[TUT] - Navigating cPanel - by Uzi.

[Uzi]

Index

• Introduction
  
• What is cPanel
  
• Where to get cPanel
  
• Finding cPanel on your website
  
• Viewing Statistics
  
• Preferences
  
• Mail
  
• Files
  
• Logs
  
• Security
  
• Domains
  
• Databases
  
• Software/Services
  
• Advanced
  
• Softaculous Apps Installer

Introduction

Hello everyone and welcome to my first original tutorial for the Techsperts group on HackForums. This has been created for this group, and this group only; do not share this guide unless instructed otherwise. This is my first tutorial I've created in a while, and it's my first assignment I'm doing for an actual group. I will try to keep this as high quality as possible and fix any spelling, punctuation and grammatical mistakes; if you find any then please notify me whenever possible. Well basically, this tutorial is for navigating cPanel and everything within cPanel, I can't explain much more in this section (Introduction) but I'll explain more below. I hope you enjoy this tutorial/guide and find it beneficial.



What is cPanel?

cPanel is the industry leader for turning standalone servers into a fully automated point-and-click hosting platform. Tedious tasks are replaced by web interfaces and API-based calls. cPanel is designed with multiple levels of administration including admin, reseller, end user, and email-based interfaces. These multiple levels provide security, ease of use, and flexibility for everyone from the server administrator to the email account user. cPanel is an organization that wins the loyalty of customers around the world by providing feature-rich applications backed by a team of developers, technical support engineers and quality assurance experts that provide stable builds, direct support, and fantastic customer service. cPanel powers web hosting companies and organizations that have a need to automate and offer competitive hosting services.

Wikipedia information: cPanel is a Unix based web hosting control panel that provides a graphical interface and automation tools designed to simplify the process of hosting a web site. cPanel utilizes a 3 tier structure that provides functionality for administrators, resellers, and end-user website owners to control the various aspects of website and server administration through a standard web browser. In addition to the GUI interface cPanel also has command line and API based access that allows third party software vendors, web hosting organizations, and developers to automate standard system administration processes. cPanel is designed to function either as a dedicated server or virtual private server and it supports CentOS, Red Hat Linux, and FreeBSD. Application-based support includes Apache, PHP, MySQL, Postgres, Perl, and BIND (DNS). Email based support includes POP3, IMAP, SMTP services. cPanel is commonly accessed on port 2082, with an SSL-secured server operating on port 2083. Once installed, cPanel cannot be removed. The server must be formatted, and the operating system reinstalled. Similarly, it should only be installed on a freshly installed operating system with minimal prior configuration.

Vimeo Video:

Where do I get cPanel?

cPanel comes with a lot of hosting affiliates, such as x10hosting, 000webhost and so forth. Some website hosting companies include cPanel completely free of charge if you choose to go with their website hosting service! Alternatively you can go to the official cPanel based website and view the products and what is up for offer; http://cpanel.net/ - If you would like to go straight to products page then view here; http://www.cpanel.net/products/

cPanel website useful pages;

• Homepage
  
• Products
  
• Interact
  
• Demo
  
• Support
  
• Development Center
  
• Videos
  
• Buy cPanel now

Also other pages can be located around the website by manually searching.

Finding cPanel on your website is fairly simple. It just depends on your website's hosting service and if they've included cPanel in the web-hosting package. If not then look at the above information to purchase your own cPanel access.

• Go to your website.

• Type:
  
  Code:

  www.YourWebsite.com/cpanel

• If it doesn't display go to:
  
  Code:

  www.YouWebsite.com:2083

• You should now have this login screen appearing:
  Spoiler (Click to View)

  

You should have the login information from your hosting account or when you purchased cPanel through their own website. Enter your given username and password and then click on 'Login'. You should now be redirected and sent to the cPanel homepage with all the tools, information, features and statistics.



Viewing Statistics

Statistics are basically the main pieces of information within your cPanel (X) account.
They display down the side of your cPanel account, such as on the left hand side.

