DigitalOcean
A developer-friendly cloud provider known for simple pricing and a clean UX compared to the hyperscalers. The pieces I use: App Platform (a PaaS that builds and runs apps/containers from a repo, with managed TLS and scaling), Spaces (S3-compatible object storage with a built-in CDN), and Droplets (plain VMs) when raw control is needed. It’s a middle ground between fully-managed Vercel and self-managed Hetzner.
Links
Description
- App Platform — PaaS that deploys apps/containers from Git or a registry; managed builds, TLS, autoscaling.
- Spaces — S3-compatible object storage with an integrated CDN.
- Droplets — straightforward Linux VMs.
- Managed databases — Postgres, MySQL, Redis as a service.
- Container registry & Kubernetes (DOKS) — for containerized workloads.
- Predictable pricing — flat, easy-to-forecast costs.
Download or use
- Platform: digitalocean.com
doctlCLI + App Spec (app.yaml) for declarative App Platform deploys.- Docs: docs.digitalocean.com
Reasoning for
DigitalOcean hosts the Tech To The Rescue platform — the Next.js app runs on App Platform with assets in Spaces, fronted by Cloudflare DNS. For a nonprofit, the draw is predictable, modest cost and a PaaS that removes server administration without the per-execution limits that make Vercel a poor fit for the platform’s BullMQ/Redis background workers (which need long-running processes). It’s the pragmatic “managed enough, cheap enough, no surprises” host for that engagement — distinct from Qamera AI, where heavy AI workers run on bare Hetzner Docker instead.
Alternatives considered
- Vercel — best-in-class for the Next.js web tier, but serverless timeouts don’t suit long-running queue workers; DigitalOcean runs persistent processes.
- Hetzner — cheaper raw compute, chosen for Qamera AI’s self-hosted stack; DigitalOcean trades some cost for a friendlier PaaS + managed services.
- AWS / GCP — more services and scale, far more complexity and cost-modelling overhead.
- Render / Railway — similar modern PaaS competitors; DigitalOcean adds Spaces + managed DBs in one place.
Resources
Template: tool