If you’d like to set up RoR on your HostGator account, or are interested in finding out just what’s involved in getting RoR setup there’s a great thread on you can check out at the HostGator Forums that tells you exactly how to get started.

How We Found HostGator

HostGator came to our attention via a billboard campaign they launched in our city. At about the same time, we were launching a new client’s website and had contacted our web host to get the new account set up. 24 hours later, it still wasn’t set up so we opened a trouble ticket. 72 hours after that, our normal host still hadn’t created our new account so we decided to give HostGator a try.

What We Found Out About HostGator

As soon as we looked at HostGator’s site we became excited at what they had to offer. The things that jumped right out at us were:

• Unlimited Disk Space (our previous host gave us only 50 MB!)
• Unlimited Bandwidth (before we were limited to 1000 MB)
• Unlimited Web Sites (before we could only host one per account)

Additionally, they offered a ton of  “bells and whistles” for web programmers like us:

• Unlimited MySQL Databases (our old host only gave us one)
• PHP 5
• Perl
• Ruby On Rails
• CGI
• Instant Setup (instead of waiting 24 hours like our old host)
• Cpanel (for super easy configuration of email, ftp, and file management)

HostGator offered a TON of features and looked to stand head and shoulders above every other web host we’ve used. We decided to give them a shot.

Did HostGator Deliver What They Promised?

They sure did! We went to their website and went with their “Baby” option at 7.95 per month. We thrilled to get an email from HostGator minutes after entering our billing information notifying us that our new account was set up.

We logged in and found that their Cpanel (the tool you use to configure your site) had a ton of options not available at our last web host. It was super easy to log in and get our new site up and running. After about a week we were so happy we transferred our four other sites to our HostGator account and canceled all of our other web hosting. The benefits we enjoy since switching to HostGator include:

• Slashing our hosting bill from $50.00 to $7.95 monthly
• Instant web site setup
• Super responsive customer service

Our HostGator Review

We give HostGator an A+ !

Using HostGator Coupons

When we joined HostGator we weren’t aware that there were HostGator coupons. If you’re on the fence about giving HostGator a shot, here are some HostGator coupons that will definitely make checking them out worth your while.

Code “Liberty” – First month free
Code “hgc25″ – First month for one cent
Code “Autumn” – 20% off

All you have to do to take advantage of these offers is enter the coupon code in the space provided during the signup process (it’s labeled Coupon). You can’t miss it.

Click here to  host your website with HostGator today!

HostGator’s support department responded in less than an hour and let me know they had made the necessary changes. I tested it, but it still wasn’t working so I re-opened my trouble ticket and sent them a link that was failing as an example.

About 10 minutes later they replied that they had edited another rule and to give it a try. I gave it a shot and found out it was now working! Yay!

So, if you’re using HostGator and having trouble with timthumb.php just get in touch with them and ask them to whitelist it for you. After that make sure that permissions on both timthumb.php and the folder it’s in are set to 755 and you should be good to go.