Here's what's displayed on my cPanel:

Spoiler (Click to View)

Some part of the statistics have been painted over to cover up some vital parts of information which should be kept confidential and away from public viewing.

What everything's used for:

-Main Domain
This is the domain/website you've selected to attach your cPanel/hosting account to.

-Home Directory
This shows your cPanel username login, followed by !/home/". It's basically the root of your files.

-Last Login From
This displays the latest IP address which logged into the cPanel.

-Disk Space Usage
From here you can view how much free space and used space you have on your cPanel.

-Monthly Bandwidth Transfer
This displays how much total bandwidth you've used on your account.

-Email Accounts
This displays the email accounts you have linked/created with your cPanel.

-Sub-Domains
This shows the amount of sub-domains you can have on your cPanel.

-Parked Domains
This displayed the other domains you have linked to your cPanel, alternatives to Main Domains.

-FTP Accounts
You may add FTP accounts to your cPanel, this is for uploading large amounts of files at one time.

-SQL Databases
This displays the number of SQL Databases you have created using cPanel.

-MySQL Disk Space
Displays the amount of 'disk space' you've used on your cPanel account.

-Hosting Package
This displays the source of your package, who's the owner, etc etc etc.

-cPanel Version
From here you'll know the exact version of your cPanel so you know whether or not it's up to date.

-Theme
This displays the current cPanel theme you're using.

-Operating System
This is fairly simple, it displays your OS; mine's Linux.

-Shared IP Address
This displays the IP address in which is used to access cPanel using the alternative method.



Preferences

Preferences is basically all the self-explanatory parts, such as changing your password, switching between themes, Getting Started Wizard, Video Tutorials, changing language and adding Short-cuts. There's not a lot I can explain about this part of the cPanel.

Image of the Preferences section:

Spoiler (Click to View)

Everything in the above section is basic and I do not need to explain them. Apart from the Short-cuts which is basically adding a short-cut from your PC, e.g. your Desktop to the cPanel. So you click on the short-cut and you're taken straight to the page which you set your short-cut to.



Mail

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Email Accounts
In this area you can manage the email accounts associated with your domain.

-Webmail
Webmail allows you to access your email from any computer with an Internet connection and a web browser

-BoxTrapper
BoxTrapper protects your inbox from spam by requiring all email senders not on your Whitelist reply to a verification email before you can receive their mail.

-SpamAssassin™
SpamAssassin is an automated email filtering system that attempts to identify spam messages based on the content of the email's headers and body.

-Forwarders
Forwarders allow you to send a copy of all mail from one email address to another. For example, if you have two different email accounts, joe@example.com and joseph@example.com, you could forward joe@example.com to joseph@example.com so that you do not need to check both accounts.

-Auto Responders
You can use auto responders to send a message back automatically to anyone who sends an email to a specified account. This can be useful for times when you are on vacation or unavailable, or if you have a generic message that you wish to send from a support email address.

-Default Address
The default email address will "catch" any mail that is sent to an invalid email address for your domain. To send all default mail to the main mail account, type the username of your cPanel account into the "Forward to email address" field.

-Mailing Lists
Mailing lists can simplify sending messages to a large group of people. You can add a group of email addresses to a mailing list to avoid typing those addresses each time you send a message. This can be very useful when sending newsletters or other updates to large groups of people.

-Account Level Filtering
In this area you can manage filters for your main account.

-User Level Filtering
In this area, you can manage filters for each user. Each user filter is processed after the main account filters.

-Email Delivery Route
This feature allows you to view how the mail server will treat a message when sending to or delivering to a specific address. If you enter an address on the server, it shows how the mail server will deliver mail to that address. If you enter an address that exists somewhere other than this server, it will show how the mail server will attempt to send mail to that address.

