First, let me say that after my last frustrations with (mt) Media Temple, things have been going much better. I haven’t experienced much, if any, downtime, page load time has been very good, and my WordPress Admin is working much smoother. Has everyone else noticed more consistency? I think so. I am very pleased with (mt) because of this. And they did give me one month’s hosting for free because of some of my previous downtime issues. Thanks (mt).
However, there is still something I find frustrating. I use (mt) primarily to host my WordPress sites, as I’m sure a fair number of (mt)’s users do. It’s the way to go – and I love the fact that (mt) has the 1-Click Installation of WordPress. That was one of the key components I was looking for, because I knew I’d be installing a lot of sites, and hopefully hosting some sites through my account (interested in hosting your site with me? contact me here). However, one of my frustrations has been that (mt) still only has WordPress 2.0.4 as the version they offer for the 1-Click. It’s not the biggest pain in the world, because after installing that, I just need to manually upgrade to the newest WordPress version. Not a huge deal – but something that I shouldn’t need to do. It seems they should be able to offer the newest version of WordPress that is available.
Now, hold it right there. I know what you’re going to say. “What about WordPress 2.1.1? It was hacked. It’s a good thing (mt) Media Temple didn’t have that version available!” And you’re right – that does throw a small wrench in my argument.
But what is wrong with 2.1? Ella has been out since January 22, 2007, while 2.0.4 has been out since July 29, 2006. Is (mt) saying that they don’t trust any more recent WordPress upgrades since July of 2006? That’s what I thought after I emailed (mt) Media Temple’s Customer Support and asked when they were planning on upgrading their WordPress 1-Click Installation. Below is the email that I received in response:
Adam,
We do not have plans to upgrade WordPress at this time. Once we have tested and believe it is up to Media Temple’s standards we will make a decision on weather to upgrade at that time.
If you have any further questions regarding your (mt) Media Temple services, please feel free to contact us at any time.
Best Regards,
Customer Support
(mt) Media Temple
There is the frustration: “…and believe it is up to Media Temple’s standards…?” What standards might those be? And it’s not just because (mt) is a large hosting provider. I know many large web hosts who provide up-to-date WordPress installs in their 1-Click Installation, Dreamhost being one of them. In fact, within a day of WordPress announcing that 2.1.1 got hacked, Dreamhost had WordPress 2.1.2 up and ready for their simple 1-Click Install and 1-Click Upgrade.
So what gives, (mt)? Is this one way in which a bit of (mt) Media Temple elitism is seen? Or are there good reasons for their decision to stick with an outdated version of WordPress for their customers? Even if they were not ready to upgrade to 2.1 because they still wanted to test it properly, what about Ronan? Or 2.0.7? Or the most recent release of 2.0.9 on February 21? I really would like to understand this – and I’m hoping that someone might have some insight into this frustration for me.
Update: Good news – Media Temple now offers WordPress 2.1.2.
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{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
In case you have any interest in switching hosts – I have had nothing but great experiences with Dreamhost. I use them for my blogs, and all the Decently and in Order sites. I’m even building our new church youth website on it. Pligg wasn’t a 1-click install but Wordpress is (2.1.2), as is Joomla, MediaWiki, phpbb, and about five other platforms.
ah one word . . . BlueHost. 1 click installs. 1 click upgrades. Excellent customer services. Insane prices.
It doesn’t have a cool logo but do you really need that anyway?
I did four wordpress installs last night. The first I used a 1-click install. It was great until I realized that they were only installing 2.1.1 (Should have paid more attention before I started). I deleted it and started over. I did the next two the old fashioned way – Wordpress promises a 5-minute install, but they lie. It only takes about 2 minutes. Then I did an upgrade 2.0.4 to 2.1.2 and it was incredibly easy. It took me longer to ftp the new files to the host than it did to run the upgrade script.
I’ve also had fantastico (my hosts 1-click app) bomb a couple of upgrades (different apps, not wordpress) so I’m leery about using it for that.
Wordpress is so easy I’d say just do it manually.
Pomomusings,
Thank you for your comments. While we respect your anxiousness regarding our Word Press offering, we do indeed need to test the versioning in depth before upgrading. More importantly, keep in mind when you’re upgrading software on a system that embodies thousands of clients, the testing and security of the software is just one small aspect.
An upgrade is not a small feat and could break several several things system-wide. This is the testing that takes such a thorough going-over. In that respect, we think the title of your article is a bit misleading as there’s obviously no mistrust with Word Press.
Best regards,
Jason Mcvearry
jason@mediatemple.net
Jason, thanks for your comments. I didn’t think that a simple post would get (mt)’s attention, but I do appreciate you taking the time to leave a comment.
