Monday, 28 September 2009

Web Hosting Control Panels

Managing a VPS or a Dedicated Server becomes much easier if you consider a control panel on it. You'd be able to access control panel through an easy to use web based interface. The main purpose of control panel is to manage multiple domains , create email accounts and resell web hosting services. You can create your own custom web hosting packages which you can assign to your clients along with separate control panel for their websites. Even clients would be able to manage their websites and email accounts. Control panel is offered on linux as well as windows platform which means you can resell hosting on both the platforms. You just need to make sure that you stick one control panel or one operating system platform initially as you need separate control panels for Windows and Linux operating system. Most of the web hosting companies offer control panel on their shared and reseller hosting packages so that clients can manage their own websites or reseller hosting account. Considering a fact that you have dedicated resources and full administrator or root access on VPS and Dedicated Server, separate control panel licenses are offered on it so that they can secure their servers and manage it more efficiently. Although there are different types of control panel offered, the most popular amongst them are cPanel/WHM and Parallel's Plesk. Control panel is recommended for those who host multiple websites/sub domains or email accounts. You can also manage the servers through SSH on linux servers or RDP on windows servers if you don't wish to go with control panel option.

How useful are web hosting control panels?

Web Hosting control panel is useful if you are wanting to host multiple websites rather than a single website. Resellers has the most advantages as they can manage their hosting accounts and create custom packages as per their requirements. Resources usage of each website and hosting account can be analyzed through control panel. Basic server management can also be managed through control panel if you are not an expert in managing server through root/rdp access. In summary, the main uses for web hosting control panels include:

# Web hosting services - You will find that web hosting control panel has all the features that is required for running a web hosting business. Basic web server management and email services can be easily managed through control panel. Industry leader control panels like Plesk and cPanel are configured ASP, PHP , Coldfusion etc. by default. Most of the scripting languages are suported and managed through control panels along with other advanced features.

# Server management - Web hosting control panels provide a way for those who may not be able to use a server properly to manage their server with ease as most web hosting control panels are able to offer a web based GUI that not only allows administrators to manage their web hosting clients but also their server as well - however, you should note that a web hosting control panel is no replacement for managing your server either via SSH or Remote Desktop as the functions that a web hosting control panel can provide you with are very limited when compared to what you are able to do from the console.

# Organization - Even if you don't want to use a web hosting control panel for offering web hosting services to others, you will find that it is useful to be able to control and organize all of your own websites within the context of your own server as it means that you can make full use of your server resources but also keep control of the resources that each domain/website that you are hosting is using up at the click of a few buttons - however, if you are experienced with server management then you may find it more beneficial to have a server without a web hosting control panel installed on it.

In conclusion, web hosting control panels are the main requirements of the web hosting industry as we know it with web hosting control panels being used for shared and reseller web hosting packages as well as on VPS hosting and dedicated servers as they offer people an easy way to manage their servers using a web based interface. The main web hosting control panels used are cPanel and Plesk meaning that you should look out for both when considering a web hosting provider for your needs; however, the control panel that you use will depend on the server operating system that you choose to run.

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