Parallels Plesk Panel Client's Guide

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Parallels® Plesk Panel

ISBN: N/A

Parallels

660 SW 39th Street

Suite 205

Renton, Washington 98057

USA

Phone: +1 (425) 282 6400

Fax: +1 (425) 282 6444

Parallels, Inc.

Distribution of this work or derivative of this work in any form is prohibited unless prior written

permission is obtained from the copyright holder.

Patented technology protected by U.S.Patents 7,328,225; 7,325,017; 7,293,033; 7,099,948;

7,076,633.

Patents pending in the U.S.

Product and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners.

Contents

Preface 7

Who Should Read This Guide ....................................................................................................... 7

Typographical Conventions ........................................................................................................... 7

Feedback ....................................................................................................................................... 8

Getting Started 9

Logging In to Plesk ...................................................................................................................... 10

If You Forgot Your Password ............................................................................................ 10

Becoming Familiar with Plesk's Interface .................................................................................... 11

Items in the Desktop View ................................................................................................. 12

Items in the Standard View ............................................................................................... 12

Changing Your Contact Information and Password .................................................................... 13

Customizing Your Control Panel 15

Setting Up Global Account .......................................................................................................... 16

Creating A Global Account ................................................................................................ 18

Connecting Local Accounts To Your Global Account ....................................................... 18

Switching Between Accounts ............................................................................................ 19

Changing Global Account Password ................................................................................ 19

Disconnecting Local Accounts From Global Account ....................................................... 19

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Standard View ............................................................... 20

Setting Interface Language and Skin for Your Control Panel ........................................... 20

Setting a Custom Logo ...................................................................................................... 20

Adding a Hyperlink Button to Your Control Panel ............................................................. 21

Removing a Hyperlink Button from Your Control Panel .................................................... 22

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Desktop View ................................................................ 22

Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package 24

Viewing IP addresses Included in Your Hosting Package .......................................................... 24

Viewing Resource Allotments for Your Account .......................................................................... 25

Viewing the List of Operations You Can Perform within Your Control Panel .............................. 27

Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates 29

Creating Templates ..................................................................................................................... 30

Modifying Templates ................................................................................................................... 35

Removing Templates................................................................................................................... 35

Managing Hosting Accounts 36

Upgrading Hosting Accounts ....................................................................................................... 37

Renewing Hosting Accounts ............................................................................................. 41

Suspending and Unsuspending Hosting Accounts ..................................................................... 41

Changing Web Hosting Type From Physical to Forwarding ....................................................... 42

Introducing Similar Changes to Numerous Hosting Accounts .................................................... 43

Removing Hosting Accounts ....................................................................................................... 44

Preface 4

Hosting Web Sites 45

Predefining Content for New Web Sites ...................................................................................... 46

Obtaining Domain Names ........................................................................................................... 47

Setting Up Hosting Account for a Web Site ................................................................................ 48

Limiting the Amount of Resources a Site Can Consume .................................................. 52

Allowing the Site Owner to Log in to Control Panel .......................................................... 54

Publishing a Site .......................................................................................................................... 56

Publishing Sites Through FTP .......................................................................................... 56

Uploading Sites Through Plesk File Manager ................................................................... 59

Publishing Sites from Microsoft FrontPage ....................................................................... 60

Publishing Sites from SiteBuilder ...................................................................................... 64

Publishing Sites with Adobe Dreamweaver ...................................................................... 65

Previewing a Site ......................................................................................................................... 66

Configuring ASP.NET .................................................................................................................. 66

Configuring ASP.NET for Domains ................................................................................... 67

Configuring ASP.NET for Virtual Directories ..................................................................... 69

Restoring Default ASP.NET Configuration ....................................................................... 71

Changing .NET Framework Version for Domains ............................................................. 72

Changing .NET Framework Version for Virtual Directories .............................................. 72

Setting PHP Version for a Domain .............................................................................................. 73

Deploying Databases .................................................................................................................. 73

Creating and Importing Databases ................................................................................... 74

Creating Database User Accounts .................................................................................... 75

Changing Database User Passwords ............................................................................... 75

Removing Database User Accounts ................................................................................. 76

Removing Databases ........................................................................................................ 76

Accessing Data From External Databases ................................................................................. 77

Creating Connections to External Databases by Installing New ODBC Drivers ............... 77

Changing Settings Of Existing ODBC Connections .......................................................... 78

Removing Connections to External Databases ................................................................ 78

Installing Applications .................................................................................................................. 79

Installing Java Web Applications....................................................................................... 82

Installing ASP.NET Web Applications ............................................................................... 83

Configuring Data Source Names for Adobe ColdFusion............................................................. 84

Creating a New Data Source Name .................................................................................. 84

Changing Settings of a Data Source Name ...................................................................... 85

Removing a Data Source Name ....................................................................................... 85

Using IIS Application Pool ........................................................................................................... 86

Setting Up IIS Application Pool ......................................................................................... 87

Disabling IIS Application Pool ........................................................................................... 87

Organizing Site Structure with Subdomains ................................................................................ 88

Setting Up Subdomains .................................................................................................... 89

Removing Subdomains ..................................................................................................... 91

Setting Up Additional Domain Names for a Site (Domain Aliases) ............................................. 91

Setting Up a Domain Alias ................................................................................................ 92

Modifying Properties of a Domain Alias ............................................................................ 93

Removing a Domain Alias ................................................................................................. 93

Using Virtual Directories .............................................................................................................. 94

Creating Virtual Directories ............................................................................................... 95

Changing Virtual Directory Settings .................................................................................. 96

Adding and Removing MIME Types ................................................................................. 99

Setting PHP Version for Virtual Directories ..................................................................... 101

Removing Virtual Directories ........................................................................................... 101

Hosting Personal Web Pages on Your Web Server .................................................................. 102

Changing FTP Password for a Web Page Owner .......................................................... 103

Allocating More Disk Space to the Web Page Owner .................................................... 103

Removing Web Page Owner's Account .......................................................................... 104

Preface 5

Setting Up Anonymous FTP Access to the Server ................................................................... 104

Customizing Web Server Error Messages ................................................................................ 105

Customizing DNS Zone Configuration for Domains .................................................................. 107

Adding Resource Records .............................................................................................. 108

Modifying Resource Records .......................................................................................... 109

Modifying Common Access Control List (ACL) ............................................................... 110

Removing Resource Records ......................................................................................... 111

Restoring the Original Zone Configuration ...................................................................... 111

Serving Sites with External Domain Name Servers .................................................................. 112

Serving Domain Names for Sites Hosted on Other Servers (Domain Forwarding) .................. 114

Renaming Domains ................................................................................................................... 115

Suspending and Unsuspending Domains ................................................................................. 115

Removing Domains ................................................................................................................... 116

Protecting Web Sites 117

Securing E-commerce Transactions with Secure Sockets Layer Encryption ........................... 118

Obtaining and Installing SSL Certificates from Comodo, GeoTrust, Inc. or GoDaddy ... 119

Obtaining and Installing SSL Certificates from Other Certification Authorities ............... 120

