Parallels Plesk Panel - 11.0 Administrator’s Guide
Parallels® Plesk Panel
Copyright Notice
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All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Contents
Preface 6
Typographical Conventions ........................................................................................................... 6
Feedback ....................................................................................................................................... 7
About This Guide 8
Introduction to Panel 9
Installation and Upgrade Overview ............................................................................................. 11
Installing and Updating Third-Party Applications .............................................................. 12
Ports Used by Panel .................................................................................................................... 13
Licensing ..................................................................................................................................... 14
System Maintenance 15
Changing Your Server's Host Name ........................................................................................... 16
Changing IP Addresses ............................................................................................................... 17
Moving the Virtual Hosts Directory .............................................................................................. 18
Moving the Directory for Storing Panel Backups ......................................................................... 19
Moving the Directories for Storing Mail Data ............................................................................... 20
Switching Between MySQL and MSSQL Database Server Engines .......................................... 21
Using GUI to Switch Between Database Servers ............................................................. 22
Using Command-Line Interface to Switch Between Database Servers............................ 23
Programming Event Handlers to Execute Custom Scripts.......................................................... 26
Automating Administration Tasks with Command-Line Utilities .................................................. 27
Monitoring Status of System Services......................................................................................... 28
Managing Services from the Command Line and Viewing Service Logs ................................... 29
Predefining Values for Customizable PHP Parameters .............................................................. 34
Website Applications ................................................................................................................... 35
Multiple Web Apps in a Single Directory ........................................................................... 35
Hiding Commercial Apps ................................................................................................... 36
Spam Protection .......................................................................................................................... 37
Configuring SpamAssassin ............................................................................................... 38
Optimizing the Task Manager Performance ................................................................................ 39
Cloning Panel in Virtual Environment .......................................................................................... 41
Removing Panel .......................................................................................................................... 43
Third-Party Components 44
Web Deploy 2.0 ........................................................................................................................... 45
1. Install Web Deploy ........................................................................................................ 45
2. Improve the Security Level ............................................................................................ 46
3. Secure the Service with a Valid Certificate ................................................................... 46
4. Activate Web Deploy in Hosting Plans and Subscriptions ............................................ 46
Manual Installation of Web Deploy.................................................................................... 46
Backing Up, Restoring, and Migrating Data 48
Preface 4
Backing Up Data .......................................................................................................................... 49
Backup Objects: Hierarchy and Volume ........................................................................... 50
Specifying Data for Backing Up ........................................................................................ 53
Defining Properties of Files That Compose Backup ......................................................... 60
Exporting Backup Files ..................................................................................................... 62
Defining How the Backup Process Is Performed .............................................................. 64
Backup Utility Commands and Options ............................................................................ 65
Restoring Data ............................................................................................................................. 69
Defining Objects for Restoration ....................................................................................... 69
Defining How the Restoration Process Is Performed........................................................ 76
Conflict Resolution Rules and Policies ............................................................................. 77
Restoration Utility Commands and Options ...................................................................... 98
Migrating Data ............................................................................................................................. 99
Changing Security Settings for File System Objects and Accounts 100
Panel's Security Policies ........................................................................................................... 101
Windows Accounts Used by Panel to Manage Windows Objects ............................................ 101
Default User Permissions for Disks................................................................................. 101
Windows Accounts Used by Panel to Manage Hosted Windows Objects ................................ 104
Administering Windows Objects Security on Panel-managed Server ...................................... 105
Initial Windows Security Configuration During Panel Installation or Hosting Account Creation
........................................................................................................................................ 106
Browsing Object Security Settings Through Panel GUI .................................................. 106
Customizing Object Security Settings in Panel ............................................................... 107
General Security Metadata Structure .............................................................................. 121
Restoring Disk User Permissions .............................................................................................. 125
Statistics and Logs 126
Calculating Statistics on Demand .............................................................................................. 127
Log Files and Log Rotation ....................................................................................................... 129
Customizing Panel Appearance and GUI Elements 130
Customizing Panel Appearance and Branding ......................................................................... 131
Hiding and Changing Panel GUI Elements ............................................................................... 132
Ways of Changing the Panel Functionality ..................................................................... 133
Changing the Panel Functionality ................................................................................... 137
Changing Web Presence Builder Functionality ............................................................... 172
Customizing Website Topics ..................................................................................................... 178
Adding Custom Website Topics ...................................................................................... 179
Rearranging and Removing Topics and Categories ....................................................... 186
Localization 188
Registering Additional Services with Panel Notifications 189
Preparing a Service for Registration ......................................................................................... 191
Registering the Service ............................................................................................................. 192
Code Samples ........................................................................................................................... 193
Implementation of Plan_Item_Interface .......................................................................... 194
Registration of an Additional Service .............................................................................. 198
Troubleshooting 199
Preface 5
Repairing Panel Installation ....................................................................................................... 200
Detecting Newly Installed Components..................................................................................... 203
Restoring Mail Configuration ..................................................................................................... 204
Reducing Amounts of Notifications from Antivirus .................................................................... 205
Recovering Forgotten Password ............................................................................................... 205
Checking and Correcting Component and Folder Permissions ................................................ 206
Glossary 207
6 Preface
In this section:
Typographical Conventions ............................................................................... 6
Feedback .......................................................................................................... 7
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 QoS 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 style sheet
selectors, files and directories,
and CSS fragments.
