I'm looking into getting and a low-end VPS box and setting it up as a Node.js web server. I will be doing mostly hobby stuff, nothing too critical (yet). I'll probably go for a 512MB RAM VPS, but ideally this thing should run on a 256MB one too. I guess I'll run a single Node.js process and a database.
My biggest question is the database -- what would you recommend for a low-memory machine? Can I start with something like SQLite and use an ORM that will let me migrate to something bigger like PostgreSQL with little trouble later on?
Or do people use mostly NoSQL databases? Which ones would fit on such a server?
I'm usually using NoSQL databases.
When I started working with node.js I also had a small VPS to play with. I'm not a sys admin and I just wanted to play with node. Therefore I quickly realized that using an own server keeps me away from doing what I really wanted -> using node.
Although you'll learn a lot, like SSH, upstart, vim, user management, installing packages, shell, etc. when you use your own server.
Today I'm using paas / saas instead my own server. My favourite node.js hosting provider is nodejitsu. You can try nodejitsu for free for 30 days. Heroku is also quite famous. For mongoDB databases I use mongolab and mongoHQ. For storing user session I prefer redis using RedisToGo. A good overview of db paas/saas can be found on heroku#data-stores.