Creating and Installing Free Self-signed SSL Certificate ................................................ 121

Uninstalling a Certificate from Your Site ......................................................................... 122

Configuring Shared SSL and Master SSL Domain ......................................................... 123

Using SSL Certificate Shared By Another Domain (Shared SSL) .................................. 124

Restricting Bandwidth Usage For Domains .............................................................................. 125

Restricting the Amount of Simultaneous Web Connections to Domains .................................. 125

Protecting Sites From Bandwidth Stealing (Hotlinking) ............................................................. 126

Allowing and Disallowing Domains to Directly Link to Your Domain Files ...................... 126

Restricting Access to Web Server's Resources with Password Protection .............................. 127

Protecting a Resource ..................................................................................................... 127

Adding and Removing Authorized Users ........................................................................ 128

Unprotecting a Resource ................................................................................................ 129

Setting File and Folder Access Permissions ............................................................................. 129

Setting and Changing Access Permissions for Groups and Users ................................. 130

Removing Access Permissions from Groups and Users ................................................ 130

Setting Up Access Permissions Inheritance for Files and Folders ................................. 131

Setting, Changing and Removing Special Access Permissions ..................................... 131

Setting Access Permissions for Virtual Directories ......................................................... 132

Repairing Access Permissions ........................................................................................ 132

Viewing Statistics 134

Automating Report Generation and Delivery by E-mail ............................................................ 136

Viewing Log Files and Configuring Recycling of Log Files ....................................................... 138

Backing Up And Restoring Your Data 139

Backing Up Individual Domains (Web Sites) ............................................................................. 140

Backing Up Your Databases ..................................................................................................... 141

Backing Up Databases .................................................................................................... 141

Restoring Databases ....................................................................................................... 142

Maintaining Database Backup Files Repository ............................................................. 142

Recovering Orphaned Database Users .......................................................................... 144

Scheduling Backups .................................................................................................................. 145

Restoring Data From Backup Archives ..................................................................................... 146

Maintaining Your Backup Files Repository ............................................................................... 146

Uploading Backup Files to Server ................................................................................... 147

Downloading Backup Files from Server .......................................................................... 147

Removing Backup Files from Server .............................................................................. 148

Preface 6

Using E-mail Services 149

Creating Mailboxes .................................................................................................................... 150

Setting Up Your E-mail Program for Retrieving Mail from Your Mailbox .................................. 151

Accessing Your Mail From a Web Browser ............................................................................... 152

Protecting Mailboxes From Spam ............................................................................................. 153

Setting Up Additional Disposable E-mail Addresses (Mail Aliases)................................ 154

Setting Up Spam Filter .................................................................................................... 155

Protecting Mailboxes From Viruses ........................................................................................... 159

Switching on Antivirus Protection .................................................................................... 160

Switching off Antivirus Protection .................................................................................... 160

Suspending and Unsuspending Mailboxes ............................................................................... 161

Removing Mailboxes ................................................................................................................. 162

Switching off the Mailbox Service When You Have Decided to Turn Your Account into a Mail

Forwarder .................................................................................................................................. 162

Setting Up Mail Forwarding to a Single E-mail Address ........................................................... 163

Suspending and Unsuspending Mail Forwarders ........................................................... 164

Setting Up Mail Forwarding to Multiple E-mail Addresses ........................................................ 165

Adding and Removing Recipient Addresses ................................................................... 166

Switching off Mail Forwarding to Multiple E-mail Addresses .......................................... 167

Removing Mail Forwarders ....................................................................................................... 167

Setting Up Automatic Reply ...................................................................................................... 168

Switching off Automatic Reply ................................................................................................... 169

Setting Up Site-wide Preferences for Handling Mail to Nonexistent Users (Mail Bounce) ....... 170

Introducing Similar Changes to a Number of Mail Accounts at Once ....................................... 171

Maintaining Mailing Lists ........................................................................................................... 171

Setting Up a Mailing List ................................................................................................. 172

Subscribing and Unsubscribing Users ............................................................................ 172

Exporting The List Of Subscribed Users ......................................................................... 173

Posting to Your Mailing List ............................................................................................. 173

Removing Mailing Lists ................................................................................................... 173

Scheduling Tasks 174

Scheduling a Task ..................................................................................................................... 174

Suspending and Resuming Execution of Tasks ........................................................................ 175

Unscheduling a Task ................................................................................................................. 175

Monitoring Connections to Control Panel and FTP Services 176

Monitoring Connections to Control Panel .................................................................................. 176

Monitoring Connections to FTP Service .................................................................................... 177

Accessing The Server Via Remote Desktop (RDP) 178

Using Help Desk for Resolving Your Customers' Issues and Requesting Assistance from Provider 180

Viewing Trouble Tickets in Your Help Desk .............................................................................. 181

Commenting and Closing Trouble Tickets ................................................................................ 181

Submitting a Problem Report to Your Service Provider ............................................................ 182

Preface 7

In this section:

Who Should Read This Guide ........................................................................... 7

Typographical Conventions ............................................................................... 7

Feedback .......................................................................................................... 8

Formatting convention

Type of Information

Example

Special Bold

Items you must select, such as menu options, command buttons, or items in a list.

Go to the System tab.

Titles of chapters, sections, and subsections.

Read the Basic Administration chapter.

Italics

Used to emphasize the importance of a point, to introduce a term or to designate a command line placeholder, which is to be replaced with a real name or value.

The system supports the so called wildcard character search.

Monospace

The names of commands, files, and directories.

The license file is located in the

http://docs/common/licen ses directory.

Preface

Who Should Read This Guide

This guide is intended for hosting resellers and owners of multiple domains, who were provided with access to Plesk control panel as part of their shared, dedicated or reseller hosting package.

Typographical Conventions

Before you start using this guide, it is important to understand the documentation conventions used in it.

The following kinds of formatting in the text identify special information.

8 Preface

Formatting convention

Type of Information

Example

Preformatted

On-screen computer output in your commandline sessions; source code in XML, C++, or other programming languages.

# ls –al /files

total 14470

Preformatted Bold

What you type, contrasted with on-screen computer output.

# cd /root/rpms/php

CAPITALS

Names of keys on the keyboard.

SHIFT, CTRL, ALT

KEY+KEY

Key combinations for which the user must press and hold down one key and then press another.

CTRL+P, ALT+F4

Feedback

If you have found an error in this guide, or if you have suggestions or ideas on how to improve this guide, please send your feedback using the online form at

http://www.parallels.com/en/support/usersdoc/. Please include in your report the guide's title,

chapter and section titles, and the fragment of text in which you have found an error.

Plesk is the control panel software that you use for reselling shared hosting services,

In this chapter:

Logging In to Plesk ............................................................................................ 10

Becoming Familiar with Plesk's Interface........................................................... 11

Changing Your Contact Information and Password ........................................... 13

C H A P T E R 1

Getting Started

and hosting your own domain names and web sites.

You can manage the hosted domain names and web sites on your own, or delegate permissions to manage individual domains to other users. Upon delegation, a separate Domain Administrator's control panel environment is automatically created, providing your customer with site and e-mail management capabilities in accordance with the permissions you define.

