Can I install Askbot on shared hosting?

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I got a similar replies from many hosts. I have tried These hosts

hostgator -I have asked these guys many a times .They have checked the Documentation of OSQA and said no on shared servers .They even said that their servers does not support some applications .

Certifiedhosting :same Reply(only on Dedicated servers)

site5 :Same reply

Pacifichost: Same reply for OSQA,shapado and askbot.I requested them to look at askbot's documentation .They looked at it said no .They said that they support mod_wsgi (or one of mod_fcgi, mod_python) .But not mongodb .

TMDhosting :Same reply . These are some of the top hosting companies and said no to stackoverflow based sites on shared hosting .

Arvixe They support mod_wsgi (or one of mod_fcgi, mod_python) .But not mongodb .

Some of the above said companies including hostgator and pacifichost firstly said that they support OSQA and askbot .Later after I purchasing it .They said No.

• The Company who said Yes :

Webfaction.com

Update:

Hostgator guys said that they won't support mod_wsgi on shared servers : (09:36:43 AM) asshu: Do you support mod_wsgi (or one of mod_fcgi, mod_python) configuration ? (09:37:23 AM) Derrick Em: Not on the shared servers. (09:37:31 AM) Derrick Em: You would need a VPS or dedicated server to install those.

You certainly don't need VPS to host applications like that. There is definitely no technical limitation, maybe they have their own business-related reasons to say that.

Ask them if mod_wsgi (or one of mod_fcgi, mod_python) configuration is available at the control panel. If they have it then you should be able to install askbot. If they don't give access to that part of the configuration - then you depend on their willingness to configure a "link" between the webserver and your application (served by one of those modules).

There are three differences in the installation on a shared host vs a host where you have full access to the server configuration and other system resources (such as VPS or a dedicated server).

On shared hosts:

• you edit the server config and setup databases indirectly - through a control panel and maybe .htaccess file or similar
• cannot easily install production-grade system resources, such as databases, webserver modules, etc.
• any other dependencies (e.g. python modules) that are not met by the provider must be installed in your user space and you need to add that location to the system path variables (for python it's PYTHONPATH)

When shopping for a provider for python web apps like askbot - ask if they support mod_wsgi apache module and explicitly say that they support Django. If they don't - try some other provider, djangofriendly.com has a good list of providers that support django apps. If the host supports django you will not need to compile the database adapter.

To install python app at an alternate location use --prefix=/path/to/some/dir parameter for setup.py or easy_install. The installer may complain about missing directories - if it does - create them and re-run the installer script.

I managed to install OSQA on DjangoEurope (djangoeurope.com). I used a virtualenv to install the two pre-requisites that were not already installed.

Askbot looked like it would work, but I ran into an installation problem with the initial migration - I suspect that can be solved.