The license file is called
license.key.
Preface
Typographical Conventions
The following kinds of formatting in the text identify special information.
Preface 7
Preformatted Bold
What you type, contrasted with
on-screen computer output.
Unix/Linux:
# cd /root/rpms/php
Windows:
>cd %myfolder%
Preformatted
On-screen computer output in
your command-line sessions;
source code in XML, C++, or
other programming languages.
Unix/Linux:
# ls -al /files
total 14470
Windows:
>ping localhost
Reply from 127.0.0.1:
bytes=32 time<1ms
TTL=128
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.
Parallels Plesk Panel for Windows Advanced Administration Guide is a companion
C H A P T E R 1
About This Guide
guide for Parallels Panel Administrator's Guide. It is intended for server administrators
whose responsibilities include maintaining hosting servers and troubleshooting server
software problems.
The guide provides step-by-step instructions to perform server management tasks that
require use of Panel functionality other than the GUI and GUI-only tasks that
administrators may need to perform only in rare specific situations. Administrators can
use several additional tools that are supplied in the standard Parallels Plesk Panel
distribution package to add customized automation tasks, back up and restore data,
and repair Panel components and system settings. The tools include a number of
standalone Windows applications, command-line utilities, and the ability to integrate
custom scripting with Parallels Plesk Panel.
This guide consists of the following chapters:
Introduction to Panel. Describes the main components and services operated by
Panel, licensing terms, and the ways to install and update Panel components.
System Maintenance. Describes how to change server host name, IP addresses, and
locations of directories for storing virtual host files, backups, and mail content. This
chapter also introduces Panel's command-line tools, a mechanism for running
scripts on Panel events, and service monitor that allows monitoring and restarting
services without logging in to Panel.
Backing Up, Restoring, and Migrating Data. Describes how to back up and restore Panel
data by means of the command-line utilities pleskbackup and pleskrestore,
and introduces the tools for migrating hosted data between servers.
Changing Security Settings for File System Objects and Accounts. Describes the process
of applying Parallels Plesk Panel security rules to file system objects and accounts.
Presents examples of commonly used security rules with explanations.
Customizing Panel Appearance and GUI Elements. Introduces Panel themes that can be
used to customize Panel appearance and branding and describes how to remove
specific elements of Panel GUI or change their behaviour.
Statistics and Logs. Describes how to run calculation of statistics on disk space and
traffic usage on demand and access web server logs.
Localization. Introduces the means to localize Panel GUI into languages for which
Parallels does not provide localization.
Troubleshooting. Describes how to troubleshoot malfunction of Panel services.
Glossary. Explains terms used in this guide.
Parallels Plesk Panel consists of the following main components:
C H A P T E R 2
Introduction to Panel
Front-end GUI service. The GUI, served with the Internet Information Services (IIS)
server, is the main means of interaction with Panel.
Panel core. The core processes management requests from the Panel GUI,
command line interface, and API RPC. The core contains scripts, binary files and
other resources used to link Panel components with each other and with external
services.
Panel's main database called psa. The database stores information about Panel
objects, such as IP addresses, domains, user accounts, and many others. The
database is served by MySQL or the Microsoft SQL database engine.
Panel's configuration files.
Panel's log files.
Command-line utilities. Command-line interface allows integration of third-party
software with Panel, and provides the means to manage Panel through the server
console. For more information about the Panel command-line interface, refer to
Panel Command Line Reference.
API RPC. This interface is another way to integrate third-party software with Panel.
It allows to manage Panel objects from remote by sending specifically structured
XML packets and receiving responses from Panel. For more information on API
RPC, refer to Developer's Guide: Read Me First and API RPC Protocol Reference.
Services Managed by Panel
Panel uses standard packages for the following services:
IIS as a set of Internet services including HTTP, FTP, and others.
