How to Get a Free Linux Server in the Cloud - Oracle Cloud Free Tier 

same here. I rum a bunch of services on their free tier using docker.

Could you tell us best combinations that works smooth?

Could u help me sign up I'm from South Africa

How did you get free ssl?

Let me get this straight, you're saying as long as you pay then you get reliable (ie usable) service? What was the point of this video again?

​everything is free except the blok volume,which only seems to last a month in trial,after that they will smartly lock you out giving you no choice but to upgrade.Nothing is free here....

Can someone explain what this is used for? What exactly can you do with this?

@@ArturoGarzaID If you need a server that needs to have maximum uptime, then I would recommend that you get a paid service from Oracle or someone else. But if you need a service where a little down time can be tolerated, then this is worth considering. Personally I use this as a git server for my personal projects, for doing some heavy calculations that I don't want to burden my local workstation with and for a continuous service that collects data from various parts of the internet. If you are developing a project that will take some time before it goes live to real users then you could also use a free server until you get real users at which point it would be wise to upgrade to a paid version. I have also considered running a NextCloud server, there are many possibilities. I don't know what @Mr_ravee_ is refering to, but you get up to 200Gb of free storage included, I have had my server running for free for more than a year.

Do keep backups somewhere else.. Maybe setup a cloud sync with gdrive or other alternatives. It's not reliable. So better to make backups periodically.

Good luck trying to create one, its out of capacity.

I'd advice against this unless there's a way around the payment info section. The payment info part might scare the students, especially if they don't have any payment sources. This is coming from a recent graduate, so I'm not trying to speak for all. 😊

I'm surprised the college doesn't have the infrastructure to allow students this option, especially for an official class.

@@rbjolly We're a community college with extremely limited resources, unlike a university. Also, the goal is to familiarize students with cloud infrastructure rather than local VMs.

MobaXterm rocks.

I run Ubuntu on the Ampere VM and iptables -L shows empty chains. So nu problem there.

On the other hand, it is Oracle. They WILL screw you, sooner or later. No thanks.

FREE as in FEAR

All providers run these type of promotions. It costs them nothing. You can learn things you just don't have the infrastructure to do. If you were smart, you'd see the value in this instead of making sill comments about things you know nothing about.

Fuck yea! Tell him!

Oracle cloud is a scam. Please search google with keyword oracle cloud free scam, you can find many evidence it

Which card you used when upgrading to payg? My card was charged 100$ worth inr but haven't refunded yet and upgrade also still showing in progress

I tried their so called free server which they without any notice simply closed and also banned from creating any resources. Their customer care is total waste and they simply say "we can't tell any further on this" kind of template reply. It seems first they were accepting debit cards and that time I registered but without any notice they changed their policy and wanted credit cards and without informing or giving a chance to enter the credit card details they simply blocked all resources. Problem is now when I try to register freshly with an credit card it isn't allowing because my mobile number is already with them. I cannot give some other mobile number as it won't pass through credit card verification. Even if I change my mobile number and link to the credit still it is not allowing as they already have my credit card number as well which I tried earlier! It is not even allowing to create even a paid account. Usual "we can't help..." template reply from their customer care even when I like to take a paid account. As for those free servers which I tried for a limited period it works fine but at times it simply just not accessible. For any serious web hosting it is better to take some paid server than rely on oracle because even if we are paying 100s of $ in their paid account still the customer care is very very bad. Better to avoid them totally.

My debit card is not working wt to do ,if I buy SBI credit card will it work ?

@@vinusuhas4978 credit card should work. You can also try other debit card make sure to enable international transactions before trying.

If only I had mentioned that in the video!

No, privacy cards or debit cards don't work

If you eventually do get it to work... The account will be banned after 30 days

Oh, that isn't good. Thanks for sharing, I will keep my eyes open to see if others have similar problems.

Yes Many of my friends' accounts got banned just the same way after random days... It's not reliable... So. Whatever you do should be backed up Some place safe.

​@@GaryExplains it's common with OCI Free Tier specifically for my Country India. They ban accounts without any notice or anything. One day your instance is working the next day you wake up and the instance is deleted and the account is banned

But I guess there must be a reason, like using a unique single use virtual card number, or downloading torrents, or something like that. It says very clearly that they check the card number from time to time to make sure it is still valid.

