Question

This is my first time building a website and using CodeIgniter for a school project. I was wondering whether you have any tips on uploading CI to a free web host , my database, free webhosting and basic security tips.

Can I just upload the entire CI folder? Or do I have to upload individual files (God no!)? What are my options?

What about my MySQL database – do I just upload my mysqldump to the webhost?

Also, can you recommend a good free webhost. I was thinking about 000webhost.

Any basic tips on security would also be appreciated (I’ve implemented many of the form_validation rules like xss_clean for starters)

Any other suggestions will be more than welcome. Thanks!

Answer 1

I used 000webhost.com long time ago and remembered having minor inconvenient here and there (i.e.: slow connection, server unreachable sometime). I don’t have any suggestion on a good free webhost because in most situation the words “good” and “free webhost” do not belong in the same sentence. You get what you paid for.

Now, onto the uploading itself.

1. You need to upload the entire CI folder and your app as well
   • You can either zip them all and extract the zip if you have shell access to the server
   • You can use FTP to upload all files at once
2. MySQL DB: if you have SQL scripts, you can execute them in phpMyAdmin interface if the web host provider gives you access to it. Please read phpMyAdmin documentation for ways to upload your MySQL data.

In terms of security:

• http://codeigniter.com/user_guide/installation/index.html
• http://codeigniter.com/user_guide/general/security.html
• Sanitize user input if you’re using SQL expression directly
• If you are using CI ORM/database library, make sure you keep yourself up to date to any security issues by checking CI mailing-list, IRC, or whichever the preferred communication channel the CI people use.
• For simplicity, avoid HTML tags (as a user) input, treat them as literal