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So question for the masses, I’ve wanted to setup a personal account on Google cloud, azure etc and take advantage of free stuff but I am terrified something wi

by Vaslo 6y ago

So question for the masses, I’ve wanted to setup a personal account on Google cloud, azure etc and take advantage of free stuff but I am terrified something will happen and I’ll mess something up or someone will mess it up for me and I’ll be out hundreds on my credit card. Any suggestions here? Great list.

kodah 6y ago
Meh, I hate the idea of individual devs signing up for clouds like AWS, GCP, or Azure. These are huge cost machines and are designed to serve fast moving startups and hulking enterprises. The best you can do is setup account limits and alerts. The real answer is that if you have an understanding of networks and systems, then the cloud is just a data center with different considerations. Your company should be giving you resources like sandbox accounts that you can play in. This is how you'll really learn.
pkage 6y ago
I strongly recommend setting up and using virtual credit cards, you can use them to enforce spending limits and spend maximums. There are several services that allow this, for example my CC company supports them directly or there are several services that let you set them up backed by a debit card. That way, if your hosting provider overcharges you it'll just bounce.
- mycall 6y ago
  PayPal can provide virtual credit cards, if I remember correctly.
- lemarchr 6y ago
  Bills don't just magically go away if you refuse to pay them.
  - jojobas 6y ago
    They do to a degree. Nobody's going to court over a $200 bounced charge that you could argue shouldn't have been there in the first place. Most services will just close your account and move on with their lives.
    - smnrchrds 6y ago
      But in the current climate of big tech oligopoly, they don't have to take you to court to make your life miserable. They can simply ban you from their services and make your professional life much more difficult for the rest of your natural life. When the pandemic hit, flights were cancelled, and refund requests were unanswered here in Canada, many were afraid of requesting a charge back through their credit card company. In a country with only two major airline companies and a size that is too vast to travel by land all the time, getting banned from one, if they choose to do it, would make one's life so much more difficult. Tech is not far from that in terms of oligopoly power.
      - jojobas 6y ago
        They're not That Smart. A new email address and PO box is a new person. Was there ever a precedent of an airline ban over a chargeback where a refund was warranted?
        smnrchrds 6y ago
        > A new email address and PO box is a new person. Not to airlines, which have your full legal name, date of birth, and passport number on file. Not to big tech either, which are in practice giant surveillance companies and have mastered the art of tracking everyone and anyone on- and offline. > Was there ever a precedent of an airline ban over a chargeback where a refund was warranted? I don't know. But many people would not have the time to research this to their satisfaction, nor would want to risk it and find out the answer the hard way.
- nsomaru 6y ago
  Is there a way to do this for people based in Africa? My cursory searches came up empty...
- esterin 6y ago
  This is a valid strategy, but some companies already disallow virtual/prepaid cards, Scaleway for example.
jakequade 6y ago
Grab a revolut account. They're free, and they have a tool called 'digital temporary card' that is good for one use. After the card number is used, it's cycled. Not affiliated, I'm in Aus and I use my temp card for anything I don't want to be ongoing. Doubles as a breach safeguard (my credit card involved in a DB dump doesn't matter if it was a one-off number). There's other good reasons to use revolut but will save it :)
- bombcar 6y ago
  If you do something like this do NOT sign up for AWS or Google Cloud with your “main account” as a denied card can get your entire account lost.
  - jakequade 6y ago
    Hasn't been my experience, but good to hear.
  - ArchOversight 6y ago
    Also, don't use virtual cards with Google Cloud. My old boss used his shiny new Apple Credit Card, which has a virtual number for non Apple Pay charges. His entire account got locked out until he was finally about to get ahold of someone in billing to reverse it. It was right around the time that this article: https://smartprivacy.io/learn/i-got-banned-from-google-ads-for-using-apple-card https://smartprivacy.io/learn/i-got-banned-from-google-ads-f... was making the rounds.
gm 6y ago
Set up a budget. At least Azure has those, and you can set whatever limit you want. If you hit the limit, the access will be cut off (and VMs shut down, etc). Your data will not be lost, though. When the new billing period rolls around, all will be back to normal. I highly recommend something like this if you want to learn the cloud and do not have an employer to sponsor an account for you. All these suggestions of using a throw-away CC number to avoid paying the bill are just unethical, IMO. No need to resort to those measures.
- ficklepickle 6y ago
  Be careful with that. On AWS, at least, you can get a massive bill before the limits kick in. There have been horror stories posted here before.
tibu 6y ago
Based on stories from HN I would totally separate these accounts from any personal accounts. Even separate it project based. It any of them gets canceled, locked you shouldn't lose access to your personal mail or mobile phone.
smallnamespace 6y ago
You can set up alerts and triggers, up to pulling the plug automatically. Not exactly for the faint of heart. GCP https://cloud.google.com/billing/docs/how-to/budgets-programmatic-notifications https://cloud.google.com/billing/docs/how-to/budgets-program... AWS https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awsaccountbilling/latest/aboutv2/budgets-managing-costs.html https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awsaccountbilling/latest/aboutv2... https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/10/announcing-aws-budgets-actions/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/10/announcin...
otabdeveloper4 6y ago
Can only speak for AWS. Don't do it, Amazon's whole shtick is having such opaque and illogical and convoluted pricing that you just throw your hands up and let it go.
rurban 6y ago
I was on the free Redhat Open Cloud (rhcloud.com) for the years it existed. Thus I would never use the free Oracle cloud. Since then I'm a happy free Heroku user, but also tried Azure, Google, AWS. Azure had the worst UI and features, but the others similar bad. Google also cannot be trusted for such a freebie, because of their random PM policies, Amazon forgot why. Both high risk to pay unexpectedly.
ja27 6y ago
Buy a $25 Visa gift card, spend $20-ish of it elsewhere, and use that for the account. They may post a charge of $1 or so to initially confirm the card. (I've had success with this in the past but apparently results can vary - some services may block a prepaid card)

by Vaslo 6y ago

kodah 6y ago

Meh, I hate the idea of individual devs signing up for clouds like AWS, GCP, or Azure. These are huge cost machines and are designed to serve fast moving startups and hulking enterprises. The best you can do is setup account limits and alerts. The real answer is that if you have an understanding of networks and systems, then the cloud is just a data center with different considerations. Your company should be giving you resources like sandbox accounts that you can play in. This is how you'll really learn.