FTP servers - ServU, Gene-6, used as alternative FTP servers.
Mail servers - MailEnable, IceWarp (Merak), CommuniGate Pro, or
SmarterMail.
BIND or MS DNS - used as the domain name server.
MySQL used to store the Panel's database called psa that is used for administrative
purposes
MSSQL or MySQL - used as a database server by Panel users.
Tomcat - used as an infrastructure for servlet and JSP-based applications shipped
in the *.war format.
JDK (j2sdk) - used as a library for java applications.
SpamAssassin - used as protection against spam e-mail messages.
Parallels Premium Antivirus, Kaspersky Antivirus, or IceWarp
Antivirus - used as e-mail antivirus tools.
10 Introduction to Panel
In this chapter:
Installation and Upgrade Overview .................................................................... 11
Ports Used by Panel .......................................................................................... 13
Licensing ........................................................................................................... 14
Files and Directories Used by Panel Installations
Parallels Plesk Panel and its components are installed by default in the directory
C:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk\ on a physical server, or C:\Program
Files\Plesk\ in the Parallels Containers environment. The default installation
directory is referred to as %plesk_dir% in the following list. Some of the subdirectories
with corresponding components are listed below.
%plesk_dir%\admin\ - The core components used by Panel GUI.
%plesk_dir%\admin\plib\ - Panel's PHP files.
%plesk_dir%\admin\bin\ - Binary utilities.
%plesk_dir%\bin\ - Binary utilities.
%plesk_dir%\etc\ - Configuration files.
%plesk_dir%\MailServer\ - Mail servers.
%plesk_dir%\backup\ - Backup files.
%plesk_dir%\dns\ - BIND name server files.
%plesk_dir%\MySql\ - Panel's MySQL database server.
%plesk_dir%\Databases\ - Database servers for serving user data.
Introduction to Panel 11
Installation and Upgrade Overview
In this section:
Installing and Updating Third-Party Applications ............................................... 12
The most common way of installing and upgrading Parallels Plesk Panel is to use the
Parallels Installer utility. This utility connects to the Parallels Updates server where the
Panel distribution packages are stored. It then retrieves, downloads, and installs Panel.
You can download the Parallels Installer utility from
http://www.parallels.com/eu/download/plesk/products/.
For detailed instructions on how to use Parallels Installer, refer to the Installation,
Upgrade, Migration, and Transfer Guide.
For information about installing third-party software services on Panel-managed
servers, refer to the section Installing and Updating Third-Party Applications (on page
12).
Installing Panel in Parallels Virtuozzo Containers Environment
If you operate in the Parallels Virtuozzo Containers (PVC) environment, you can use
application templates for installing Panel on containers.
When the application templates are installed on a PVC hardware node, they allow you
to easily deploy the application on as many containers as required, saving system
resources such as disk space.
You can obtain the Panel templates at
http://www.parallels.com/eu/download/plesk/products/ or download them using the
PVC command line utility call vzup2date -z (available on PVC 4 and above).
For more information on installing Panel on PVC, read the Installation, Upgrade, Migration,
and Transfer Guide, chapter (Advanced) Installation to Parallels Virtuozzo Containers.
Checking Potential Issues Before Upgrading to Panel 11
If you use Parallels Plesk Panel 9 or earlier and want to upgrade it to Panel 11, you
may encounter problems due to changes in the Panel business model. In particular, it
might be impossible to transfer some settings and business objects.
To efficiently anticipate or resolve the problems, we offer a tool called
plesk101_preupgrade_checker.php. This checks potential business logic issues
with upgrading to Panel 10 and later and gives recommendations that help you fix the
possible problems related to transition of Panel objects. You can download the tool and
find descriptions of the report messages at http://kb.parallels.com/9436.
12 Introduction to Panel
Installing and Updating Third-Party Applications
To enable basic hosting services and functions on a Panel-managed server, Panel
distribution package includes several third-party software applications, that are installed
along with Parallels Plesk Panel. These applications are ultimately responsible for providing
various hosting services such as DNS, e-mail, FTP, and others.
All software components shipped with Panel can be installed and updated by means of
Parallels Installer. These components are listed at
http://download1.parallels.com/Plesk/PP11/11.0/release-notes/parallels-plesk-panel-11.0-forwindows-based-os.html#4.
You can also install and manage through Parallels Plesk Panel many other third-party
applications that are not included in the Parallels Plesk Panel distribution package. For the
complete list of third-party applications currently supported by Panel, refer to
http://download1.parallels.com/Plesk/PP11/11.0/release-notes/parallels-plesk-panel-11.0-forwindows-based-os.html#5.