-Important Addresses/Forwarders
This feature allows you to use 2 types of files to create multiple email address or email forwarders for your account simultaneously. You may use Excel spreadsheet files (.xls) or comma-separated values sheet, aka CSV file (.csv) to import the data. A CSV file is a plain text file that has been given a .csv extension.

-Email Authentication
Email authentication is the effort to equip messages of the email transport system with enough verifiable information, so that recipients can recognize the nature of each incoming message automatically. Enabling email authentication will help fight the spread of spam. Both of the methods below work to prevent forged mail from going in and out of your server. The great benefit of enabling these methods is to prevent mail from looking like it is coming from your domain(s). When enabled, these methods should reduce the amount of bounce messages or unwanted emails received when spammers "spoof" one or more of your email addresses.

-MX Entry
An MX (mail exchanger) entry tells a client which server receives mail sent to a domain name.



Files

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Backups
Backups allow you to download (to your computer) a zipped copy of either your entire site (including your home directory, databases, email forwarders configuration, and email filters configuration) or one of the previously mentioned parts of your site. These are not automatically scheduled backups. Automatically scheduled backups need to be enabled by the server owner/administrator.

-Backup Wizard
This feature allows you to download a zipped copy of your entire site or parts of it onto your computer. The following are backed up and included in a zip file for your convenience; Home Directory, MySQL Databases, Email forwarders configuration, and Email filters configuration.

-Legacy File Manager
This feature allows you to manage your files without using an FTP such as FileZilla. It's very convenient if you don't have an FTP account configured or wish to manage everything straight from the cPanel.

-File Manager
Same as stated above on "Legacy File Manager".

-Web Disk
The Web Disk feature is cPanel's implementation of the WebDav protocol. This feature allows you to manage files associated with your website. By creating an account and accessing your Web Disk, you can navigate, upload, and download files to and from your web server as though they were part of your personal computer.

-Disk Space Usage
The cPanel Disk Usage Viewer provides an overview of the disk space that your account is using. It shows disk usage totals for your account’s directories and all of its databases rather than for individual files or databases. Use the File Manager to see disk usage data for individual files, and the MySQL main page to see data for individual databases.

-FTP Accounts
FTP accounts allow you to access your website's files through a protocol called FTP. You will need a third-party FTP program to access your files. You can log into via FTP by entering

-FTP Session Control
You can use this function to see who is currently logged into your site through FTP. You can also terminate any FTP connections to your site that you feel should not be open. This can be very useful in preventing users from accessing your files without your permission.



Logs

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Latest Visitors
This function will show the last 300 people who have accessed your site.

-Bandwidth
This function allows you to see the bandwidth usage for your site. It shows the current month's bandwidth usage, as well as your total bandwidth usage. This will include all HTTP (web) and POP (mail) bandwidth usage, and may include FTP bandwidth usage if your system administrator has enabled FTP bandwidth logging.

-Webalizer Stats
Webalizer is a complex stats program that produces a variety of charts and graphs about who has visited your site.

-Webalizer FTP
Webalizer FTP is a complex stats program that produces a variety of charts and graphs about who has visited your site using FTP protocol.

-Raw Access Logs
Raw Access Logs allow you to see who has visited your website without displaying graphs, charts or other graphics. You can use the Raw Access Logs menu to download a zipped version of the server’s access log for your site. This can be very useful when you want to quickly be able to see who is visiting your site.

-Analog Stats
Analog produces a simple summary of all the people who have visited your site. It is fast and provides great lightweight statistics. Analog shows the people who have accessed your site during a specific month. It provides limited content but can be helpful to see where your main users are from.

-Error Log
This function will display the last 300 errors for your site. This can be very useful for finding broken links or problems with missing files. Checking this log frequently can help keep your site running smoothly.

-Choose Log Programs
This function allows you to choose what stats programs you will use when viewing site statistics, if you are allowed to do so.

-Awstats
Awstats produces visual statistics about visitors of your site.




