Parallels Plesk Expand 2.3 User guide

Parallels

®

Plesk Expand

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Contents

Preface 5

About This Guide ........................................................................................................................... 5

Who Should Read This Guide ....................................................................................................... 5

Typographical Conventions ........................................................................................................... 6

Feedback ....................................................................................................................................... 7

Introducing Plesk Expand 8

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand ......................................................................................... 8

What is Plesk Expand ......................................................................................................... 9

Plesk Expand Business Model and Operation Principles ................................................. 11

What‟s New in This Release ....................................................................................................... 13

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand Interface ........................................................................ 14

Navigation Pane ................................................................................................................ 15

Work Area ......................................................................................................................... 17

Action Bar .......................................................................................................................... 20

First Steps with Plesk Expand 21

Before You Start .......................................................................................................................... 22

Configuring Plesk Expand to Run Behind a Firewall ........................................................ 23

Logging in to Plesk Expand for the First Time ............................................................................ 25

If You Forgot Your Password ...................................................................................................... 26

Using Password Retrieval Option in the Control Panel .................................................... 27

Using XML API .................................................................................................................. 28

Using CLI API .................................................................................................................... 30

Configuring Plesk Expand 32

Configuring the Administrator Control Panel ............................................................................... 32

Changing Login Details and Contact Information ............................................................. 33

Setting Interface Language, Skin and Number of Items Displayed Per Page .................. 34

Configuring and Managing the Plesk Expand Server ................................................................. 34

Setting Plesk Expand Default Language and Skin ........................................................... 35

Setting Session Idle Time ................................................................................................. 35

Configuring Plesk Expand Installation With Other Parallels Products .............................. 36

Viewing Overall Plesk Expand Statistics ........................................................................... 37

Viewing Plesk Expand Logs .............................................................................................. 38

Managing Plesk Expand License ...................................................................................... 44

Managing IP Addresses in Plesk Expand ......................................................................... 48

Managing Plesk Servers in Plesk Expand .................................................................................. 61

Registering a Plesk Server ................................................................................................ 62

Adjusting a Plesk Server Settings ..................................................................................... 63

Viewing Useful Information About a Plesk Server ............................................................ 82

Organizing Plesk Servers in Plesk Server Groups ........................................................... 93

Managing Plesk Servers Installed in Virtuozzo HWNs ..................................................... 96

Managing Plesk Server Sessions Centrally .................................................................... 102

Managing DNS ACL of a Plesk Server ........................................................................... 104

Configuring DNS Recursion Setting for a Plesk Server .................................................. 106

Managing Backups of a Plesk Server ............................................................................. 106

Preface 4

Configuring and Managing Plesk Expand Centralized Services ............................................... 109

Configuring and Managing Centralized Mail Service ...................................................... 110

Configuring and Managing Centralized DNS Service ..................................................... 124

Configuring and Managing Centralized Database Service ............................................. 148

Managing Centralized Help Desk.................................................................................... 155

Managing Central Backups ............................................................................................. 160

Managing Central Migrations .......................................................................................... 174

Serving Your Customers With Plesk Expand 180

Before You Start Serving Your Customers ............................................................................... 181

Simplifying Setup of User Accounts ................................................................................ 182

Viewing List of Applications Your Customers Can Use .................................................. 219

Managing User Accounts .......................................................................................................... 220

Managing Plesk Domains ............................................................................................... 221

Managing Plesk Clients ................................................................................................... 254

Managing Expand Clients ............................................................................................... 281

Managing Expand Resellers ........................................................................................... 307

Appendix A. Troubleshooting 313

Using Health Monitor ................................................................................................................. 314

Appendix B. Interface Customization Options For Advanced Users 317

Building Custom Centralized Login Form .................................................................................. 318

Configuring Multilanguage Support in Plesk Expand ................................................................ 320

Adding Support of an Interface Language in Plesk Expand ........................................... 321

Modifying Interface Messages in Supported Language .................................................. 322

Removing Support of Interface Language in Plesk Expand ........................................... 329

Appendix C. Integrating Plesk Expand with Other Applications 330

Using Event Tracking System ................................................................................................... 330