Automatic Detection of Pre-installed Components
Supported third-party applications that have already been installed on a server prior to Panel
installation will be automatically detected during installation of Panel by Parallels Installer and
integrated as Panel components.
Manual Installation, Update, and Integration of Components Supported by Panel
If Panel is already installed and you want to install an application package or an update that
you obtained from a software vendor, you need to do the following:
1. Upload the package to the Panel-managed server and run the package installation
program or, when applicable, follow the vendor's installation instructions.
2. Complete the component installation or update by integrating the application with Panel:
a. Log in to Panel as administrator.
b. Go to Tools & Settings > Server Components. The list of the currently
registered Panel components is displayed.
c. Click Refresh under Tools. The list of registered Panel components is
refreshed. The integrated component entry appears in the list.
Alternately, you can use the following command line call to ensure detection of installed
components: "%plesk_bin%\defpackagemng.exe" --get --force
Note: For some newly installed applications, you might need to additionally configure the
application settings to ensure proper integration.
Installation of Software not Supported by Panel
You might want to install and use on the server other third-party applications not supported
by Panel. The applications will operate properly but will not be manageable through Panel.
Introduction to Panel 13
In accordance with Panel security policies, Panel sets permissions for all its partitions to
Service name
Ports used by service
Administrative interface of Panel
TCP 8443, 8880
Samba (file sharing on Windows networks)
UDP 137, UDP 138, TCP 139, TCP
445
VPN service
UDP 1194
Web server and Panel Updater
TCP 80, TCP 443
FTP server
TCP 20, 21, 990
SSH (secure shell) server
TCP 22
SMTP (mail sending) server
TCP 25, TCP 465
POP3 (mail retrieval) server
TCP 110, TCP 995
IMAP (mail retrieval) server
TCP 143, TCP 993
Mail password change service
TCP 106
MySQL server
TCP 3306
MS SQL server
TCP 1433
Tomcat Java service
TCP 9080, 9008
Licensing Server connections
TCP 5224
Domain name server
UDP 53, TCP 53
Panel upgrades and updates
TCP 8447
restrict users' access to each other and to third-party applications which are unknown to
Panel. For this reason, to ensure proper operation of third-party applications not supported
by Panel, you need to set required permissions in Panel. For more information about Panel
security policies, see the chapter Changing Security Settings for File System Objects and
Accounts (on page 100).
To enable a third-party application not supported by Panel, allow the psacln and psaserv
groups the required access level to required directories of the application.
If you are installing any IIS extensions or COM components that need to be available on
customers' websites, we highly recommend that you install 32-bit versions of these
applications because websites that Panel creates are 32-bit.
Ports Used by Panel
On servers protected by a firewall, the following ports must not be blocked to ensure proper
operation of Panel and accessibility of Panel-managed services.
14 Introduction to Panel
Licensing
After you install Parallels Plesk Panel, a trial license key for 14 days is installed by default.
To continue using Panel after the trial license key expires, you should obtain a lease license
key or purchase a permanent license key.
A leased license implies that you pay for a limited time during which you can use Panel, say,
for a couple of months. During the lease period, Panel will perform free monthly updates of
your license key. The lease license includes free upgrades to all new major versions of
Panel.
The permanent license implies that you buy a Panel license for a lifetime. A permanent
license is updated every three months for free. Upgrading a Panel installation with a
permanent license to the next major version requires a separate payment unless you use
Software Update Service (SUS). See http://www.parallels.com/support/sus/ for more
information on SUS.
Panel license keys have a grace period of 10 days right before the expiration date. During
the grace period, Panel automatically performs daily attempts to update the license key
automatically. If an automatic update fails, Panel notifies the administrator. If you do not
update a license key during the grace period, it expires and blocks Panel functions until you
install a valid license key.
Panel defines whether it needs to update the license key using the update-keys.php utility
located in the %plesk_dir%\admin\plib\DailyMaintainance\ directory, where
%plesk_dir% is an environment variable denoting the Panel installation directory. This utility
checks the license grace period and expiration date and tries to retrieve a new license key or
blocks Panel.
Panel runs the utility every day as a part of the daily maintenance script. If you want to check
for license updates, you can run the script manually by executing the command
"%plesk_bin%\php.exe" -d
auto_prepend_file="%plesk_dir%\admin\plib\DailyMaintainance\script.p
hp".
You can retrieve and manage license keys through the Panel GUI. The information about
current license key and controls for managing license keys are located in Server Administration
Panel > Tools & Settings > License Management.
