Accounts, packages and resellers

An account is one hosting customer: a system user, a home folder, a main domain, a DNS zone, mailboxes, databases and a hosting panel to manage them. A package sets the limits. This chapter covers the whole life of an account in the Host Manager.

Create a New Account

Host Manager → Account Functions → Create a New Account. The form has four cards.

Domain Information

• Domain - the main domain, without www..
• Username - 2 to 16 lower-case letters and digits, starting with a letter. Empty means the first letters of the domain.
• Password - at least the strength set in Tweak Settings (50 by default). The Generate button makes a strong one.
• Contact Email - where the account owner gets notices.

Package - Choose a Package, or Select Options Manually to type the limits for this account only (disk, bandwidth, FTP, e-mail, lists, databases, subdomains, parked, addon domains and hourly e-mail).

Settings - Hosting panel theme, Locale, IP address (the shared IP unless the account needs its own), Shell access, Database prefix (prefix every database and user with the account name, Hosting Panel style), Spam filter, and for root only Reseller.

DNS & Mail - create a DNS zone for the domain or not, choose the Mail routing and tick Welcome e-mail to send the sign-in details to the contact address.

On Create, the panel records the account, its main domain, the DNS zone and the mail routing, then asks the driver to make the user, the home with public_html, the Apache virtual host and the PHP-FPM pool. You land on List Accounts with the new account found.

Creation stops with a clear line when the username or domain exists, the password is too weak, or the licence limit is reached. See The licence key.

List Accounts

Account Information → List Accounts. One row per account: Domain, User, IP, Owner, Package, Disk (used and limit), Created, Status. Click a column title to sort; the search box looks at domain, user, owner, IP and e-mail; 25 rows per page. Each row has:

• Hosting Panel - sign in as the account. The hosting panel opens in the same browser as that customer, and the action is written to the activity log. Use it for support.
• Modify, Suspend or Unsuspend, Terminate.

Smaller lists: List Parked Domains, List Subdomains, List Suspended Accounts, Search for a Domain, Show Active and Inactive Accounts, Show Accounts Over Quota and View Bandwidth Usage.

Packages

Packages → Add a Package. Three cards: Package Name, Resources and Settings.

Each resource has a number box and an Unlimited tick: Disk Space Quota (MB), Monthly Bandwidth Limit (MB), Max FTP Accounts, Max SQL Databases, Max Email Accounts, Max Mailing Lists, Max Subdomains, Max Parked Domains, Max Addon Domains, Max Hourly Email by Domain Relayed, the failed-or-deferred percentage a domain may reach per hour, Max Passenger Applications and Max Team Users.

Settings are Dedicated IP, Shell Access, CGI Access, Digest Authentication, Feature List, Hosting Panel Theme and Locale. Use Edit a Package and Delete a Package later. The default package cannot be deleted; accounts of a deleted package keep their limits. A reseller's packages are named resellername_package automatically.

Upgrade/Downgrade an Account applies another package to one account; Modify/Upgrade Multiple Accounts does it for many through the task queue. See The panel cron.

Feature lists

A feature list decides which hosting panel tools an account sees. Packages → Feature Manager (also under Hosting Panel) edits them. Three come ready: default (everything), disabled (nothing) and Mail Only. Tick or untick tools such as Email Accounts, File Manager, Terminal or Cloudflare. A tool that is off disappears from the account's home page, and typing its address shows This feature is not included in your hosting package.

Resellers

Make a reseller by ticking Reseller when you create the account, or later in Resellers. The reseller signs in to the Host Manager with the account's user name and password.

• Reseller Center and Show Reseller Accounts list them; View Reseller Usage and Manage Account Status shows what each uses.
• Edit Reseller Nameservers and Privileges sets the ACLs: what the reseller may do (create accounts, set packages, suspend, edit DNS and so on).
• Manage Reseller's Shared IP and IP Delegation decide which addresses the reseller may give out.
• Change Ownership of an Account (and of Multiple Accounts) moves accounts between resellers.
• Email All Resellers and Reset Resellers are the bulk tools.

A reseller sees and changes only the accounts they own, and only the pages in their reduced menu. See The Host Manager.

Suspend, unsuspend, terminate

• Manage Account Suspension takes a reason, suspends the account and shows the suspended page on its domains. Modify Suspended Account Page edits that page. A suspended customer cannot sign in to the hosting panel.
• Limit Bandwidth Usage sets a monthly cap. The cron suspends an account that goes over it; on the 1st of the next month the counters reset and those accounts are unsuspended. Unsuspend Bandwidth Exceeders and Reset Account Bandwidth Limit do it by hand.
• Terminate Accounts removes the user, home, domains, DNS zone, mailboxes, databases and cron jobs. Terminate Multiple Accounts runs in the task queue. Both ask you to confirm, and Terminate Accounts has a Keep the DNS zone box. Termination cannot be undone, so take a backup first. See Services and backups.

Other account tools

Modify an Account is one form with three cards: Account Information (primary domain, which can be renamed, owner, contact e-mail), Package & Settings (package, feature list, theme, locale, PHP version, dedicated IP, shell and CGI access) and Resource Limits. Besides it there are Password Modification, Force Password Change (the customer sees a banner until they pick a new one), Quota Modification, Manage Shell Access, Manage Demo Mode (changes made in the hosting panel are not saved, for a demo account), Skeleton Directory (files copied into every new home), Rearrange an Account, Raw Apache Log Download and Email All Users.