Viewing the List of Event Classes in Plesk Expand ........................................................ 331

Configuring General Settings of an Event Class ............................................................. 333

Adding a Program to the Run Programs Event Handler ................................................. 333

Removing Programs From the Run Programs Event Handler ........................................ 334

Configuring Mail Notification Events Handler .................................................................. 334

Preface 5

In this section:

About This Guide ............................................................................................... 5

Who Should Read This Guide ........................................................................... 5

Typographical Conventions ............................................................................... 6

Feedback .......................................................................................................... 7

About This Guide

The purpose of this guide is to provide full and comprehensive information about Plesk

Expand, the hosting automation software that unites multiple Plesk servers on a single

hosting platform. The guide focuses on the core Plesk Expand concept of the centralized

management. It will familiarize you with the way to register Plesk servers in Plesk Expand, to

centrally manage these Plesk servers and objects registered on them (Plesk clients and

domains) and Plesk Expand objects (Expand resellers and clients).

Accordingly, all topics of this guide are organized on the basis of the Plesk Expand concept

of the centralized management as well, i.e. the centralized management of Plesk servers,

Plesk clients, domains, IP ranges, DNS zones, and so on.

Who Should Read This Guide

This guide is intended for hosting service providers, who have two or more Plesk servers to

manage.

For customers, who have Plesk servers installed on Virtuozzo, and for customers using

HSPComplete, this guide can be a reference point on integrating these products with Plesk

Expand into a single hosting platform.

We assume that the reader has basic knowledge of hosting business and of system

administration routines for the corresponding Plesk versions and operating systems (Linux,

FreeBSD or Windows).

Preface

6 Preface

Typographical Conventions

Before you start using this guide, it is important to understand the documentation

conventions used in it.

The following kinds of formatting in the text identify special information.

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 System 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 commands,

files, and directories.

The license file is located in the

http://docs/common/licen

ses directory.

Preformatted

On-screen computer

output in your command-

line sessions; source code

in XML, C++, or other

programming languages.

# ls –al /files

total 14470

Preformatted Bold

What you type, contrasted

with on-screen computer

output.

# cd /root/rpms/php

CAPITALS

Names of keys on the

keyboard.

SHIFT, CTRL, ALT

KEY+KEY

Key combinations for

which the user must press

and hold down one key

and then press another.

CTRL+P, ALT+F4

Preface 7

Feedback

If you have found a mistake 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.

This chapter provides basic information about Plesk Expand, its purposes, business

model and operation principles. This chapter will help you to:

 Become familiar with basic Plesk Expand concepts, business model and operation

principles (see page 9);

 Learn what software products and components work with and are managed by

Plesk Expand;

 Learn what new features are implemented in this version of Plesk Expand (see

page 13);

 Become familiar with Plesk Expand interface, its main elements and typical actions

(see page 14).

In this chapter:

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand .............................................................. 8

What‟s New in This Release .............................................................................. 13

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand Interface ............................................... 14

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand

In this section, you can get the general concept of what Plesk Expand is and how it

operates.

In this section:

What is Plesk Expand ....................................................................................... 9

Plesk Expand Business Model and Operation Principles ................................... 11

C H A P T E R 1

Introducing Plesk Expand

Introducing Plesk Expand 9

What is Plesk Expand

The main thing about Plesk Expand is that it extends Plesk™ functionality and works

as an add-on application for Plesk™. Plesk Expand cannot be used separately, it

requires at least two Plesk servers to operate.

Below we provide a short description of Plesk™ and Plesk Expand.

Plesk™ is a control panel designed to automate all aspects of a hosting service

provider‟s business and deliver superior flexibility and stability to your customers. It

enables users to create and remotely manage hundreds of virtual hosts through an

easy-to-use, intuitive interface, without in-depth technical knowledge of web hosting

technologies. The extensive set of Plesk features allows you to completely automate

product installation, enrich self-administration capabilities for your clients, and minimize

the number of support calls.

Plesk Expand is a centralized control panel for administering several Plesk servers,

including servers running different Plesk versions and operating systems. From the

Plesk Expand control panel, the administrator can manage all Plesk client accounts,

domains and other objects registered on different Plesk servers, without having to login

and re-login to these servers.