Security

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Password Protect Directories
This option will allow you to require a username and password to access a folder or folders from the web. This can be very useful when you need to limit access to a certain part of your site.

-IP Deny Manager
This feature will allow you to block a range of IP addresses to prevent them from accessing your site. You can also enter a fully qualified domain name, and the IP Deny Manager will attempt to resolve it to an IP address for you.

-SSL/TLS Manager
The SSL/TLS Manager will allow you to generate ssl certificates, signing requests, and keys. These are all parts of using SSL to secure your website. SSL allows you to secure pages on your site so that information such as logins, credit card numbers, etc are sent encrypted instead of plain text. It is important to secure your site's login areas, shopping areas, and other pages where sensitive information could be sent over the web.

-SSH/Shell Access
SSH allows secure file transfer and remote logins over the internet. Your connection via SSH is encrypted allowing the secure connection. In this section you can manage your SSH keys to allow automation when logging in via SSH. Using public key authentication is an alternative to password authentication. Since the private key must be held to authenticate, it is virtually impossible to brute force. You can Import existing keys, generate new keys, as well as manage/delete keys.

-Hotlink Protection
Hotlink protection prevents other websites from directly linking to files (as specified below) on your website. Other sites will still be able to link to any file type that you don't specify below (i.e., HTML files). An example of hotlinking would be using an <img> tag to display an image from your site somewhere else on the Web. The end result is that the other site is stealing your bandwidth. List all sites below from which you wish to allow direct links. This system attempts to add all sites it knows you own to the list; however, you may need to add others.

-Leech Protect
Leech Protect allows you to prevent your users from giving out or publicly posting their passwords to a restricted area of your site. This feature will redirect accounts which have been compromised to a URL of your choice (and suspend them, if you choose).

-GnuPG Keys
GnuPG is a publicly available encryption scheme that uses the "public key" approach. With GnuPG, messages are encrypted using a "public key" however, they can only be decrypted by a "private key", which is retained by the intended recipient of the message.



Domains

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Subdomains
Subdomains are URLs for different sections of your website. They use your main domain name and a prefix. For example, if your domain is uzigaming.com a sub-domain of your domain might be support.uzigaming.com.

-Addon Domains
An addon domain allows visitors to reach a subdomain of your site by typing the addon domain's URL into a browser. This means that you can host additional domains from your account, if allowed by your hosting provider. Addon Domains Subdomains are relative to your account's home directory.

-Parked Domains
Parked Domains (Domain pointers) allow you to "point" or "park" additional domain names to your existing hosting account. This will allow users to also reach your website when entering the "parked" or "pointed" domain into their browsers.

-Redirects
Redirects allow you to make a specific web page redirect to another page and display the contents of that page. This way you can make a page with a long URL accessible by a page which has a shorter and easier to remember URL.

-Simple DNS Zone Editor
DNS is the component of the Internet which converts human-readable domain names (e.g. uzigaming.com) into computer-readable IP addresses (e.g. 46.249.57.110). It does this according to DNS zone files that reside on your server which tie domain names to IP addresses. There are several different types of records in a domain's zone file. This feature allows you to create and edit A and CNAME records.

-Advanced DNS Zone Editor
Zone files allow you to control how DNS functions. For example, if you want to have a subdomain point to another IP address and/or domain, add a new CNAME record.



Databases

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Spoiler (Click to View)

-MySQL Databases
MySQL Databases allow you to store lots of information in an easy to access manner. The databases themselves are not easily read by humans. MySQL databases are required by many web applications including some bulletin boards, content management systems, and others. To use a database, you'll need to create it. Only MySQL Users (different than mail or other users) that have privileges to access a database can read from or write to that database.

-MySQL Database Wizard
MySQL Databases allow you to store lots of information in an easy to access manner. The databases themselves are not easily read by humans. MySQL databases are required by many web applications including some bulletin boards, content management systems, and others. To use a database, you'll need to create it. Only MySQL Users (different than mail or other users) that have privileges to access a database can read from or write to that database.