This chapter describes how to perform the following tasks:
In this chapter:
Changing Your Server's Host Name .................................................................. 16
Changing IP Addresses ..................................................................................... 17
Moving the Virtual Hosts Directory .................................................................... 18
Moving the Directory for Storing Panel Backups ................................................ 19
Moving the Directories for Storing Mail Data...................................................... 20
Switching Between MySQL and MSSQL Database Server Engines .................. 21
Programming Event Handlers to Execute Custom Scripts ................................. 26
Automating Administration Tasks with Command-Line Utilities.......................... 27
Monitoring Status of System Services ............................................................... 28
Managing Services from the Command Line and Viewing Service Logs ........... 28
Predefining Values for Customizable PHP Parameters ..................................... 34
Website Applications ......................................................................................... 35
Spam Protection ................................................................................................ 37
Optimizing the Task Manager Performance ...................................................... 39
Cloning Panel in Virtual Environment ................................................................ 41
Removing Panel ................................................................................................ 43
C H A P T E R 3
System Maintenance
Change server's host name.
Change server IP addresses. You may need to do this when, for instance, you are
moving your Panel server to a new datacenter, and need to reconfigure the Panel
installation to run on new IP addresses.
Move the directory where virtual hosts reside to another location on the same or
another partition. You might want to do this when disk space on the current partition
is running out.
Move the directory where Panel backup files are stored to another location on the
same or another partition. You might want to do this when, for instance, there is
insufficient disk space on the current partition to house new backup files, and you
want to move them all to a new, larger volume.
Move the directories that house mail content to another location on the same or
another partition. You might want to do this when there is insufficient amount of disk
space on the current partition to serve a larger amount of mailboxes, and you want
to move them all to a new larger volume.
Switch the database server engine used by Panel.
Stop, start, and restart Panel-managed services from command line, and access
their logs and configuration files.
16 System Maintenance
Changing Your Server's Host Name
You specify your server's host name during your very first login to Panel. If you want to
change the host name later, you can do it through Panel.
Note: Specifying an invalid host name will result in unpredictable Panel behavior and server
malfunction. The host name must resolvable from the Panel-managed server, especially if
Customer and Business Manager is installed.
To change your server's host name:
1. Log in to Server Administration Panel.
2. Go to Tools & Settings > Server Settings.
3. Enter the new host name in the Full hostname field.
This should be a fully qualified host name, but without an ending dot (for example,
host.example.com).
4. Click OK.
System Maintenance 17
Changing IP Addresses
You can switch from an existing IP address on your Panel-managed server to a newly
created IP address or to another existing address.
During life-time of a Panel installation, you may need to replace IP addresses used for
hosting with other IP addresses. Replacing all old IP addresses with new ones may be
necessary when moving a Panel server onto a new network. More often, you may need to
introduce more subtle changes in your server's IP address pool. For example, you may need
to free up one or more IP addresses currently used for hosting on the server. This will allow
you to use the addresses for other purposes or to eliminate them from the server's IP pool
altogether.
Every time you replace an IP address with a new one on a Parallels Plesk Panel server, you
need to reconfigure Panel and various services to use the new IP address instead of the
replaced one.
You can switch from one IP address to another and automatically reconfigure Panel and all
hosting services on the server to use the new address by using the Change Server IP
Addresses option in the Reconfigurator utility.
Note: By using this feature, you can only replace one IP address with another. You cannot
migrate a group of select domains from one or more IP addresses to a new IP address.
To change from one IP address on a Panel-managed server to another, follow
these steps:
1. Log in to the Panel-managed server as a user with administrator rights by
using Remote Desktop.
2. In the W indows Start menu, select All Programs > Parallels > Panel > PP
Reconfigurator. The Reconfigurator application window opens.
3. Select the Change server IP addresses option. The IP Addresses Reconfiguring
window opens.
4. Under Select the IP addresses to be changed, select the checkboxes corresponding
to the IP addresses that you want to change to other IP addresses.
To view the list of domains hosted on particular IP address, click the IP address entry to
highlight it. The list of hosted domains using the highlighted IP address is displayed in a
window to the right.
18 System Maintenance
5. Map each selected to an IP address of your choice.
a. To map a selected address, click on the selected address entry. The
entry is highlighted.
b. Select the address to map to:
To map to an existing IP address, select Existing Address option and then select an
existing address entry. The entry information is displayed in the Mapping Information
column for the selected IP address entry under Select the IP addresses to be changed.