pkage 6y ago

I strongly recommend setting up and using virtual credit cards, you can use them to enforce spending limits and spend maximums. There are several services that allow this, for example my CC company supports them directly or there are several services that let you set them up backed by a debit card. That way, if your hosting provider overcharges you it'll just bounce.

mycall 6y ago
PayPal can provide virtual credit cards, if I remember correctly.
lemarchr 6y ago
Bills don't just magically go away if you refuse to pay them.
- jojobas 6y ago
  They do to a degree. Nobody's going to court over a $200 bounced charge that you could argue shouldn't have been there in the first place. Most services will just close your account and move on with their lives.
  - smnrchrds 6y ago
    But in the current climate of big tech oligopoly, they don't have to take you to court to make your life miserable. They can simply ban you from their services and make your professional life much more difficult for the rest of your natural life. When the pandemic hit, flights were cancelled, and refund requests were unanswered here in Canada, many were afraid of requesting a charge back through their credit card company. In a country with only two major airline companies and a size that is too vast to travel by land all the time, getting banned from one, if they choose to do it, would make one's life so much more difficult. Tech is not far from that in terms of oligopoly power.
    - jojobas 6y ago
      They're not That Smart. A new email address and PO box is a new person. Was there ever a precedent of an airline ban over a chargeback where a refund was warranted?
      - smnrchrds 6y ago
        > A new email address and PO box is a new person. Not to airlines, which have your full legal name, date of birth, and passport number on file. Not to big tech either, which are in practice giant surveillance companies and have mastered the art of tracking everyone and anyone on- and offline. > Was there ever a precedent of an airline ban over a chargeback where a refund was warranted? I don't know. But many people would not have the time to research this to their satisfaction, nor would want to risk it and find out the answer the hard way.
nsomaru 6y ago
Is there a way to do this for people based in Africa? My cursory searches came up empty...
esterin 6y ago
This is a valid strategy, but some companies already disallow virtual/prepaid cards, Scaleway for example.

jakequade 6y ago

Grab a revolut account. They're free, and they have a tool called 'digital temporary card' that is good for one use. After the card number is used, it's cycled. Not affiliated, I'm in Aus and I use my temp card for anything I don't want to be ongoing. Doubles as a breach safeguard (my credit card involved in a DB dump doesn't matter if it was a one-off number). There's other good reasons to use revolut but will save it :)

bombcar 6y ago
If you do something like this do NOT sign up for AWS or Google Cloud with your “main account” as a denied card can get your entire account lost.
- jakequade 6y ago
  Hasn't been my experience, but good to hear.
- ArchOversight 6y ago
  Also, don't use virtual cards with Google Cloud. My old boss used his shiny new Apple Credit Card, which has a virtual number for non Apple Pay charges. His entire account got locked out until he was finally about to get ahold of someone in billing to reverse it. It was right around the time that this article: https://smartprivacy.io/learn/i-got-banned-from-google-ads-for-using-apple-card https://smartprivacy.io/learn/i-got-banned-from-google-ads-f... was making the rounds.

gm 6y ago

Set up a budget. At least Azure has those, and you can set whatever limit you want. If you hit the limit, the access will be cut off (and VMs shut down, etc). Your data will not be lost, though. When the new billing period rolls around, all will be back to normal. I highly recommend something like this if you want to learn the cloud and do not have an employer to sponsor an account for you. All these suggestions of using a throw-away CC number to avoid paying the bill are just unethical, IMO. No need to resort to those measures.

ficklepickle 6y ago
Be careful with that. On AWS, at least, you can get a massive bill before the limits kick in. There have been horror stories posted here before.

tibu 6y ago

Based on stories from HN I would totally separate these accounts from any personal accounts. Even separate it project based. It any of them gets canceled, locked you shouldn't lose access to your personal mail or mobile phone.

smallnamespace 6y ago

You can set up alerts and triggers, up to pulling the plug automatically. Not exactly for the faint of heart. GCP https://cloud.google.com/billing/docs/how-to/budgets-programmatic-notifications https://cloud.google.com/billing/docs/how-to/budgets-program... AWS https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awsaccountbilling/latest/aboutv2/budgets-managing-costs.html https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awsaccountbilling/latest/aboutv2... https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/10/announcing-aws-budgets-actions/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/10/announcin...

otabdeveloper4 6y ago

Can only speak for AWS. Don't do it, Amazon's whole shtick is having such opaque and illogical and convoluted pricing that you just throw your hands up and let it go.

rurban 6y ago

I was on the free Redhat Open Cloud (rhcloud.com) for the years it existed. Thus I would never use the free Oracle cloud. Since then I'm a happy free Heroku user, but also tried Azure, Google, AWS. Azure had the worst UI and features, but the others similar bad. Google also cannot be trusted for such a freebie, because of their random PM policies, Amazon forgot why. Both high risk to pay unexpectedly.

ja27 6y ago

Buy a $25 Visa gift card, spend $20-ish of it elsewhere, and use that for the account. They may post a charge of $1 or so to initially confirm the card. (I've had success with this in the past but apparently results can vary - some services may block a prepaid card)