Besides the centralized login, Plesk Expand provides the following privileges:

 Centralized administration of system services - mail, DNS and database

management. You can assign separate servers (Plesk or sometimes non-Plesk) to

serve as central mail servers, central DNS servers and central Database servers.

These servers will be free from client accounts and domains, and will be configured

according to their specialization. When it is necessary to perform a particular task

(for example, receive Plesk client‟s mail), all Plesk servers in the system will

address the corresponding central server. This approach helps to balance the

workload in the system and to effectively manage these services.

 Plesk Expand user roles - Expand reseller and Expand client - allow the Plesk

Expand owner (administrator) to sell a number of advanced service offerings to

their customers.

 Expand reseller can sell a variety of hosting plans, ranging from reselling single

domains to VE and dedicated hosting. Reseller‟s capabilities depend on the

permissions given to them by the Plesk Expand administrator. The Plesk

Expand administrator can set up and sell several reseller service plans.

 Expand client can own and manage several domains (web sites) on different

Plesk servers through the single Plesk Expand control panel. This allows you to

offer customers a wide set of site application packages, regardless of the

hosting platform (UNIX or Windows). For example, a customer wants to host

one web site on PHP (which ties them to Plesk for Linux/UNIX), and wishes to

deploy a number of ColdFusion applications on another web site (which can be

hosted only on Plesk for Windows). Being registered as an Expand Client, this

customer has access to Plesk Expand control panel, where they can manage

both web sites without having to re-login between Plesk servers.

 Plesk Expand can be easily integrated with the provider‟s infrastructure through a

set of special tools:

10 Introducing Plesk Expand

 Plesk Expand events. Plesk Expand uses events for integrating with third-party

systems, such as billing or provisioning software. Using events you can make

Plesk Expand execute certain actions in response to certain situations in the

system. For example, when a Plesk client creates a new domain for their

account, you can configure Plesk Expand to send command “issue a bill” to the

external system, or to send an e-mail notification to the Plesk Expand

administrator.

 APIs (Application Programming Interfaces): XMl API, Remote XML API and CLI

API. Working with these APIs is described in detail in the Plesk Expand

Integration Guide at http://www.parallels.com/en/products/plesk/expand/docs/.

Introducing Plesk Expand 11

Plesk Expand Business Model and Operation Principles

Plesk Expand operation model is shown in the following figure:

Figure 1: Plesk Expand Operation Diagram

Plesk Expand user roles and basic object types are described below.

Plesk Expand Objects

Plesk Expand objects are Plesk objects registered in Plesk Expand, and groups of

such objects.

There are the following types of objects:

 Plesk server is a hosting server running the Plesk

TM

control panel software (either

Plesk for Windows or Plesk for Linux/Unix) registered in Plesk Expand.

12 Introducing Plesk Expand

 Plesk server group is several Plesk servers united into a group by the Plesk

Expand administrator. This is done for the administrator‟s convenience: usually, in

order to assign common rules (such as IP allocation policy) to these servers, or to

assign them to one reseller.

 Plesk client is a Plesk client account registered on one of Plesk servers. Plesk

clients can have access to the Plesk control panel (if the Plesk Expand

administrator provides this permission), but never to the Plesk Expand control

panel.

 Domain is a web site (virtual host) on the Internet registered on one of Plesk

servers. The domain administrator can have access to the Plesk control panel, if

they have a configured Domain Administrator account, and if the Plesk Expand

administrator grants them the permission to access the control panel. The domain

administrator cannot login to Plesk Expand. Each domain is owned by a Plesk

client, an Expand reseller or an Expand client.

Plesk Expand Users

Plesk Expand users have certain rights and privileges on certain Plesk objects they

own. Plesk Expand users have access to the Plesk Expand control panel, where they

can manage their objects and accounts, within the limits and capabilities provided by

their user roles and by the Plesk Expand administrator. There are the following user

roles in Plesk Expand:

 Administrator is a Plesk Expand user, who has the full rights to configure Plesk

Expand and manage all its objects and user accounts.

 Expand reseller is a Plesk Expand user, who can own and manage Plesk servers,

groups of Plesk servers, Plesk client accounts and domains. Resellers have

administrator‟s rights to all the Plesk Expand objects they own.

