Getting to know WHM on a VPS server

Our Free Reseller Program helps you to become a Virtual Private Server reseller and to start reselling Dedicated Servers, Virtual Private Servers and Semi-Dedicated Servers offering various features and Control Panel options, among which cPanel, DirectAdmin, as well as ResellersPanel's very own Control Panel - the Hepsia Web Hosting Control Panel. You can choose between several Operating System platforms such as CentOS, Debian and Ubuntu. You can use our Dedicated Hosting services both in your dedicated, VPS and semi-dedicated server reseller capacity, or as a client yourself.

After you purchase your Virtual Private Server with the cPanel Control Panel, you should know that the most vital part of getting to know any product, be it a washing machine or a complex web software platform, is reading the given product's manual. The cPanel Development Team has established a pretty useful and by all means a diligently composed documentation pertaining to their acclaimed web hosting software. The documentation that you all probably want to take a look at, can be found at the following web addresses:

https://cpanel.net/docs/cpanel - for the client web hosting environment

https://cpanel.net/docs/whm - for the administration backend tool

The first step of using cPanel on your VPS involves a better understanding of the main difference between WHM and cPanel. Although they represent a combination of tools for managing and maintaining the web hosting package you have just bought, they just as well differ, being two powerful sources of administration. Since your duties as a reseller (for your clients - a full-blown Web Hosting Provider) will require you to manage every part of the service on a local level, we shall start with explaining the WHM part of the cPanel web hosting platform first.

The WHM (short for Web Hosting Manager) is, as we have already mentioned above, the administration tool for the cPanel users. WHM is a web-based tool used by server administrators and resellers to manage hosting accounts on the Virtual Private Server. WHM listens on ports 2086 and 2087 by default. It is the place where you will be able to administer the following set of functions:

Account Information - this is the area where the reseller can acquire all the needed information regarding all client subaccounts on the Virtual Server. The area consists of 7 task related link references that you can use to:

* List accounts - you can list all client accounts here. The access path is Main >> Account Information >> List Accounts. The user-friendly cPanel account search form allows you to perform a complex search based upon the following criteria: Domain, Username, Reseller/Owner, Package, IP Address. All criteria are self explanatory. At the "Selector" table where you can put the form into use, you can modify the way the search will show you the results. In the "Match" field, you can set up the domain name extension, and in the "Accounts Per Page" field, you are allowed to set the number of accounts to display from the search results. The table that is displaying the exact results contains 12 columns that carry system information regarding the accounts displayed in the table. The columns are: Domain, cPanel, IP, Username, Contact Email, Setup Date, Partition, Quota, Disk Used, Package, Theme and Owner. The Domain field matches the main domain for the given user - no subdomains, addon domains or parked domains are being displayed into that column. The cPanel field is containing the cPanel icon - your gateway to directly entering the clients' cPanel accounts. Note that if you enter a client's cPanel account from your WHM through the cPanel icon showed in that column, you will enter it with reseller privileges and won't be able to use the following cPanel functions - the Fantastico De Luxe script installer and the phpMyAdmin tool. The reason for this is that those software applications do not run under different user accounts and user groups. You will, however, be able to manage the rest of the cPanel account as an ordinary user. The IP field displays the IP Address the given account is using at the moment. It can either be the shared IP Address of your reseller account that your clients are using by default, the shared IP Address on the VPS, or a Dedicated IP Address that you can purchase separately from the cPanel Reseller Package as an addon. The Contact Email field consists of the email address your client is using for administrative requests and system related messages. The Setup Date field stores the account's setup date - the time of its creation. The Partition field notifies you on what server partition exactly the account is stored. Usually, on all Linux-based Operating Systems, the partition to store regular users' data is /home. The Quota and the Disk Used fields are related. The Quota field shows the exact disk usage quota of the relevant client and the Disk Used field shows how much of that quota is already occupied by the user's web content. The Package field shows the client's package - it can be any of the packages you have set up. The Theme field provides you with information about the cPanel theme the client is using. It can be easily unified by you - by setting up a default cPanel theme. The final column shows who is the account's Owner. That would be your reseller username. Note that by clicking on a column's description, you can sort the displayed information in ascending and descending order.

* List parked domains - this is the section where all parked domains for your account or the accounts of your clients go into. The access path for it is Main >> Account Information >> List Parked Domains. For Domains parked on top of Subdomains (addon domains), please use List Subdomains.

