Ryan Frankel

CTO and Contributing Expert
Ryan Frankel
About the Author

Ryan began developing websites in the late '90s and has personally tested just about every web host and cloud platform worth trying on the market today. With a masters degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Florida, he leverages his extensive knowledge of hardware, software, and their engineering relationship to inform HostingAdvice readers of the technical implications of their hosting choices. Ryan's subject matter expertise includes, but is not limited to, WordPress, cloud infrastructure management, product UI/UX design, and popular web development languages such as JavaScript and PHP.

Latest Posts

48 posts written/edited to date
iPage Is No Longer Accepting New Customers

iPage Is No Longer Accepting New Customers
By: Ryan Frankel • 7/21/2024
In a somewhat surprising move to many, iPage is no longer accepting any new customers. As one of the larger web hosts in the EIG (now Newfold Digital) brand, iPage... read more »
End of an Era: GoDaddy Officially Retires Media Temple Brand

GoDaddy Officially Retires Media Temple Brand
By: Ryan Frankel • 9/20/2023
I remember when Media Temple was the premier host of the world and the place that was the first “cool” site that meant your blog was finally ready to move past... read more »
5 Best CBD Hosting Providers (2024)

Will Any Hosting Provider Host My CBD Site?
By: Ryan Frankel • 12/13/2022
CBD, or cannabidiol, is a compound found in the cannabis plant that has been gaining popularity in recent years for its potential health benefits. With the... read more »
Symantec’s Michael Klieman Talks "Encryption Everywhere" — How New Freemium Service Provides Security Without Sacrificing Speed

Security and Speed: Hallmarks Of Symantec's Encryption Everywhere
By: Ryan Frankel • 9/8/2016
97% of websites have no basic security in place, leaving criminals with free reign on your personal information, which can lead to potential financial ruin... read more »
"PHP Memory Limit" — How to Increase Your RAM

How to Increase Your PHP Memory Limit
By: Ryan Frankel • 8/31/2016
Sometimes while in development or production, we find that our software uses more memory than we ever expected. To keep things under control, PHP has default memory... read more »
MySQL <em>ALTER TABLE</em> Commands: How to Add, Delete, &amp; Change Columns

How to Add, Delete, & Change Columns with MySQL Alter Table
By: Ryan Frankel • 8/12/2016
MySQL (and MariaDB) allows you to change the structure of tables with the ALTER TABLE SQL command. Using the command, you can easily change the name of your table... read more »
JavaScript MD5 Library (Plus the Perks, Uses, and Examples)

How to Use an MD5 Library in JavaScript
By: Ryan Frankel • 8/3/2016
MD5 libraries are often required by JavaScript developers, on either the client or server side, to verify file data. By far, the most popular library is the... read more »
13 Best WordPress Website Builder Options (2024)

13 Best WordPress Website Builder Options
By: Ryan Frankel • 6/9/2016
A WordPress website builder sounds like the best of both worlds, combining the world’s most popular content management system with ultra-simple, drag-and-drop web... read more »
How Incapsula Protects Your Site Against DDoS Attacks While Boosting Performance &mdash; Progressive Challenges, CDN, &amp; Custom Software

Incapsula: DDoS Defense & CDN Speed Boosting
By: Ryan Frankel • 5/13/2016
No one is immune to the havoc that follows a Distributed-Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack — that helplessness that you feel immediately after a hit as you watch your... read more »
Thoroughly Impressed By DreamHost: How We Launched, Scaled, &amp; Tested an Infrastructure Using DreamCompute

DreamHost Part 2: Our Team's Testing of DreamCompute
By: Ryan Frankel • 5/10/2016
Every developer and DevOps master dreams of having simple, fine-grained control of their environment with the ability to scale up and down at will and a defined... read more »
The WHIR Networking Events Return &mdash; 11 New Chances to Create &amp; Foster Lasting Business Relationships in Hosting

Why Attend The WHIR Networking Events 2016
By: Ryan Frankel • 1/5/2016
It’s that time of year again — the WHIR Networking Events will soon make their way across the US, Europe, and Brazil (new!), allowing hosting and cloud... read more »
How to Delete a Wix Site (2024)

How to Delete My Wix Site
By: Ryan Frankel • 11/19/2015
Learning how to delete a Wix site is not nearly as complicated as you probably fear. That being said, there are lots of components you may not have thought of. Even... read more »
"AWS S3&rdquo; Pricing (Calculator &amp; Sample Plan)

AWS S3 Pricing (Calculator & Sample Storage Configuration)
By: Ryan Frankel • 8/11/2015
In this article, we’ll focus on the cost of the AWS S3 storage solution. (Hint: It’s CHEAP!) There are basically three factors that determine the total cost of using... read more »
Akamai and Trustwave&trade; &mdash; 3 Factors Driving the Growing Need for Vulnerability Monitoring &#038; DDoS Protection

Akamai and Trustwave™ — 3 Factors Drive the Rising Need for DDoS Threat Monitoring
By: Ryan Frankel • 6/29/2015
Since 1998, Akamai has engineered performance and security solutions, now serving up two trillion Internet interactions daily. With the rising scale of DDoS... read more »
CodeGuard — CEO David Moeller Gives Us a Look at Their Cutting-Edge Website Backup &amp; Restore Technology

CodeGuard CEO Gives Us an Inside Look at Their Cutting-Edge Site Backup & Restore Technology
By: Ryan Frankel • 6/3/2015
CodeGuard is a time-saving and precise automated backup solution, featuring differential backups and full-site recovery. No other service offers this level... read more »
How to Create a WordPress Page Template

Blogging 101: How to Create a WordPress Page Template
By: Ryan Frankel • 5/14/2015
Creating a page template in WordPress is actually quite simple. This guide assumes you understand the basics of creating a Theme in WordPress and have your directory... read more »
5 Basic Tips to Using Regular Expressions (RegEx) in Varnish

5 Basic Tips to Using Regular Expressions (RegEx) in Varnish
By: Ryan Frankel • 4/22/2015
Even though Varnish is an extremely popular tool out of the box, you will quickly find you will need to customize it for the intricacies of your site. Whether it be... read more »
HostingAdvice.com Launches Mobile Version of <strike>Articles and Reviews</strike> our ENTIRE SITE!

HostingAdvice.com Launches Mobile Version of Articles and Reviews our ENTIRE SITE!
By: Ryan Frankel • 4/17/2015
Update: As of 12:21 p.m. EST on April 20, 2015, we have launched the mobile version of our articles and reviews! The Latest Update: As of 4:08 p.m. EST on May 28... read more »
How WPEngine Brings Blazing Speed to 300,000+ Websites

How WPEngine Brings Blazing Speed

By: Ryan Frankel • 3/16/2015
In a world where milliseconds matter, WPEngine’s unmatched technology delivers WordPress sites at incredible speeds with incredible value. By bringing high... read more »
How to Install Gearman on Ubuntu 14.04

Install Gearman on Ubuntu 14.04 in 5 Simple Steps
By: Ryan Frankel • 2/6/2015
Similar to our guide on installing Gearman on Ubuntu 12.04, this guide will get you all set up and running with Gearman on Ubuntu 14.04. In case you don’t know... read more »