Using the Domain Administrator's control panel, a site owner can:

 Change passwords for access to control panel and Web space through FTP,

 Publish and preview a Web site,

 Install, manage and remove databases and Web applications,

 Order and install SSL certificates to secure online transactions (this is possible for

Web sites hosted on a dedicated IP address, which is not shared among other Web sites),

 Set up, manage and remove subdomains,

 Host personal Web pages for other users,

 Password protect areas of a Web site,

 Customize Web server error messages,

 Backup and restore a Web site with its databases and applications,

 Schedule automatic backups,

 Create, edit, remove mailboxes, and protect them against spam and viruses,

 Allow access to individual E-mail administration panel to mailbox owners (this is

convenient when running mail hosting business or creating mailboxes for other users),

 Create, edit, remove mail forwarders and automatic replies,

 Create, manage, remove mailing lists, subscribe and unsubscribe users.

You have access to all these features from your own control panel, therefore, you will not need to use neither the Domain Administrator's nor E-mail Administrator's control panels.

To learn more about using Domain Administrator's control panel, please refer to the Domain Administrator Guide.

10 Getting Started

Logging In to Plesk

 To log in to your Plesk control panel:

1. Open your web browser, and in the address bar type the URL where your Plesk control panel is located.

For example, https://your-domain.com:8443, where your-domain.com is the domain name of your Web host.

2. Press ENTER. Plesk login screen will open.

3. Type the login name and password your provider gave you into the

4. If you log in for the first time, select the language for your control panel from the Interface language drop-down box. If you had previously specified the interface language and saved it in your interface preferences, leave the User default value selected.

5. Click Login.

Note for hosting resellers: Your customers who were granted access to control panel

for managing their own web sites will need to specify their domain names in the Login box.

If You Forgot Your Password

 To restore your forgotten password:

1. In your web browser’s address bar, type the URL where your Plesk

control panel is located (for example, https://your-domain.com:8443)

2. Press ENTER.

Plesk login screen will open.

3. Click the Forgot your password? link.

4. Type your login name into the Login box, and type your e-mail address

registered in the system into the E-mail box.

5. Click OK.

Your password will be sent to your e-mail address.

Getting Started 11

Becoming Familiar with Plesk's Interface

When you log in to control panel, it can open in either a standard view, a simplified desktop view, or a combination of both. The standard view is a customary view of the

control panel divided into two main areas: navigation pane on the left and the main screen where operations are performed on the right.

The desktop view can show site statistics and shortcuts to the operations you frequently perform—everything you may need can now be accessible from a single screen.

12 Getting Started

In this section:

Items in the Desktop View ................................................................................. 12

Items in the Standard View ................................................................................ 12

Items in the Desktop View

The desktop view originally shows three sections:

 Tools. This group shows shortcuts to the operations that you can perform through

the control panel. You can freely add and remove these shortcuts.

 Statistics. This shows the number of domains you have under your account, disk

space and monthly bandwidth usage, and number of mailboxes on your hosted domains.

 Favorites. This group shows four types of shortcuts sorted by type and placed on the

respective tabs. The Domains tab shows shortcuts to your favorite domains. The Mail Accounts tab shows shortcuts to the favorite e-mail accounts. The Shortcuts tab shows all other types of shortcuts that do not relate to domains and e-mail user accounts. The Recent tab shows last ten control panel screens you have been on. The Favorites group also provides search tool for finding domains and e-mail accounts. To use the search tool, type the search criteria (this can be any

combination of symbols, search is case insensitive) and click Search.

To customize your control panel in the Desktop view, refer to the Customizing Your Control Panel in the Desktop View (on page 22) section.

Using Wizards

When you work with Plesk in the Desktop view, you accomplish the tasks you need through wizards. Each wizard is a series of consecutive screens. To accomplish a task using a wizard, follow the instructions displayed on the wizard screens. For information on individual options, refer to the respective sections of this guide.

Items in the Standard View

The navigation pane is located on the left. It gives you access to sets of administrative functions:

 Home. This is where you modify settings related to your account, manage Web sites

and e-mail services.

 Sessions. When site and mailbox owners log in to control panel, or connect to the

server via FTP protocol, they establish sessions that you can monitor and terminate.

Getting Started 13

 Global Account. This shortcut appears in your Plesk Control Panel when the single

sign-on capabilities are switched on the hosting server. Single sign-on technology allows you to log in to different Parallels products using a single global login name and password. This shortcut is used for changing the global login settings.

 Help Desk. This is the help desk system integrated with your control panel. If your

provider uses it, then you can use it to report your problems to provider’s technical

support staff.

 Help. Provides context sensitive help.

 Log Out. When finished working with control panel, click this icon to close your

session.

 Desktop in the SiteBuilder group. The Desktop screen is divided into two areas: Tasks

and Statistics. In the Tasks area you can see an overview of main functionalities of the Administrator Panel. In the Statistics area you can see how many users, sites, are currently in the system.

 Sites in the SiteBuilder group. On this screen you can see the list of available

websites created in SiteBuilder and manage them.

 Server in the SiteBuilder group. This page allows you access to the SiteBuilder's

server administration functions.

Below the Help icon, there is a context help tip area. It provides a brief description of the current screen or available operations. When you place the mouse pointer over a system element or status icon, it displays additional information.

To navigate through Plesk, you can also use a path bar: a chain of links that appears in the right part of the screen, below the banner area. To return to a previous screen, use

Up Level in the upper-right corner of the screen.

To find items in lengthy lists, use search boxes located above every list of items: type a search criterion into the input box, and click Search. A list will show the items matching the search criteria. To return back to viewing all items, click Show All. You can hide the search area by clicking Hide Search. To show the hidden search area, click Show Search.

To sort a list by a certain parameter in ascending or descending order, click on the parameter's title in the column heading. The order of sorting will be indicated by a small triangle displayed next to the parameter's title.

To customize your control panel in Standard view, refer to the Customizing Your Control Panel (on page 15) section.

Changing Your Contact Information and Password

 If you need to update your contact information, or change password:

1. On your Home page, click Edit in the Tools group.

2. Update your information as required, or type a new password, and click

OK.

14 Getting Started

 If you forgot your password:

1. In your web browser’s address bar, type the URL where your Plesk control panel is located.

2. For example, https://your-domain.com:8443.

3. Press ENTER. Plesk login screen will open.

4. Click the Forgot your password? link.

5. Type your login name into the Login box, type your e-mail address

registered in the system into the E-mail box, and click OK.

Your password will be sent to your e-mail address.

In this chapter:

Setting Up Global Account ................................................................................ 16

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Standard View ...................................... 20

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Desktop View ....................................... 22

C H A P T E R 2

Customizing Your Control Panel

16 Customizing Your Control Panel

Setting Up Global Account

Global Account is a single sign-on (SSO) technology feature that allows you to log in to different Parallels products using a single global login and password. If you have several accounts in Plesk Control Panel, you can connect them all to a global account and switch between these accounts without entering a password every time. You can also connect all your accounts in other Parallels products to your global account and switch between them without providing credentials.

