​Odoo Hosting for Dummies

Odoo Online: The Simplicity

Odoo Online is SaaS (Software as a Service).  In a few seconds, and a couple of clicks, your cloud instance will be ready to use anywhere and anytime.  It even comes with a pre-configured email server!

Odoo Online is simple:  you’ll never have to worry about the technical aspects because Odoo takes care of everything.  It is included in the price of c. £17.50 per user per month with access to all of the modules.  It is backed up every day, replicated across three continents, and you can duplicate your live environment to try out new things.

The restrictions:  it is great for start-ups but if you need any customisations or want to run multi-company then you will need to upgrade to Odoo SH.  The performance is pretty good.  But you cannot control the speed, you are on a shared server, so there is nothing you can do on performance or storage capacity.

On-Premises: Limitless Possibilities

Odoo Enterprise can also be deployed independently form Odoo’s own servers.  This means you have much more control on performance.  An appealing proposition….

BUT - if you want to serve Odoo in-house, you need to be aware that you will need your own Odoo infrastructure and administration skills – which are likely to cost you £50,000 + in salary.  If you are in Military Intelligence, Arms manufacturing or Central Government you will have very good reason for self-hosting – or should you ‘Outsource’?

And that is where we at Calibrate started – from experience of using a specialised managed hosting provider when working for another Odoo partner – it was the obvious choice when we started our company.  We chose a well-qualified Odoo-specialist hosting company that offered all of the technical and administrative expertise in Odoo.  It has a competitive pricing model, that allowed us to have our own Odoo instance, and offer clients what they need, with a small margin for us.

We carried over the internal customer stickiness message from our previous Odoo services provider.  When we are managing the hosting of Odoo on behalf of a client – moving away is more of a challenge than if they were centrally hosted by Odoo directly.

We used this Odoo managed hosting model for our first few clients, and it worked pretty well, there were challenges with managing alerts back to the provider, some limitations on the staging instances, and performance degradation when loading additional apps.

The invoices coming from the hosting provider were increasing as the client base expanded, and this triggered discussions with a long-established and very experienced Odoo Partner, Sapentia, with whom we have a good working relationship.  The advice from Sapentia’s Andy Dyson, was that Odoo SH is the simple, no-overhead (administrative, technical and financial) option. Easy to upgrade performance, manage staging instances and view diagnostics.

It took time, but when we tried it with a new client our Operations Director was so impressed, that we transitioned all of our clients to Odoo SH.  In our opinion, it is the best hosting option in terms of flexibility and ease of use.  Our clients stick with us because of the quality of service we deliver, not the hosting hand-cuffs!

We do not need to answer the following questions – Odoo does it:

• ​What is the service level agreement (guaranteed uptime) and how does it scale (when you add users, apps, or process more data)?
• What is the disaster recovery policy?
• How and when can I download my back-ups and what is the data policy?
• What kind of test environment do you provide?
• Who is responsible for the maintenance and upgrades of third-party apps (Odoo SA is always responsible for the maintenance and upgrades of certified apps)?

Odoo.sh: The Best of Both Worlds

Odoo.sh is a PaaS (Platform as a Service) managed by Odoo SA.  Odoo.sh allows you to deploy your own cloud platform in a couple of clicks.  It also comes with an email server.

Odoo.sh is made for customised Odoo implementations:  you can easily install Odoo certified apps as well as any third-party apps available on the Odoo apps store, or customisations from your Odoo Partner. Odoo.sh is also needed if you are integrating with other software, such as Shopify or Xero or third-party logistics providers (which are just a few examples of what Calibrate has done for clients).

For the more technically minded - you can also find built-in tools that will help you to develop new apps and custom features such as:

• Integration with Github
• An online editor
• Continuous integration (your own “runbot”)
• A development and staging environment
• Branch management (track, fork, merge, etc...)
• Automated testing of every new commit
• And more...

Odoo.sh gives you the flexibility to choose the best deployment architecture (number of workers, storage, and number of staging environments) and lets you easily adjust your configuration as your needs evolve.  The platform will scale as your company grows!

The platform gives you the best of both worlds: the deployment and maintenance convenience of Odoo Online combined with the freedom of Odoo On-Premises.

Migrating to Another Platform

Migrating from one platform to another one is always an option.  Depending on the origin and the destination platform, the migration complexity will vary.  If you want to discuss the complexity of the migration from one platform to another, you can contact us to discuss your options.

Summary

Choosing your hosting environment is an important decision to make before implementing Odoo, and you have the freedom to choose what suits you best.  Odoo Online is the best solution if you're looking for standard software that is easy to set-up and maintain, but as your Odoo partner we can help you determine the best option for you and your business goals. 

Contact Us Today For Calibrate Hosting Options Adv​​​​​​ice

*prices and hosting options may vary.

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