To map to a new IP address that will be created during mapping, select Create New
IP address option and then enter the IP address, network mask, and network
interface name. The entry information is displayed in the Mapping Information
column for the selected IP address entry under Select the IP addresses to be changed.
6. Click Next.
Panel installation is reconfigured to use the newly specified IP addresses in place of the
old ones. All relevant records in the Panel's database are updated, network adapters
settings are changed accordingly (the old IP addresses are removed), FTP and web
servers are reconfigured accordingly, DNS records are updated accordingly.
Note: If changing IP address fails during execution, all changes are rolled back. When
connected to the server through the Remote Desktop connection, a change of your server’s
IP address will terminate your session.
Moving the Virtual Hosts Directory
This option allows moving the directory where virtual hosts reside to another location on the
same or another partition. Use this feature when disk space is insufficient on the current
partition to house new virtual hosts, and you want to move them all to a new, larger volume.
To move the virtual hosts directory to a new location, follow these steps:
1. Log in to the Panel-managed server as a user with administrator rights by
using Remote Desktop.
2. In the W indows Start menu, select All Programs > Parallels > Panel > PP
Reconfigurator. The Reconfigurator application window opens.
3. Select the Change Virtual Hosts location option.
4. Specify the destination directory name. If the directory does n ot exist, it will
be created.
5. Click Next.
During this operation all Panel's services will be restarted.
System Maintenance 19
Moving the Directory for Storing Panel Backups
By using Panel Reconfigurator utility, you can move the Panel backup files storage directory
to another location on the same or another partition. Use this option when disk space is
insufficient on the current partition to house new backup files, and you want to move them all
to a new, larger volume.
To change location of the backup files directory, follow these steps:
1. Log in to the Panel-managed server as a user with administrator rights by
using Remote Desktop.
2. In the W indows Start menu, select All Programs > Parallels > Panel > PP
Reconfigurator. The Reconfigurator application window opens.
3. Select the Change Plesk Backup Data location option.
4. Specify the destination directory name. If the directory does not exist, it will
be created.
5. Click Next. During this operation, all services will be restarted.
20 System Maintenance
Moving the Directories for Storing Mail Data
You can move the directories that store mail content to another location on the same or
another partition. Use this option when disk space is insufficient on the current partition to
serve larger data volume or amount of mailboxes and you want to move all mail content to a
new, larger volume.
To move the mail content directories to another location, follow these steps:
1. Log in to the Panel-managed server as a user with administrator rights by
using Remote Desktop.
2. In the W indows Start menu, select All Programs > Parallels > Panel > PP
Reconfigurator. The Reconfigurator application window opens.
3. Select the Change Plesk Mail Data location option.
4. Specify the destination directory name. If the directory does not exist, it will
be created.
5. Click Next. During this operation, Panel's services will be restarted.
System Maintenance 21
Switching Between MySQL and MSSQL
In this section:
Using GUI to Switch Between Database Servers .............................................. 22
Using Command-Line Interface to Switch Between Database Servers .............. 23
Database Server Engines
Panel can use several different database engines to access the Panel's internal database. At
any time you can change the database location and select to use different database engine
to access the database. To switch from one database server to another, you need to migrate
the database to a new database server and configure Panel to connect to the server to
access the database. The following database servers are supported by Panel:
MySQL
Microsoft SQL
You can use the Switch Database Provider option in Reconfigurator to switch between database
servers to access Panel's internal database. Reconfigurator will migrate the Panel's internal
database to a new database server and configure Panel to access the database by means of
the new database server.
Two methods exist for switching between database servers: by using the Reconfigurator GUI
(on page 22) and by using the command-line interface (on page 23). This section describes
both of these methods.
22 System Maintenance
Using GUI to Switch Between Database Servers
You can migrate Panel's internal database to a new database engine and configure Panel to
access the database at the database server.
To switch between database servers through Reconfigurator GUI, follow these
steps:
1. Log in to the Panel-managed server as a user with administrator rights by
using Remote Desktop.
2. In the W indows Start menu, select All Programs > Parallels > Panel > PP
Reconfigurator. The Reconfigurator application window opens.
3. Select the Switch DB provider option.
4. Enter the supported database server engine type in the Server type field.
5. Enter the server address (IP address or host name) and, if different from
default, port number in the corresponding fields.
(The field are available only if MySQL or MSSQL server type is entered.)
6. Enter the new server administrator's login and password.
Note: If you switch to MySQL database in Panel 8.2 or later, note the following:
* if MySQL database was not used as a Panel database provider before, MySQL
administrator's login is 'admin' and password is 'setup'.