 To switch on support for single sign-on for your server, do the following:

In Plesk Control Panel for Linux/Unix

1. Find out the IP address of the SSO server that you will be using. It can be provided by your hosting company, or you can set up the SSO server on any machine that is accessible over the Internet, including your Plesk Control Panel server. For installation instructions, refer to the Plesk Control Panel Installation Guide.

2. Register your server with the single sign-on server: issue the command

<plesk_installation_directory>/admin/sbin/sso -server https://idp-master.example.com:11443.

3. Switch on single sign-on: issue the command

<plesk_installation_directory>/admin/sbin/sso -e.

 In Plesk Control Panel for Windows

2. Register your server with the single sign-on server: issue the command <plesk_installation_directory>\sso.exe -server https://idpmaster.example.com:11443.

3. Switch on single sign-on: issue the command <plesk_installation_directory>\sso.exe -e.

Customizing Your Control Panel 17

In this section:

Creating A Global Account ................................................................................ 18

Connecting Local Accounts To Your Global Account ......................................... 18

Switching Between Accounts ............................................................................ 19

Changing Global Account Password ................................................................. 19

Disconnecting Local Accounts From Global Account ......................................... 19

18 Customizing Your Control Panel

Creating A Global Account

After you create a global account and connect local accounts to it, you will be able to choose from any account connected to your global account when logging in under your global account.

 To create a global account:

1. Log in to Plesk, go to Global Account and click Connect To Global Account.

2. Select Create new global account and provide the login and password for

your global account.

3. Click OK.

Your global account is active now, so you can proceed with connecting other accounts to it. Refer to Connecting Local Accounts to Your Global Account (on page 18) section for more information.

Connecting Local Accounts To Your Global Account

 To connect a local Plesk account to your global account:

1. Log in to Plesk under the local account you want to connect.

2. Go to Global Account and click Connect To Global Account.

3. Make sure that Use existing global account option is selected and provide

the login and password for the global account you want to connect to.

4. Click OK.

Repeat steps 1-4 for other local accounts as necessary.

 To connect an account in another product with SSO support to your

global account:

1. Log in to software product with SSO support under the account you want to connect.

2. Follow the instructions on connecting to a global account in respective software product documentation. Make sure that you provide the credentials for the existing global account when you are asked to .

Repeat steps 1-2 for other accounts or products as necessary.

Note. Different software products may use different names for the Global Account feature, such as Federated Identity or Global Login. Refer to respective software product documentation for more information.

Customizing Your Control Panel 19

After you have connected all required accounts to your global account, you can log in under your global account all the time in any product where you have a local account connected to your global account. You will be shown the list of local accounts connected to your global account every time you log in under it, so you can choose which account you would like to use now. You can switch to another account any time you want. Refer to Switching Between Accounts (on page 19) section for more information.

Switching Between Accounts

 To switch to another account:

1. Click Switch User in the upper right corner.

2. Select the account you want to switch to:

 Choose the required local account from the list of accounts connected to your

global account

 Select Specify credentials for another account and provide login and password for a

local account not connected to your global account or to another global account. You can also specify the language for your control panel from the Interface language menu. If you had previously specified the interface language for that account and saved it in its interface preferences, leave the Default value selected.

3. Click OK.

Changing Global Account Password

 To change password of your global account:

1. Log in to Plesk under your global account or any local account connected to it.

2. Go to Global Account and click Change Password.

3. Enter your old and new passwords, and click OK.

Disconnecting Local Accounts From Global Account

 To disconnect a local account from your global account:

1. Log in to Plesk under the local account you want to disconnect.

2. Go to Global Account and click Disconnect From Global Account.

20 Customizing Your Control Panel

3. Confirm the disconnection and click OK.

In this section:

Setting Interface Language and Skin for Your Control Panel ............................. 20

Setting a Custom Logo ...................................................................................... 20

Adding a Hyperlink Button to Your Control Panel .............................................. 21

Removing a Hyperlink Button from Your Control Panel ..................................... 22

Repeat steps 1-3 for other local accounts as necessary.

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Standard View

Setting Interface Language and Skin for Your Control Panel

 To change preferences of your control panel:

1. On your Home page, click Preferences in the Tools group.

2. Specify the interface language, skin, interface customization templates.

3. If required, clear the Prevent working with Plesk until page is completely loaded

checkbox and modify the creation or retention of SiteBuilder User by selecting or clearing the appropriate checkbox.

4. Click OK.

Setting a Custom Logo

 To set up a custom logo image that will be visible to your customers when

they log in to Plesk control panel:

1. On your Home page, click Branding.

2. Click Browse... to navigate to the desired image file that you have on

your local computer.

We recommend that you use an image that is 50 pixels in height, in GIF, JPEG or PNG format, and preferably not larger than 100 kilobytes to minimize the download time.

Customizing Your Control Panel 21

3. If you wish to attach a hyperlink to the logo image, type the URL into the Enter new URL for logo box.

4. Click OK to submit.

 To restore the original Plesk logo image:

1. On your Home page, click Branding.

2. Click Default Logo.

Adding a Hyperlink Button to Your Control Panel

 To add a custom hyperlink button to your Plesk control panel and specify

whether your customers will see it in their control panels:

1. On your Home page, go to Custom Buttons and click Add New Button.

2. Specify properties of the button:

 Type the text that will show on your button in the Button label field.

 Choose the location for your button. To place it in the right frame of your Home

page, select the Client home page value from the Location drop-down box. To place it on each domain's administration screen (Home > domain name), select the Domain Administration page value. To place it in the left frame (navigation pane) of your control panel, select the Navigation pane value.

 Specify the priority of the button. Plesk will arrange your custom buttons on the

control panel in accordance with the priority you define: the lower the number – the higher is priority. Buttons are placed in the left-to-right order.

 To use an image for a button background, type the path to its location or click

Browse to browse for the desired file. It is recommended that you use a 16x16 pixels GIF or JPEG image for a button to be placed in the navigation pane, and 32x32 pixels GIF or JPEG image for buttons placed in the main frame.

 Type the hyperlink of your choice to be attached to the button into the URL box.

 Using the checkboxes, specify whether to include the information, such as

domain name, FTP login, FTP password and other data to be transferred within the URL. These data can be used for processing by external web applications.

 In the Context help tip contents input field, type in the help tip that will be displayed

when you hover the mouse pointer over the button.

 Select the Open URL in the Control Panel checkbox if you wish the destination URL

to be opened in the control panel's right frame, otherwise leave this check box unchecked to open the URL in a separate browser window.

 If you wish to make this button visible to the mailbox users with access to control

panel, select the Visible to all sub-logins checkbox.

3. Click OK to complete creation.

22 Customizing Your Control Panel

Removing a Hyperlink Button from Your Control Panel

 To remove a hyperlink button from your Plesk control panel:

1. On your Home page, click Custom Buttons in the Tools group.

2. Select a check box corresponding to the button that you wish to remove

and click Remove Selected.