* List Subdomains - this is the section where you can browse all domains parked on top of subdomains. The access path is Main >> Account Information >> List Subdomains.

* List suspended accounts - this is the section where you can list all the accounts that got suspended either by you or by the system. Whenever we suspend an account of yours, an email message will be sent to you with an explanation of the causes of the suspension and with a request to contact us to acquire further information on what to do next. The table consisting of all the suspended accounts under your Reseller account, can display the following columns: Domain, User, Owner, Date Suspended, Reason, and buttons for unsuspension and deletion. The Domain and User columns show the suspended user and their main domain name, the Owner shows your Reseller account, the suspension date field gives you a clearer idea on when exactly the account was suspended and the Reason field shows the reason why the account was suspended - it can vary and you can set up your own list of suspension reasons to serve you as reminders. The Unsuspend and Terminate buttons allow you to quickly reinstate the account or remove it from the system. The access path is Main >> Account Information >> List Suspended Accounts

* Search accounts - this section represents merely a simpler way to search for an account. For more information, refer to List accounts. The access path is Main >> Account Information >> Search Accounts

* Show accounts over quota - the access path for this section is Main >> Account Information >> Show Accounts over Quota. The section contains a table with four columns. The User column combines the user and the domain name of the account that has passed the initial quota it was orignally allocated. The Space Used and the Quota fields mark the space that the client has used (it will usually outgrow the quota statement) and the quota that you have set up for the account. The M is for MB. The results cannot be displayed in any other format, so instead of seeing 2 GB, you will be seeing 2000 MB. The Change button is active and you can directly change the user's quota if you want to - you can increase or decrease it.

* View bandwidth usage - this is the section where you can monitor and control the bandwidth usage of your clients' accounts. Subdomains that have not used any of the above bandwidth quota will no longer be shown. Parked domains' bandwidth quota is included in that of the main domain. The access path for this section is Main >> Account Information >> View Bandwidth Usage.

Now that you have learned the most basic and at the same time the most important information about working with WHM's Account Information area, we will briefly introduce you to the other functions that your Web Host Manager is provided with. The full list of features in a collapsed order, is:

Support - this feature allows you to configure where support requests go when they are submitted through cPanel. The cPanel accounts have the "submit a support request" function that allows the clients to contact you directly. You can also redirect a person making a support request to a URL. This can be useful if, for instance, you have a ticket system that will handle their support requests. You may also choose to send (pipe) support requests to a program.

Cluster/Remote Access - a remote access key is used for automatic account creation scripts, external billing software, and various other things that need to call the WHM to create / remove / modify accounts. You can learn more about using this feature here. A certain example is the ClientExec Billing Software that we install for you in order to fully automate your billing system.

Account Functions - this is the area where you can manually create, suspend and terminate accounts, as well as modify the accounts, their quota, passwords and skeleton directory (the one that consists of the cPanel structure files - you can add some as per your choice and way of work). You can also upgrade accounts through that section.

Multi Account Functions - this is the area where you can work simultaneously with your clients' accounts, you can upgrade/downgrade multiple accounts and also terminate them at once.

Themes - this is the section where you can change the WHM Theme you are using - you can choose between the default and the WHM X Theme. Note that both differ in the way they display features and functions.

Packages - this is the section where you create your Web Hosting Plans - it is the place where your business starts at.

DNS Functions - this is the section where you can modify and edit, delete and add DNS Zones for your clients' accounts.

Email - this is the section where you check and verify the validity of email addresses by tracing their corresponding Mail Servers.

cPanel - this is the section where you can change the way your clients' cPanel themes will look like - you can change the Branding and modify the cPanel news section.

SSL/TLS - this is the area where you can generate SSL Certificates. Note that only the root user on the Virtual Private Server has rights to install SSL Certificates, so in case any of your clients wishes to set their own SSL Certificate, you will have to contact our Support Personnel in order for them to successfully install the Certificate.

Plugins - this section contains tools for managing and utilizing different cPanel related plugins - the Fantastico De Luxe, the RVSite Builder Manager and the RVSkin Manager.

Congratulations! You have passed through the first and most basic step - getting to know the structure and the environmental peculiarities of the Web Host Manager and the cPanel software in general, which will no doubt help you out in configuring your Virtual Private Server.