* if MySQL database was already used as a Panel database provider in the past, you
should use MySQL administrator's login and password which were used before changing
of the Panel database provider from MySQL to another server type.
7. Under Create a new database to locate data in, enter information about the new
Panel's database that the data will be migrated to:
a. In the Database field, enter the new database name. For example:
plesk_new.
b. In the Database user name field, enter user name to be used by Panel to
access the migrated database.
c. In the Password and Confirm password fields, type the database user
password.
Warning! By changing the database user password, you also change the Panel
administrator's password for accessing Panel. The Panel administrator's password and
database user password are always the same (although usernames can be different).
System Maintenance 23
To change MySQL database user password, follow these steps:
Option
Parameter
Description
Comment
--new-provider
MSSQL | MySQL
The new
database server
type.
1. Go to %Plesk_dir%\MySQL\Data.
2. Open the my.ini file and add to the [PleskSQLServer] section the
following line:
skip-grant-table
3. Go to Administrative Tools > Computer Management and start Panel's SQL server.
4. Issue the following in command line:
cd %Plesk_dir%\mysql\bin
mysql -P8306
mysql> use mysql
mysql> update user set password=password('<as your Panel admin
password>') where user="admin";
5. Go to %Plesk_dir%\MySQL\Data.
6. Erase from the [PleskSQLServer] section of the my.ini file the following
line:
skip-grant-table
7. Restart the Panel's SQL server.
Using Command-Line Interface to Switch Between Database Servers
You can migrate Panel's internal database to a new database server and configure Panel to
access the database at the database server.
The command for switching the Panel's database servers has the following syntax:
reconfigurator --switch-plesk-database --new-provider=<provider name> -host=<host name> --db=<database name> --login=<database user login> -password=<database user password> [--password=<port number>] [--adminlogin=<administrator login>] [--admin-password=<administrator password>]
See the following table for the command options descriptions.
Options
24 System Maintenance
Option
Parameter
Description
Comment
--db
<database
name>
Name of the
Panel's database
on the new
database server.
For MySQL and MSSQL
databases, you need to specify
only the database name on the
server. For example:
"--db=psa_new"
--host
<host name>
Database server
IP address or
host name.
--login
<user login
name>
Database user
name used by
Panel.
--password
<user
password>
Password used
by Panel.
--port
<port number>
New database
server port
number. This
parameter is
optional.
Define a port number if the new
database server uses a nondefault port number.
--admin-login
<administrator
login name>
Database server
administrator
login name. This
parameter is
optional.
Define the server administrator
credentials if you want a new
database user created with the
username and password specified
by the --login and --password
options. If the options are omitted
from the command, Panel will be
configured to use the database
user credentials specified by the -
-login and --password
options, no new user will be
created for the database.
--adminpassword
<administrator
password>
Database server
administrator
password. This
parameter is
optional.
System Maintenance 25
To switch between database servers through command-line interface, follow
these steps:
1. Log in to the server as a user with administrator right s by using Remote
Desktop.
2. Start cmd.exe.
3. Change directory to the %plesk_dir%\admin\bin\ folder (where
%plesk_dir% is the system variable defining the folder where Panel is
installed).
4. Execute the server switch command.
For example, to migrate the Panel's internal database to a new location accessible at
c:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk\admin\db\psa3.mdb, and instruct Panel
to use existing user credentials (login name dbadmin and password dbadminpass) to
access the database, use the following command:
reconfigurator --switch-plesk-database --host=localhost “--db=c:\Program
Files\Parallels\Plesk\admin\db\psa3.mdb” --login=dbadmin -password=dbadminpass
Warning! By changing the database user password, you also change the administrator's
password for accessing Panel. The administrator's password and database user password
are always the same (although user login names can be different).
26 System Maintenance
Programming Event Handlers to Execute Custom Scripts
Parallels Plesk Panel provides a mechanism that allows administrators to track specific
Panel events and make Panel execute custom scripts when these events occur. The events
include operations that Panel users perform on accounts, subscriptions, websites, service
plans, and various Panel settings.
It works the following way: you create a script to be executed upon a certain Panel event,
and then set up an event handler in Server Administration Panel that triggers processing of
the event by the script. You can assign several handlers to a single event.
To learn how to track Panel events and set up execution of commands or custom scripts,
refer to Parallels Plesk Panel Administrator's Guide, chapter Event Tracking available at
http://download1.parallels.com/Plesk/PP11/11.0/Doc/en-US/online/plesk-administratorguide/59205.htm.