Customizing Your Control Panel in the Desktop View

 To add or remove items from the desktop:

1. Go to Desktop > Customize Desktop.

2. In the Tools group, specify what tasks you would like to accomplish

through the control panel. The appropriate shortcuts will be placed to the desktop. The Selected tasks list shows the tasks for which shortcuts are already placed on the desktop. The Available tasks list shows the tasks for which you do not yet have shortcuts on your desktop.

 To add a shortcut to the desktop, select the required tasks in the Available tasks

list and click Add >>.

 To remove a shortcut from the desktop, select the task that you do not need in

the Selected tasks list and click << Remove.

3. To show your custom buttons on the desktop, select the Custom buttons check box.

4. To show the shortcut for creating new custom hyperlink buttons at the bottom of the desktop, select the Create a new domain custom button check box.

5. Specify whether to show the Statistics and Favorites groups and what items to show there. Clearing check boxes will remove the respective items from the desktop. The Favorites group shows the links to items or control panel screens that you added to desktop by navigating to the respective control panel screens and clicking the Create shortcut or Add to favorites icons.

6. Click OK.

Customizing Your Control Panel 23

 To add a domain to the Favorites group of the desktop:

1. On your Home page, click the domain name you want to add to favorites.

2. Click the Add to favorites icon at the upper right corner of the screen.

3. Specify the desktop shortcut label and the description.

4. Click OK.

 To add a mail account to the Favorites group of the desktop:

1. On your Home page, click the required domain name.

2. Click the Mail icon in the Services group.

3. Click the e-mail address you want to add to favorites.

4. Click the Add to favorites icon at the upper right corner of the screen.

5. Specify the desktop shortcut label and the description.

6. Click OK.

 To add items to the Favorites group of the desktop:

1. Navigate to the control panel screen you need.

2. Click the Create Shortcut icon at the upper right corner of the screen.

3. Specify the desktop shortcut label and the description.

4. Click OK.

 To remove items from the Favorites group of the desktop:

1. On the desktop, click the shortcut that you wish to remove.

2. Click the Edit Favorites icon in the upper right corner of the screen.

3. Click Remove.

1. On the desktop, click the icon corresponding to the shortcut that you wish to remove.

2. Click Remove.

In this chapter:

Viewing IP addresses Included in Your Hosting Package .................................. 24

Viewing Resource Allotments for Your Account ................................................. 25

Viewing the List of Operations You Can Perform within Your Control Panel ...... 27

C H A P T E R 3

Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package

Viewing IP addresses Included in Your Hosting Package

To view the IP addresses included in your hosting package, on your Home page, click IP Pool. Your IP addresses are listed and the following supplementary information is given:

 An icon in the S (Status) column shows if your IP address is properly configured

on the network interface. If your IP address was removed from the network interface by your provider, an icon will show .

 An icon in the T (Type) column shows if you were allotted a dedicated IP

address, and if the address is shared among other customers of your service provider. A dedicated IP address is not used by other users, so you can use it to host either:

A single e-commerce Web site secured with Secure Sockets Layer encryption, or a number of web sites that do not need Secure Sockets Layer encryption.

Note: Shared IP addresses should be used for hosting only non e-commerce Web sites.

 The Certificate column shows which SSL certificate (for what domain name) is tied to

an IP address. See the section "Securing e-commerce transactions with Secure Sockets Layer encryption" for details.

 The FTP over SSL column shows whether it is possible to use secure FTP

connection (FTP over SSL) on one of the domains hosted on this IP. To switch on FTP over SSL for an exclusive IP address, select the check box corresponding to the required IP address under the FTP over SSL column.

 The Hosting column shows a number of web sites hosted on an IP address. To view

the domain names of these web sites, click the number in the Hosting column.

Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package 25

Viewing Resource Allotments for Your Account

To view the resource allotments for your account, on your Home page, click Limits. The resource allotments are shown as follows:

 Maximum number of domains. The total number of domain names/web sites you can

host on the server. This includes web sites that you host on this server, and domain forwarders that point to web sites hosted on other servers. Domain aliases (additional domain names for sites hosted on this server) are not limited by this resource type.

 Maximum number of domain aliases. Displays the maximum number of domain aliases

that can be created for your domains.

 Maximum number of subdomains. Displays the maximum number of subdomains that

can be hosted under your domains.

 Disk space. Shows you the total amount of disk space allocated to your account.

This amount is measured in megabytes. It includes disk space occupied by all files related to your domains/web sites: web site contents, databases, applications, mailboxes, log files and backup files. This is the so-called soft quota: when it is exceeded, domain names and web sites are not suspended automatically, only the appropriate notices are sent to your provider's e-mail addresses and the resource

overage is indicated by a corresponding icon shown in the control panel to the left of your domain name.

 MySQL databases quota and Microsoft SQL databases quota. Displays the maximum disk

space amount that MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server databases respectively can occupy on your domains.

 Maximum amount of traffic. Displays the maximum amount of data in megabytes that

can be transferred from your websites during a month. Once the limit is reached, the appropriate notices are sent to your provider's e-mail addresses and the

resource overage is indicated by a corresponding icon shown in the control panel to the left of the domain name.

 Maximum number of web users. Shows the maximum number of personal web pages

that you can host for other users under your domains. This service is mostly used in educational institutions that host non-commercial personal pages of their students and staff. These pages usually have web addresses like http://yourdomain.com/~username.

 Maximum number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts. Displays the maximum

number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts you can create on your domains.

 Maximum number of additional FTP accounts. Displays the maximum number of

additional FTP accounts that you can create on your domains.

 Maximum number of MySQL databases and Maximum number of Microsoft SQL Server

databases. Displays the maximum number of MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server

databases respectively that can be hosted in your domains.

 Maximum number of mailboxes. Shows the maximum number of mailboxes that can be

hosted in your domains.

26 Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package

 Mailbox quota. Displays the amount of disk space in kilobytes that is allocated to

each mailbox in your domains.

 Total mailboxes quota. Displays the total amount of disk space available for all

mailboxes on all your domains.

 Maximum number of mail redirects. Shows the maximum number of mail redirects that

can be used in your domains.

 Maximum number of mail groups. Shows the maximum number of mail groups that can

be used in your domains.

 Maximum number of mail autoresponders. Displays the maximum number of

autoresponders that can be set up in your domains.

 Maximum number of mailing lists. Shows maximum the number of mailing lists that you

can run in your domains.

 Maximum number of Java applications. Displays the maximum number of Java

applications or applets that you can install on your domains.

 Maximum number of IIS application pools. Specify the total number of dedicated IIS

application pools that the customer can allocate between his or her domains.

 Maximum number of shared SSL links. Shows the total number of subdomains

(including their parent domain) that can link to the Master SSL domain defined by the server administrator.

 Maximum number of ODBC connections. Shows the maximum number of ODBC

connections that you can use on your domains.

 Validity period. Shows the term for a hosting account. At the end of the term, your

domain/web site will be suspended, its Web, FTP and mail services will no longer be accessible to the Internet users, and you will not be able to log in to the control panel.

Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package 27

Viewing the List of Operations You Can Perform within Your Control Panel

To view the list of operations you can perform within your control panel, on your Home page, click Permissions. The permissions for operations are listed as follows:

 Access to control panel. Shows whether you can access the control panel for

managing domains and sites.

