hope you re-consider encrypting user data.

[m3nu]

> Leaving it unencrypted exposes my data to all other users of the system.

This would be an issue if we would offer access to block devices. That’s not the case. The pod can only see the files and not read at the block level. Else every shared hosting setup would have this issue.

I’ll still look into it and see if there is any action needed. And the potential overhead for encrypting only the mounted user files. My feeling is that it’s pretty doable.