I've got 3 free instances running for over 2 years now; only a few restarts (for security updates I think?) Just using it for website and ftp-server in the cloud 0 billing

I found the firewall an issue even after opening the ports. Oddly resolved by installing ufw and opening ports there as well as on Oracle's system.

In the region you selected that instance is not available probably.

Noooo he changed the thumbnail😢

Presumably you could run a command line torrent program, nohup it and come back later to collect. But that said I don't think you get much space on the free instance, so your torrent would need to be small (and, obviously, legal).

I think if they spot you doing that you will probably get banned due to the legal issues.

If you are living abroad then surely you also have a local bank account in the country where you live? No?

@@GaryExplains I live in China, which raises all sorts of additional complications. Yes, I have a local account, but I specifically want a host that is outside this specific walled garden.

If Oracle thinks you have just started the instance but you aren't using it, like leaving a light switched on during the day time, then it will switch it off. It isn't deleted, but shutdown. You can then restart it.

You notice the background that much?

@@GaryExplains It may just be me, but one of the advantages of listening to videos rather than actual people is that you can let your eyes ponder wherever you want without appearing rude. So, yes, at least I am spending quite some time looking at video backgrounds.

Seriously? They will shut down your machine without telling u?? What if we open 2 accounts and run the project using docker swarm across 2 separate servers?

@p s I cover that in the video, didn't you watch it. They don't do it "without telling u", I covered that in the video as well.

@@ps3301 They usually do this when the user violates their terms of service, create multiple accounts, they try to use a pre-paid card, etc.

Of course they tell it in advance, but there is no way to stop it once you get the notice. You have to wait for the precise moment to power up your machine again to minimize the downtime and reclaim the resource. It is very difficult to get an Ampere machine. Since my workload is almost constant, i believe they do this to avoid commercial usage, when they shut down they explicitly mention they never shot down paid instances. I can't say it's unfair nor complain because it's a free service.

They will add it to monthly statement

@@mkpati Even if I only use "always free" resources?

@@masterneme always free resources are limited by usage... If you are running always free tier instances you can use them as you wish... It won't charge you...

@@mkpati Yes but they have a monthly traffic/bandwidth limit. I was just wondering what do they do when you reach it.

Larry has to pay for his yachts somehow

you can have a total of 3 free instances ( 2x single core - dual thread AMD EPYC with 1GB RAM each + 1x eight cores AMPERE with 24GB RAM)

Are you sure it is the first 3000 hours PER MONTH and not just the first 3000 hours in total (as a one off).

@@GaryExplains I found another channel, he tells that per month ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-g7sP33QtuxM.html

What is the link to the offer, is it Oracle? Edit: I had a quick look and yes that seems to be the offering for Arm servers which is great. My problem is that none are available in my area which I covered briefly in the video.

24GB RAM, 200GB Storage, 4 arm vCPU Cores, 4 Gbps Connection

I guess the best way to get help is from Oracle directly.

Yea, also had issues and just gave up

I contacted them some time ago, you cannot create multiple accounts. They do some checks for the address the Creditcards are registered on or some other checks. Logical I guess, it is a free tier… they don’ want people to misuse this privilege.

@@GaryExplains They were of no help didn't get any usefull information.

​@@GaryExplains they won't help. I tried. 😅

"When your 30-day trial period for the expanded set of services ends [which includes the $300], you can continue using Always Free services with no interruption." Oracle site.

Yes, you get credit to use extra services. Those will stop after 30 days if you don’t upgrade. The free tier services remain forever.

Not quite the same, it is free of charge, within specified monthly usage limits. "When you stay within the Free Tier limits, these resources are not charged against your Free Trial credits or to your Cloud Billing account's payment method after your trial ends."

@@GaryExplains are you talking google or oracle now? google: 30 GB-months standard persistent disk 1 GB network egress from North America to all region destinations (excluding China and Australia) per month Your Free Tier e2-micro instance limit is by time, not by instance. Each month, eligible use of all of your e2-micro instance is free until you have used a number of hours equal to the total hours in the current month. Usage calculations are combined across the supported regions. Compute Engine free tier does not charge for an external IP address.

​@@GaryExplains they shutdown registration page, have you know that??

I doubt it was for no reason, of course the people say it was for no reason as they aren't going to confess to downloading torrents or having multiple accounts or using virtual card numbers or whatever.

@@GaryExplains you are right - all i have to go off is their word. nothing wrong with virtual credit cards however - they can bounce a payment, just like a normal card

I haven't checked but I doubt that. Oracle has been offering this service for several years.