 Domain creation. Shows whether you can host new domain names/web sites on the

server.

 Physical hosting management. Shows whether you can fully control hosting accounts

for your web sites. If it says No, then you can only change FTP password for accessing your web spaces.

 System access management. Shows whether you can enable and disable access to

the system through Remote Desktop.

 Hard disk quota assignment. Shows whether you can set up the hard quotas on disk

space allocated to your sites.

 Subdomains management. Shows whether you can set up, modify and remove

subdomains.

 Domain aliases management. Shows whether you are able to set up additional

alternative domain names for web sites and allow users to do so.

 Log rotation management. Shows whether you can adjust the cleanup and recycling of

processed log files for your site.

 Anonymous FTP management. Shows whether you can have an FTP directory where

all users could download and upload files without the need to enter login and password. A web site should reside on a dedicated IP address in order to use anonymous FTP service.

 FTP accounts management. Shows whether you can create and manage additional

FTP accounts.

 Scheduler management. Shows whether you can schedule tasks with the task

scheduler. Scheduled tasks can be used for running scripts or utilities on schedule.

 Domain limits adjustment. Shows whether you can distribute the resources given to

you by your service provider between your domains.

 DNS zone management. Shows whether you can manage the DNS zones of your

domains.

 Tomcat applications management. Shows whether you can install Tomcat Java

applications and applets on the web site through the control panel.

 Mailing lists management. Shows whether you can use mailing lists provided by the

GNU Mailman software.

 Spam filter management. Shows whether you can use spam filter provided by the

SpamAssassin software.

 Antivirus management. Shows whether you can use server-side antivirus protection

for filtering incoming and outgoing mail.

28 Viewing Resource Allotments and Hosting Features Included in Your Hosting Package

 Backup/restore functions. Shows whether you can use the control panel's facilities to

backup and restore your sites. Scheduled and on-demand backups are supported.

 Ability to use remote XML interface. Shows whether can remotely manage web sites

through custom applications. The XML interface can be used for developing custom applications integrated with web sites, which could be used, for instance, for automating setup of hosting accounts and provisioning of services for customers purchasing hosting services from your reseller's site. The remote XML interface operations are limited to setting up and removing domain names/web spaces on the server, modifying domain and web site related preferences and hosting services, retrieving information on domains.

 SiteBuilder. Shows whether you can use SiteBuilder for creating and editing your

web sites.

 Hosting Perfomance Management. Shows whether you can change the hosting

performance preferences for your domains.

 IIS Application Pool Management. Shows whether you can manage your IIS application

pool.

 Web statistics management. Shows whether you can manage web statistics for your

domains.

 Additional write/modify permissions management. Shows whether you can manage

additional write/modify permissions for your domains. These permissions are required if your web applications are using a file-based database (like Jet) located in the root of httpdocs or httpsdocs folders. Please note that selecting this option might seriously compromise the web site security.

 Shared SSL management. Shows whether you can manage shared SSL for your

domains.

 User interface. Shows what type of Plesk control panel interface you can use -

standard, desktop, or both.

 Desktop management. Shows whether you can customize and manage your desktop

interface.

 Ability to select a database server. Shows whether you can select a database server of

each type for creating your databases, not only use the default database server.

If you are going to resell hosting services or planning to host numerous domains and

In this chapter:

Creating Templates ........................................................................................... 30

Modifying Templates ......................................................................................... 35

Removing Templates ........................................................................................ 35

C H A P T E R 4

Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates

web sites, you may want to create hosting configuration presets, referred to as domain templates, that will simplify setting up hosting accounts for new domains and web sites. The templates cover all resource usage allotments, permissions and limits that you can define for a hosting account, plus mail bounce and Web statistics retention settings.

30 Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates

Creating Templates

To implement a hosting plan (or simplify setup of multiple domains), create a domain template, and define hosting services and resource allotments in accordance with your hosting plan:

1. On your Home page, click Domain Templates in the Tools group.

2. Click Add New Domain Template.

3. Specify the template properties:

 Template name. Specify a name for this template. During setup of a new hosting

account, you will be prompted to select the required template by its name. Therefore, we recommend that you choose a meaningful name that corresponds to one of your hosting plans or describes the amount of allotted resources. For example, Mail hosting, 1GB disk space, 500 mailboxes.

 Mail to nonexistent users. Specify the domain-wide mail bounce options: When

somebody sends an e-mail message to an e-mail address that does not exist under your domain, the mail server on your domain accepts mails, processes it, and when it finds out that there is no such a recipient under your domain, it

returns the mail back to sender with the ―this address no longer accepts mail‖

notice. You can choose to:

 change the default notice if you do not like it (leave the Bounce option

selected and type another message into the input box),

 forward undelivered mail to another e-mail address (select the Catch to

address option and specify the e-mail address you need), or

 reject mail without accepting it (select the Discard option). This setting can

decrease mail server load caused by a large amount of spam, which is often directed at randomly generated user names. However, for spammers this can somewhat speed up scanning your mail server for valid e-mail addresses.

 Choose the required WebMail client software in the WebMail menu to enable the

ability to read mail through a browser-based WebMail application for users of mailboxes in this domain. If you don't want to provide this ability, select None.

 Maximum number of domain aliases. Specify the number of domain aliases that can

be used for this domain.

 Maximum number of subdomains. Specify the number of subdomains that can be

hosted under this domain.

Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates 31

 Disk space. Specify the total amount of disk space allocated to a hosting account

associated with the domain. This amount is measured in megabytes. It includes disk space occupied by all files related to this domain/web site: web site contents, databases, applications, mailboxes, log files and backup files. This is the so-called soft quota: when it is exceeded, domain names and web sites are not suspended automatically, only the appropriate notices are sent to your and your provider's e-mail addresses and the resource overage is indicated by the

icon shown in the control panel to the left of the domain name (see the list of domain names on your Home page). And then it is up to you to decide what to do with the domain:

 you can notify the domain owner and suspend the domain/web site after a

grace period until you receive the payment

 upgrade the hosting plan for your customer (see the Upgrading Hosting

Accounts (on page 37) section for more information).

 MySQL databases quota and Microsoft SQL databases quota. Specify the maximum

disk space amount that MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server databases respectively can occupy on a domain.

 Maximum amount of traffic. Specify the amount of data in megabytes that can be

transferred from the web site during a month. Once the limit is reached, the appropriate notices are sent to your and your provider's e-mail addresses and the resource overage is indicated by a corresponding icon shown in the control panel to the left of the domain name (see the list of domain names on your Home page). When a web site starts attracting more visitors and requires more bandwidth, consider upgrading a hosting plan (see the instructions on upgrading hosting plan below).

 Maximum number of web users. Specify the number of personal web pages that the

 Maximum number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts. Specify the maximum

number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts that can be created on a domain.

 Maximum number of additional FTP accounts. Speficy the maximum number of

additional FTP accounts that can be created on a domain.

 Maximum number of MySQL databases and Maximum number of Microsoft SQL Server

databases. Specify the maximum number of MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server

databases respectively that can be hosted on a domain.