 Expand client is a Plesk Expand user, who owns and manages domains registered

on several Plesk servers, including servers running different platforms (Plesk for

Windows or Plesk for Linux/Unix), and manages them through the Plesk Expand

control panel.

Plesk Expand Central Servers

Plesk Expand offers a set of centralized services. A centralized service is a service

received by several Plesk servers remotely from a single central dedicated server.

Such a server (called a central server) is allocated for providing this service to several

or all objects registered on other Plesk servers. This allows you to reduce the workload

on each Plesk server, optimize the overall system performance, and helps to quickly

and easily detect and resolve typical service issues. There are the following types of

central servers in Plesk Expand:

 Mail server is a Plesk server registered in Plesk Expand, which operates as a

central mail server for several Plesk servers.

 DNS server is a Plesk or a non-Plesk server, which operates as a central DNS

server for several Plesk servers.

 Database server is a Plesk or a non-Plesk server, which operates as a central

database server for several Plesk servers.

Communication Between Plesk Expand and Plesk Servers

Introducing Plesk Expand 13

The communication between Plesk Expand and Plesk is provided by PSA API RPC,

the data and command communication software. PSA API RPC should be installed on

every Plesk for Linux server prior to registering it in Plesk Expand. There is no need to

install PSA API RPC on Plesk for FreeBSD and Plesk for Windows servers; it is

included in the distribution package. For detailed information about PSA API RPC and

instructions on its installation, see the Plesk Expand Installation Guide at

http://www.parallels.com/en/products/plesk/expand/docs/.

What’s New in This Release

Please see the Release Notes at http://www.parallels.com/en/download/expand/ for

your version of Plesk Expand.

14 Introducing Plesk Expand

Becoming Familiar With Plesk Expand

Interface

This section describes the basics of the Plesk Expand interface. Here you can find

instructions on how to navigate in your Plesk Expand control panel.

A regular Plesk Expand page looks as follows:

Figure 2: Plesk Expand interface

The main components of a Plesk expand page are:

 Navigation pane (see page 15)

 Work area (see page 17)

 Action bar (see page 20)

In this section:

Navigation Pane ................................................................................................ 15

Work Area ......................................................................................................... 17

Action Bar ......................................................................................................... 20

Introducing Plesk Expand 15

Navigation Pane

The navigation pane is located on the left side of the Plesk Expand page. In the right

part of the screen there is the work area where you can perform management

operations on a particular Plesk Expand component selected in the navigation pane.

Figure 3: Navigation pane

The navigation pane is divided into four sections: Plesk, Expand, System and Help &

Support. To expand or collapse the contents of each section, click the arrows in the

upper right corner of each section.

16 Introducing Plesk Expand

The Plesk section contains the following shortcuts:

 Plesk Servers. This shortcut takes you to the list of all Plesk servers registered in

Plesk Expand. There you can manage Plesk servers, register a new Plesk server,

reload selected servers or remove the servers you no longer need.

 Plesk Clients. This shortcut takes you to the list of all Plesk client accounts from all

Plesk servers registered in Plesk Expand. There you can manage Plesk clients,

create a new Plesk client, create a new client template. You can also suspend,

unsuspend, remove Plesk clients or refresh the particular client‟s data from the

corresponding Plesk server.

 Plesk Domains. This shortcut takes you to the list of all domains from all Plesk

servers registered in Plesk Expand. There you can manage domains, create new

domains, create and edit domain templates, manage DNS zones configured for

domains. You can also suspend, unsuspend, remove domains from Plesk Expand

and refresh a particular domain data from the corresponding Plesk server.

 Plesk CP Sessions. This shortcut takes you to the list of all sessions with Plesk

servers registered in Plesk Expand.

The Expand section contains the following shortcuts:

 Expand Resellers. This shortcut takes you to the list of all resellers registered in Plesk

Expand. There you can manage reseller accounts, create or remove resellers.

 Expand Clients. This shortcut takes you to the list of all Expand client accounts

registered in Plesk Expand. There you can create Expand clients (from scratch or

by transforming a regular Plesk client into an Expand client), remove Expand

clients, or proceed to the administration page of each Expand client.