​@@GaryExplains update: they does not shutdown the page or services. It is not able to use from Venezuela. We need a VPN for use that.

I don't think you can. You need to download the key that you got when you created the instance .

@@GaryExplains i had the key, i just wanted to login using a password instead, it worked out, thanks anyway 👍

@@GaryExplains one more question, i chose the minimum specs, and i have 250$ , can i use them to upgrade now? I still don’t get it honestly

If only I had mentioned that in the video... Oh wait...

i guess everybody says that. oracle is one of the greediest companies around

@@willi1978 Right, somehow I never payed them a cent, while using their Enterprise grade Linux OS with all the updates for free, and Cloud VM for my webserver in Oracle Free tier cloud for several years now... sure.

I thought that was pronunciation not grammar?

​@@GaryExplains As a spoken & written English Nazi apparently I don't differentiate; syntax, prononciation, spelling it's all the same. 🙂

Which makes you unqualified, I guess 😁😛

@@loc4725 What do they call someone that gets upset over the misuse of the German language?

@@prezadent1 Nationalsozialistischer deutscher Sprachperfektionist.

Why so attached to Solaris? Every other version of Unix basically died, including OSF/1, Ultrix, etc, in favor of Linux.

@@GaryExplains Hi Gary, thanks for answering. After Oracle bought Sun, all the projects changed (i am mostly thinking of java and zfs). I'm not too deep in illumos scene so i highly recommend everybody to watch Bryan Cantrill talks, or just read the wikipedia article: Acquisition of Sun Microsystems by Oracle Corporation

Yes, I know what Oracle did. But it bought the company and it had the right to do whatever it wanted with it, regardless if you or I liked it. But my question was, why are you so attached to Solaris. Surely Linux won, regardless of what Oracle did or did not so with Sun.

And?

@@GaryExplains Not just credit card details but also mobile number linked to that card and it claims it is for verification. But they store our mobile number and also credit card details. If it is totally free and without our permission they aren't going to charge then why they worry so much about asking our details? Main problem with them is all goes well till resource creating page then nothing will be created and all our details will be them. Hence we can't try again with same card or same mobile number. Through comments I come to know many from India are facing the same problem like me. May be you are lucky or the comments here which are against Oracle are unlucky people.

If you don't understand why, when I explained why very clearly in the video, then I can't help you further. What I don't understand is that Oracle is offering something for free and people still find a way to complain about it 😂

Every user of cloud computing has horror stories of unexpected large bills, nothing special about Oracle specifically.

@@GaryExplains Not exactly. I was working for a huge bank few years ago and they received a nice bill, so the bank decided to migrate to Postgresql. This is why I was working for them.

That is a different thing. Oracle database is a commercial product. Postgresql is open source and I guess they used it without any support contract etc. That isn't about cloud computing.

I haven't had any problems and I have been using it for more than a year. Lots of people here in the comments have said very positive things about it. If you try to cheat the system with a virtual card number or use multiple accounts then it seems that Oracle does close those accounts.

@@GaryExplains I used a good valid card, and in was the only account ever created. Did not do anything that could be considered cheating and they just terminated the tenancy without any notice or anything. So please do not tell me they are OK as they do not deserve the promotion for the free tier presented everywhere on RU-vid.

Ok, that sounds like a valid problem. However I have not had that experience so I made this based on my experience, not yours. I can't ask 8 billion people about their experiences of any product or service before I make a video, i can only base it on mine, and mine have been positive.

For example, there is a comment here from Maurits Dijkens, it reads, "I've got 3 free instances running for over 2 years now; only a few restarts (for security updates I think?) Just using it for website and ftp-server in the cloud. 0 billing." So he didn't have the same problem as you and he has been using it for 2 years.

@@GaryExplains I am glad people can use it, for me it was impossible. And after they terminated the tenancy after about 17 days, now I cannot use my account at all and also cannot even delete it if I want. So in my opinion it is was not a great experience.

Which would also be true if you were paying for it? Banning is because you did something not permitted by the terms and conditions, free or paid.

​@@GaryExplains doing nothing also leads to ban. Then I guess. 😅

​@@GaryExplains happened to many of my friends

​@@mkpati regular backups if you're running something sensitive

@@hotwings9382 I have learnt my lesson already. My friend was running a tg bot and when they banned the account his database was lost along with the source codes.

No they don't. I have never paid anything.