 Maximum number of mailboxes. Specify the number of mailboxes that can be

hosted in a domain.

 Mailbox quota. Specify the amount of disk space in kilobytes that is allocated to

each mailbox in a domain.

 Total mailboxes quota. Specify the total amount of disk space available for all

mailboxes on a domain.

 Maximum number of mail redirects. Specify the number of mail redirects that can be

used in a domain.

32 Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates

 Maximum number of mail groups. Specify the maximum number of mail groups that

can be used in a domain.

 Maximum number of mail autoresponders. Specify the number of automatic

responses that can be set up in a domain.

 Maximum number of mailing lists. Specify the number of mailing lists that the

domain owner can run in a domain. To allow the use of mailing lists, you should also put a check mark into the Mailing lists check box under the Preferences group.

 Maximum number of Java applications. Specify the maximum number of Tomcat

Java applications and applets that the domain owner can install in a domain.

 Maximum number of shared SSL links. Specify the maximum number of subdomains

(including their parent domain) that can link to the Master SSL domain defined by the server administrator.

 Maximum number of ODBC connections. Specify the maximum number of ODBC

connections that can be set up on a domain.

 Validity period. Specify the term for a hosting account. At the end of the term, the

domain/web site will be suspended, its Web, FTP and mail services will no longer be accessible to the Internet users, and domain owner will not be able to log in to the control panel. Hosting accounts cannot be automatically renewed, therefore, in order to bring the hosted domain name/web site back to operation, you will need to manually renew the hosting account: on your Home page, click the domain name your need, click Limits, specify another term in the Validity

period box, click OK, then click Switch On in the Domain group (Home > domain name).

 Log rotation. All connections to the Web server and requests for files that were

not found on the server are registered in log files. These log files are analyzed by the statistical utilities running on the server, which then present graphical reports on demand. If you need to view the contents of these raw log files for debugging purposes, on your Home page, click the domain name you need, click Log Manager, and then click the log file name you need. To prevent these log files from growing too large, you should enable automatic cleanup and recycling of log files:

 select the Switch on log rotation checkbox,

 specify when to recycle log files,

 specify how many instances of each log file to store on the server,

 specify whether they should be compressed,

 specify whether they should be sent to an e-mail address after processing.

 Specify additional settings in the Preferences section.

 Mailing lists. Select this checkbox to enable the ability to create and manage

mailing lists on the domain.

 Retain traffic statistics. Specify the number of months during which the bandwidth

usage statistics should be kept on the server.

Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates 33

 DNS. Specify whether the DNS server on your Web host should act as a master

(primary) or slave (secondary) name server for the domain name zone. A primary name server stores locally the zone file it serves, while a secondary server only retrieves a copy of this file from the primary. You would normally leave the Master option selected.

 Physical hosting account. If you are going to host not only domain names, but also

web sites, select the Physical hosting checkbox and specify the hosting features:

 Hard disk quota. In addition to the soft quota, you can specify the so-called hard

quota that will not allow writing more files to the web space when the limit is reached. At attempt to write files, users will get "Out of disk space" error.

 SSL support. Secure Sockets Layer encryption is generally used for protecting

transfer of sensitive data during online transactions on e-commerce Web sites that run on dedicated IP addresses. SSL certificates that participate in the encryption process are usually applied to a single domain name on a single IP address, therefore, each site that needs SSL protection must be hosted on a dedicated IP address. An exception to this is subdomains, which you can protect with a wildcard certificate. Installing an SSL certificate on a Web server that hosts several web sites with different domain names on a single IP address (shared or name-based hosting) is technically possible, however, it is not recommended: the encryption will be provided, but users will get warning messages on attempt to connect to the secure site. To allow SSL encryption for Web sites, select the SSL support check box.

 SiteBuilder support. SiteBuilder is an efficient and user-friendly WYSIWYG web

site editor running through the web interface. Select the Publish site with SiteBuilder checkbox to give domain administrator the ability to access SiteBuilder and build web site through their Plesk control panel interface by clicking SiteBuilder on the domain management page or clicking the Desktop shortcut in the SiteBuilder Admin navigation pane group. The version of SiteBuilder coming in the standard Plesk distribution is fully functional and its use is not limited in any way by the manufacturer (but you can be restricted from accessing it by your service provider).

 Microsoft FrontPage support. Microsoft FrontPage is a popular web site authoring

tool. To enable publishing and modifying the site through Microsoft FrontPage, select the Microsoft FrontPage support and Microsoft FrontPage over SSL support check boxes, and set the Remote Microsoft FrontPage authoring option to allowed.

Note. Microsoft FrontPage over SSL support is available only when SSL

support is enabled on a domain.

 Support for programming and scripting languages widely used in development of dynamic

Web sites and server-side Web applications. Specify which of the following

programming and scripting languages should be interpreted, executed or otherwise processed by the web server: Active Server Pages (ASP), Active Server Pages on .NET framework (ASP.NET), Server Side Includes (SSI), PHP hypertext preprocessor (PHP), Common Gateway Interface (CGI), Fast Common Gateway Interface (FastCGI), Internet Server Application Programming Interface (ISAPI), Perl, Python, ColdFusion and Miva scripting required for running Miva e-commerce solutions.

Note. You can change the version of ASP.NET and PHP you want to use in the

corresponding drop-down menu. You can also specify the mode for running PHP applications - CGI, FastCGI or ISAPI.

34 Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates

 Web statistics. To allow you to view the information on the number of people

visited the site and the pages of the site they viewed, select a module in Web

statistics drop-down menu and select the accessible via password protected directory /plesk-stat/ checkbox, if required. This will install the selected statistical software

module, which will generate reports and place them into the password protected directory. The domain administrator will then be able to access Web statistics at the URL: https://your-domain.com/plesk-stat/ using their FTP account login and password.

Note. If domain administrator changes the FTP credentials, web statistics

access credentials do not change. The original login and password specified upon the domain creation should always be used for accessing passwordprotected web statistics directory.

 Custom error documents. When visitors coming to site request pages that the web

server cannot find, web server generates and displays a standard HTML page with an error message. To give domain owner the ability to create their own error pages and use them on a web server, select the Custom error documents checkbox.

Note. You can enable the support for all programming and scripting languages,

web statistics and custom error documents at once by selecting All services checkbox in the Services group.

 Additional write/modify permissions. This option is required if web applications on a

domain are using a file-based database (like Jet) located in the root of httpdocs or httpsdocs folders. Please note that selecting this option might seriously compromise the web site security.

 Use dedicated IIS application pool. This option enables the use of dedicated IIS

application pool for web applications on a domain. Using dedicated IIS application pool dramatically improves the stability of domain web applications due to worker process isolation mode. This mode gives each web site hosted on the server the possibility to allocate a separate process pool for execution of its web applications. This way, malfunction in one application will not cause stopping of all the others. This is especially useful when you are using shared hosting package.

 Maximum CPU use. To limit the amount of CPU resources that domain's IIS

application pool can use, clear the Unlimited checkbox and provide a number (in percents) in the field.