I don’t want to turn this into a Media Temple vs DreamHost conversation, because clearly that has been talked about many times before – but I’m wondering if an upgrade is such a huge feat, and if it could break several things system-wide…why are DeamHost and other large hosting providers able to make upgrades available so easily.
Now, obviously, with DreamHost’s upgrade to WordPress 2.1.1, that kind of backfired, since 2.1.1 got hacked. But the next day — they had the 2.1.2 upgrade available to all users.
I appreciate much about Media Temple, but I’m just questioning the need to stay way back with version 2.0.4. Perhaps my title is a little rhetorical – but how do you explain the comment “until it is up to Media Temple’s standards…”
Is that just an example of how Media Temple has much higher standards than many other company? I’m wondering when such high standards become really necessary, or perhaps just a bit elitist?
Adam,
I can’t comment on why Dreamhost is able to deploy rapid upgrades. I do not know what the fall out is when they do apply upgrades. I can only speak for (mt) Media Temple.
We’re not comparing (mt) to, or speaking for other hosts’ standards or practices. In our case, having high standards and implementing thorough testing is absolutely necessary, I would not call that elitist, simply a business practice.
Best,
Jason
Can you let us know if you are working on deploying a new (and I would hope it would be WordPress 2.1) WordPress 1-Click Install? Any idea of when it might be available?
We are working on an install upgrade, but i can’t give a time line at this point.
Stay tuned to our blog for the announcement!!
http://weblog.mediatemple.net/weblog/
Jason
Jason…just curious. Why is that others (dreamhost) can quickly get the 2.1 version up as a one-click install, but not media temple?
Adam,
I’m with the host on this one… and I say that as as a part-owner of a hosting company. If you’ve got a handful of sites, doing the upgrade and then tweaking any fallout on each one is not a huge issue. Multiply it, and you have a problem – especially if it means clients impatiently waiting for the fix to their site which in their view wasn’t broken until you did your upgrade.
One rule of software upgrades it that you shouldn’t do it just because a new version exists. It’s a cardinal rule of enterprise-IT, but it gets overlooked a lot. If the upgrade doesn’t buy you anything, don’t risk breaking what works… I can give examples of having to go back a version of firmware or software because of this.
My suspicion, without looking at the sites of any of these hosting companies (some of whom I’m not familiar with at all), is that the response of your host actually indicates they’re a very good host for most people. Version upgrades of WP *will* break plugins, and this leads to support issues. Until they know what they’re in for, it’s prudent to evaluate first. 2.1 is a significant update (changes in the database, changes in variables, etc. – review the release notes), and there isn’t really a simple way to go back, so taking extra care at this point is wise on their part.
For those who have the technical expertise to make these decisions on their own and do upgrades independently, they should do so, and I believe that they wouldn’t be restricted… it’s just the one-click install that’s the issue, and the people who rely on that are the ones who will create a support burden. As someone pointed out above, WordPress installs are so easy that it isn’t worth complaining about having to do a couple extra clicks. I’ve never done a one-click install myself… though I’ve set up several WP installs and updates, all done on the command-line ;^) CLI or not, the setup is quick, easy, and painless; one click vs. 2 minutes (I agree, 5 minutes is a gross exaggeration, probably allows for reading instructions three times over) isn’t worth a distinction in my view.
*Any* host could get the one-click install up quickly, but doing so doesn’t prove anything… I would actually expect the ones that roll out the upgrade that fast may not support it as extensively, at least not for free. My opinion of Media Temple would go *up* as a result of this, particularly considering the quick and helpful responses you’ve gotten on your blog over this despite that fact that – no offense intended – you probably aren’t their biggest client.
And for what it’s worth – I upgraded one of my blogs to 2.1x, saw what it was, and left my other ones at 2.0x for a while longer. 2.1x is a good upgrade with a few nice features, but until all of your plugins are confirmed upgraded and working, stay where you are. My own assessment after doing the 2.1 upgrade was that I would also wait for at least one more incremental release before making the effort on my other blogs.
My 2 cents (or more)! Hope it helps with some of the perspective or insight you were looking for.
It should be noted that engineers at MT should be planning ahead. Developer builds and beta builds are available well ahead of main releases, and incremental patches whilst they do sometimes add features, are mainly fixing bugs and security.
There have been lots of security fixes since 2.04, and lots of sites that didn’t keep upgraded have had hacking problems.
Wordpress 2.04 was released October 28, 2006 – over 4 months.
I can understand why a service might not want to upgrade to 2.1.2, but 2.09 is a no brainer
I really like my hoster, but I don’t want to give out their name cuz they might get a bad rep since their still serving WP 1.5 …. bummer.
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