System Maintenance 27
Automating Administration Tasks with Command-Line Utilities
Parallels Plesk Panel command-line utilities are designed to facilitate the processes of
creating various entities in Parallels Plesk Panel bypassing the Panel GUI. Command-line
utilities are executed via command prompt opened in the %plesk_dir%\admin\bin\
folder (where %plesk_dir% is a system variable containing the Panel installation directory).
You can see the list of available commands and options by running an utility with --help or
-h command. For more information about command line utilities usage refer to Parallels Plesk
Panel for Windows Command Line Interface Reference at
http://download1.parallels.com/Plesk/PP11/11.0/Doc/en-US/online/plesk-win-cli/.
28 System Maintenance
Monitoring Status of System Services
You can monitor the status of your Panel-managed server without logging in to Panel. To do
this, you need to access your server over Remote Desktop.
A utility called Parallels Plesk Panel Services Monitor is loaded automatically every time
Panel starts. To manage the status of Panel's services, open the Parallels Plesk Panel
Services Monitor by double-clicking its icon in the taskbar. The look of the icon depends on
the state of crucial Panel services: the icon means that all Panel's services are
functioning, and the icon means that some services are stopped or not working correctly.
Once you open the Services Monitor, you can see the status of all vital Panel's services. The
icon indicates that a corresponding service is working correctly, and the icon
indicates that the corresponding service is stopped or is not working correctly.
To stop a service, select the corresponding checkbox and click Stop.
To restart a service, select the corresponding checkbox and click Restart.
To start a service, select the corresponding checkbox and click Start.
Note: You can use Select All and Clear All buttons to select or clear all available checkboxes.
To refresh the list of services and their respective statuses, click Refresh.
To remove all information about Panel sessions from Panel's database and disconnect all
users from Panel, click Delete Sessions. This is useful when you need to restart Panel, but
some users are still connected to it, and you want to avoid possible data loss or files
corruption.
Note: You can also start, stop, restart services and delete sessions by right-clicking the
Parallels Plesk Panel Services Monitor icon and selecting the required option from the menu.
To hide the Services Monitor back in the taskbar, click Hide.
System Maintenance 29
Managing Services from the Command Line and Viewing Service Logs
This section describes how to stop, start, and restart services managed by Panel, and
access their logs and configuration files.
Parallels Plesk Panel web interface
To stop the service through command line:
net stop plesksrv
To start the service through command line:
net start plesksrv
net start poppassd
To restart the service through command line:
net stop plesksrv
net start plesksrv
net start poppassd
Panel's log file is located in:
%plesk_dir%\admin\logs\W3SVC<IIS site ID>\ex<date>.log
Panel's PHP configuration file is located in:
%plesk_dir%\admin\php.ini
Internet Information Services log file is accessible at:
IIS manager > Sites/Application Pools > PleskControlPanel
Web Presence Builder
%plesk_dir%\SiteBuilder\_logs Configuration files are accessible at:
IIS manager > Sites/Application Pools > sitebuilder(default) / SiteBuilderSitesWebAppPool
phpMyAdmin
Log files are located in:
%plesk_dir%\admin\logs\W3SVC<IIS site ID>\ex<date>.log
Configuration files are accessible at:
%plesk_dir%admin\htdocs\domains\databases\phpMyAdmin\config.inc.php
30 System Maintenance
ASP.Net Enterprise Manager
Configuration files are accessible at:
IIS manager > Sites > sqladmin(default)\mssql
myLittleAdmin 2000/2005
Configuration files are accessible at:
IIS manager > Sites > sqladmin(default)\myLittleAdmin
%plesk_vhosts%\sqladmin\myLittleAdmin\2005\config.xml
MailEnable
To stop the service through command line:
net stop meimaps && net stop melcs && net stop memtas && net stop mepops &&
net stop mepocs && net stop mesmtpcs
To start the service through command line:
net start meimaps && net start melcs && net start memtas && net start
mepops && net start mepocs && net start mesmtpcs
To restart the service through command line:
net stop meimaps && net stop melcs && net stop memtas && net stop mepops &&
net stop mepocs && net stop mesptpcs && net start meimaps && net start
melcs && net start memtas && net start mepops && net start mepocs && net
start mesmtpcs
Log files are located in:
%plesk_dir%Mail Servers\Mail Enable\Logging
Configuration files are accessible at:
%plesk_dir%\Mail Servers\Mail Enable\Bin\MailEnable.msc
DNS / Named / BIND
To stop the service through command line:
net stop named
To start the service through command line:
net start named
To restart the service through command line:
net stop named && net start named
Log files are accessible through Windows Event Viewer.
Configuration files are accessible at:
%plesk_dir%\dns
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