4. Performance. To avoid excessive usage of bandwidth, which can lead to resources overage, you can set various performance limitations for a domain.

 Maximum network use. To limit the maximum speed (measured in KB per second)

that a domain can share between all its connections, clear the Unlimited checkbox and provide a number (in kilobytes) in the field.

 Connections limiting. To limit the maximum number of simultaneous connections

to a domain, clear the Unlimited checkbox and provide a number in the field

5. Click OK to complete creation of a template.

During setup of a hosting account for a new domain/web site, you will select the required template and the hosting account will be created and allocated the resources and hosting services you defined.

Implementing Hosting Plans Using Domain Templates 35

Modifying Templates

 To reflect the changes in your hosting package offerings that will apply to

the newly created accounts:

1. On your Home page, click Domain Templates in the Tools group.

2. Click the template name corresponding to the hosting plan you wish to

update.

3. Modify the settings as required and click OK.

Note that modifying templates does not affect the existing domains and web sites.

Removing Templates

 To remove a template that you no longer need:

1. On your Home page, click Domain Templates in the Tools group.

2. Select a check box corresponding to the template you no longer need.

3. Click Remove Selected. Confirm removal and click OK.

This chapter explains how to manage hosting accounts.

In this chapter:

Upgrading Hosting Accounts ............................................................................. 37

Suspending and Unsuspending Hosting Accounts ............................................ 41

Changing Web Hosting Type From Physical to Forwarding ............................... 42

Introducing Similar Changes to Numerous Hosting Accounts ............................ 43

Removing Hosting Accounts ............................................................................. 44

C H A P T E R 5

Managing Hosting Accounts

Managing Hosting Accounts 37

Upgrading Hosting Accounts

 To modify settings for a single domain or Web site:

1. On your Home page, click the domain name you need.

2. To allocate more disk space, bandwidth and other resources, click Limits

in the Domain group, adjust the following settings as required:

 Maximum number of domains. The total number of domain names/web sites you

can host on the server. This includes web sites that you host on this server, and domain forwarders that point to web sites hosted on other servers. Domain aliases (additional domain names for sites hosted on this server) are not limited by this resource type.

 Maximum number of domain aliases. Specify the number of domain aliases that can

be used for this domain.

 Maximum number of subdomains. Specify the number of subdomains that can be

hosted under this domain.

 Disk space. Specify the total amount of disk space allocated to a hosting account

icon shown in the control panel to the left of the domain name (see the list of domain names on your Home page).

 MySQL databases quota and Microsoft SQL databases quota. Specify the maximum

disk space amount that MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server databases respectively can occupy on a domain.

 Maximum amount of traffic. Specify the amount of data in megabytes that can be

 Maximum number of web users. Specify the number of personal web pages that the

 Maximum number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts. Speficy the maximum

number of additional Microsoft FrontPage accounts that can be created on a domain.

 Maximum number of additional FTP accounts. Speficy the maximum number of

additional FTP accounts that can be created on a domain.

38 Managing Hosting Accounts

 Maximum number of MySQL databases and Maximum number of Microsoft SQL Server

databases. Specify the maximum number of MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server

databases respectively that can be hosted on a domain.

 Maximum number of mailboxes. Specify the number of mailboxes that can be

hosted in a domain.

 Mailbox quota. Specify the amount of disk space in kilobytes that is allocated to

each mailbox in a domain.

 Total mailboxes quota. Specify the total amount of disk space available for all

mailboxes on a domain.

 Maximum number of mail redirects. Specify the number of mail redirects that can be

used in a domain.

 Maximum number of mail groups. Specify the maximum number of mail groups that

can be used in a domain.

 Maximum number of mail autoresponders. Specify the number of automatic

responses that can be set up in a domain.

 Maximum number of mailing lists. Specify the number of mailing lists that the

domain owner can run in a domain. To allow the use of mailing lists, you should also put a check mark into the Mailing lists check box under the Preferences group.

 Maximum number of Java applications. Specify the maximum number of Tomcat

Java applications and applets that the domain owner can install in a domain.

 Maximum number of IIS application pools. Specify the total number of dedicated IIS

application pools that the customer can allocate between his or her domains.

 Maximum number of shared SSL links. Specify the total number of subdomains

(including their parent domain) that can link to the Master SSL domain defined by the server administrator.

 Maximum number of ODBC connections. Specify the maximum number of ODBC

connections that can be set up on a domain.

 Validity period. Specify the term for a hosting account. At the end of the term, the

domain/web site will be suspended, its Web, FTP and mail services will no longer be accessible to the Internet users, and domain owner will not be able to log in to the control panel.

3. Click OK.

4. To add hosting features, such as support for programming languages

and scripts, click Setup in the Hosting group, and adjust the following settings as required:

 IP address. If you have a number of IP addresses to choose from, select the

required address from the IP address drop-down box. Notice that e-commerce sites need a dedicated IP address (not shared among other sites) to implement Secure Sockets Layer data encryption.

Managing Hosting Accounts 39

 SSL support. Secure Sockets Layer encryption is generally used for protecting

 Certificate. If you have a number of SSL certificates to choose from, select the

SSL certificate that must be used by Web server to encrypt online transactions to this web site.

 FTP/Microsoft FrontPage Login and FTP/Microsoft FrontPage password. Specify the

user name and password that will be used for publishing the site to the server through FTP. Retype the password into the Confirm Password box.

 Hard disk quota. In addition to the soft quota, you can specify the so-called hard

quota that will not allow writing more files to the web space when the limit is reached. At attempt to write files, users will get "Out of disk space" error.

 Access to system. This allows you to directly access the system through a

Remote Desktop connection. However, allowing system access via RDP also poses a potential threat to the server security, so we recommend that you do not allow it, leaving the Login prohibited option selected.

 SiteBuilder support. SiteBuilder is an efficient and user-friendly WYSIWYG web

site editor running through the web interface. Leave the Publish site with SiteBuilder checkbox selected to be able to access SiteBuilder and build web site through your Plesk control panel interface by clicking SiteBuilder Wizard on the domain management page or clicking the Desktop shortcut in the SiteBuilder Admin navigation pane group. The version of SiteBuilder coming in the standard Plesk distribution is fully functional and its use is not limited in any way by the manufacturer (but domain administrators can be restricted from accessing it).

 Microsoft FrontPage support. Microsoft FrontPage is a popular web site authoring

Note. Microsoft FrontPage over SSL support is available only when SSL

support is enabled on a domain.

 Support for programming and scripting languages widely used in development of dynamic

Web sites and server-side Web applications. Specify which of the following

programming and scripting languages should be interpreted, executed or otherwise processed by the web server: Active Server Pages (ASP), Active Server Pages on .NET framework (ASP.NET), Server Side Includes (SSI), PHP hypertext preprocessor (PHP), Common Gateway Interface (CGI), Perl, Python, ColdFusion and Miva scripting required for running Miva e-commerce solutions.

Note. If ASP.NET support is enabled, ASP.NET version 2.0 is set as default.

You can change the version in the corresponding drop-down menu.

40 Managing Hosting Accounts