-RemoteMySQL
You can allow external web servers to access your MySQL databases by
adding their domain name to the list of hosts that are able to access databases on your web site.



Software/Services

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Spoiler (Click to View)

-CloudFlare
CloudFlare accelerates and protects any website online. On average, a website on CloudFlare:

• Loads 30% faster
  
• Uses 60% less bandwidth
  
• Has 65% fewer requests
  
• And, is way more secure.

The other services are unexplainable..



Advanced

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

-Apache Handlers
Apache handlers control how the Apache web server software manages certain file types and extensions for your site. Apache comes configured to handle CGI scripts and server-parsed files. You can configure Apache to handle a new file type with an existing handler by manually adding the handler and extension below. For example, to have the server treat files with the extension .example as CGI files, you would type "cgi-script" under Handler and ".example" under Extension(s)..

-Image Manager
The Image Manager allows you to view and modify images in your account. You can change the size of your images, convert their file types, or just view them.

-Index Manager
The Index Manager allows you to customize the way a directory will be viewed on the web. You can select between a default style, no indexes, or two types of indexing. If you do not wish for people to be able to see the files in your directory, choose "No Indexing".

-Error Pages
An error page informs a visitor when there is a problem accessing your site. Each type of problem has its own code. For example, a visitor who enters a nonexistent URL will see a 404 error, while an unauthorized user trying to access a restricted area of your site will see a 401 error. Basic error pages are automatically provided by the web server (Apache). However, if you prefer, you can create a custom error page for any valid HTTP status code beginning in 4 or 5.

-Cron Jobs
Cron jobs allow you to automate certain commands or scripts on your site. You can set a command or script to run at a specific time every day, week, etc. For example, you could set a cron job to delete temporary files every week to free up disk space. Warning: You need to have a good knowledge of Linux commands before you can use cron jobs effectively. Check your script with your hosting administrator before adding a cron job.

-FrontPage Extensions
FrontPage Extensions allow you to publish your site directly from the FrontPage application. This means that you will not have to upload files through FTP or another method. Warning: Installing or uninstalling FrontPage extensions will result in the loss of all ".htaccess" files. Any changes you have made to your ".htaccess" files will be lost. Any directories you have protected with WebProtect will become unprotected until you re-protect them.

-Network Tools
Network Tools allow a user to find out information about any domain, or to trace the route from the server your site is on to the computer you are accessing cPanel from. Finding out information about a domain can be useful in making sure your DNS is set up properly as you will find out information about your IP address as well as your DNS.

-MIME Types
MIME types tell browsers how to handle specific extensions. For example, the text/html MIME type equates to .htm, .html, and .shtml extensions on most servers, and this tells your browser to interpret all files with those extensions as HTML files. You can alter or add new MIME types specifically for your site (note that you can not alter the system defined MIME type values). MIME types are often used to handle new technologies as they appear. When WAP technology first appeared no one had these extensions set up on their server. With MIME types, however, you could have set it up yourself and begun serving WAP pages immediately.



Softaculous Apps Installer

Preview image:

Spoiler (Click to View)

Scripts:

-WordPress
WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same time. More simply, WordPress is what you use when you want to work with your blogging software, not fight it. WordPress started in 2003 with a single bit of code to enhance the typography of everyday writing and with fewer users than you can count on your fingers and toes. Since then it has grown to be the largest self-hosted blogging tool in the world, used on hundreds of thousands of sites and seen by tens of millions of people every day.

-Joomla
Joomla is an award-winning content management system (CMS), which enables you to build Web sites and powerful online applications. Many aspects, including its ease-of-use and extensibility, have made Joomla the most popular Web site software available. Best of all, Joomla is an open source solution that is freely available to everyone. Joomla is used all over the world to power Web sites of all shapes and sizes.

-phpBB
phpBB is used by millions of people on a daily basis, making it the most widely used opensource bulletin board system in the world. Whether you want to stay in touch with a small group of friends or are looking to set up a large multi-category board for a corporate website, phpBB has the features you need built in. Newer users will appreciate phpBB's extensive administration panel, which allows the customization of even the most intricate features without having to edit code directly, while advanced users will value the ease with which phpBB can be integrated into existing systems.

-SMF
SMF in short is a free, professional grade software package that allows you to set up your own online community within minutes. Its powerful custom made template engine puts you in full control of the lay-out of your message board and with our unique SSI - or Server Side Includes - function you can let your forum and your website interact with each other. SMF is written in the popular language PHP and uses a MySQL database. It is designed to provide you with all the features you need from a bulletin board while having an absolute minimal impact on the resources of the server. SMF is the next generation of forum software - and best of all it is and will always remain completely free!

-PrestaShop
PrestaShop e-Commerce Solution was built to take advantage of essential Web 2.0 innovations such as dynamic AJAX-powered features and next-generation ergonomy. PrestaShop guides users through your product catalog intelligently and effortlessly, turning intrigued visitors into paying customers.

-OpenCart
OpenCart is an open source PHP-based online shopping cart system. A robust e-commerce solution for Internet merchants with the ability to create their own online business and participate in e-commerce at a minimal cost. OpenCart is designed feature rich, easy to use, search engine friendly and with a visually appealing interface.

-Drupal
Drupal is an open-source platform and content management system for building dynamic web sites offering a broad range of features and services including user administration, publishing workflow, discussion capabilities, news aggregation, metadata functionalities using controlled vocabularies and XML publishing for content sharing purposes. Equipped with a powerful blend of features and configurability, Drupal can support a diverse range of web projects ranging from personal weblogs to large community-driven sites.

-Dolphin
Dolphin is the world's most advanced community software. Open-source, independent, downloadable, scalable, customizable, full-featured, free software for building social networks, dating sites and web-communities. Loaded with video chat, recorder, video player, forums, groups, events, video messenger, mailbox, desktop app, video sharing, photo sharing, iPhone app and much more. Build your own business or advance your hobby with Dolphin!

-MyBB
MyBB is a free bulletin board system software package developed by the MyBB Group. A lot of thought has gone into the MyBB interface to make it easy to use. MyBB uses a standard discussion board structure, so your visitors will feel familiar with the way MyBB works. Your visitors can use the MyBB user control panel to change the way they view discussions. They can also easily start and reply to discussions and markup their posts. The forum administrators and moderators can use MyBB's inline editing and moderation features to control discussion and keep the forum tidy.

-Magneto
Magento is an Open Source ecommerce web application launched on March 31, 2008. It was created by Varien, building on components of the Zend Framework.

-WHMCS
WHMCS is an all-in-one client management, billing and support solution for online businesses. WHMCS handles everything from signup to termination, with automated billing, provisioning and management. With WHMCS, you're in control with a very powerful business automation tool.

-Moodle
Moodle is a Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). It is a Free web application that educators can use to create effective online learning sites.

-ClipBucket
ClipBucket is an opensource and free script that will let you start your own Video Sharing(Youtube Clone) website in matter of minutes, ClipBucket is fastest growing script with most video sharing websites and social networking freatures. ClipBucket is a free and opensource video sharing script. The owners have permitted us to redistribute ClipBucket.

And that is my tutorial done folks, I'd like to thank Vexna from HackForums for assisting me with fixing this thread up. Hope you've enjoyed reading!

[Monetize™]

Pretty amazing guide. I also know he did not copy and paste.

[Uzi]

Pretty amazing guide. I also know he did not copy and paste.

Thanks buddy. I had 27 images to begin with but the limit is '15 images'.

[Kewlz]

Well detailed guide mate, I hardly see them now.

[Uzi]

Well detailed guide mate, I hardly see them now.

Thanks buddy. I appreciate your input.