 Centralized Mail. This shortcut takes you to the list of all central mail servers

registered in Plesk Expand. There you can create or remove central mail servers,

proceed to the administration page of each central mail server by clicking its name

in the list. You can also view the overall centralized mail statistics and proceed to

the list of all mail accounts (Plesk clients and domains) registered on all the central

mail servers.

 Centralized DNS. This shortcut takes you to the list of all central DNS servers

registered in Plesk Expand. There you can create or remove central DNS servers,

proceed to the administration page of each central DNS server by clicking its name

in the list.

 Centralized DB. This shortcut takes you to the list of all central database servers

registered in Plesk Expand. There you can create or remove central database

servers, proceed to the administration page of each central database server by

clicking its name in the list.

 Central Backups. This shortcut takes you to the list of all remote storages for backing

up Plesk servers, Plesk clients and domains. There you can schedule and manage

backup tasks for Plesk servers, Plesk clients and domains.

 Migrations. This shortcut takes you to the list of all migrations of accounts between

Plesk servers, which were initiated in Plesk Expand. There you can start a new

migration, view and refresh statuses of migrations, remove migrations, proceed to

viewing information about each migration task by clicking its name in the list.

The System section contains the following shortcuts:

Introducing Plesk Expand 17

 Server. This shortcut takes you to the page, where the Plesk Expand administrator

can perform system management tasks, such as viewing system statistics and

action log, editing administrator profile and login information, managing Plesk

Expand license and so on.

 Log out. This shortcut takes you to the confirmation page, where you can close the

current session with Plesk Expand.

The Help & Support section contains the following shortcut:

 Help. This shortcut opens the Online Help topic providing information about the

page you are currently on.

Below the Help shortcut there is a context-sensitive help area that contains a short

description of the user interface item. When you point to an interface element, you

can see its brief description and available operations.

Work Area

The Plesk Expand work area includes all interface elements located to the right of the

navigation pane. The work area displays the options available for the shortcut selected

in the navigation pane.

The sections below describe how to work with the following elements of the Plesk

Expand work area interface: the path bar and lists of objects.

In this section:

Path Bar ............................................................................................................ 17

Working With Lists............................................................................................. 18

Path Bar

The path bar is a chain of links indicating your current location within the Plesk Expand

system. It is located at the top of the Plesk Expand work area. By clicking these links,

you can jump up one or more levels.

Figure 4: Path Bar

The Up Level button located in the upper right corner of the screen is used to jump up

one level.

On some screens, the Refresh Screen button appears in the upper right corner. It can be

used to renew the screen you are on.

Below the path bar, you can see the title of the Plesk Expand page you are currently

on.

18 Introducing Plesk Expand

Working With Lists

On some pages, you may see a considerable number of items, such as Plesk servers,

Plesk clients, Plesk domains, shown in Plesk Expand work area. Such multiple

elements are always displayed as shortcuts organized in tables. The list shows the

items (on the Plesk servers‟ management page, it shows Plesk servers, on the

domains‟ management page - domains, and so on), and critical parameters of these

objects in separate columns of the table. Each item in the list is clickable; by clicking an

item you get to its administration page. Values in some columns are also shortcuts to

pages where these parameters can be adjusted.

The list of items can be sorted by any parameter. To sort items by a parameter, for

example, Client name (see the figure below), click the corresponding column title. The

list will be sorted by the client name in ascending alphabet order. You can change the

sorting order, ascending to descending or vice versa, by clicking column title once

more.

The example of such page is shown below.

Figure 5: Working with lists

You can perform the following typical operations on the items listed on such pages:

 Search. To search for a specific item in the list, enter the corresponding information

into one or several of the provided search fields, and click Search. All matching

items will be displayed in a reduced list.

Note: The search patterns slightly differ for different types of search fields. For the

ID field, only exact matches are shown. For example, if you enter “3”, only objects

with ID=3 are shown, objects with ID=33 are not shown. All the text fields use the

“any word” search pattern. For example, if you enter “John” in the Client Name field,

you will see all objects containing “John”, such as “Johnson”, “John Smith”, etc.

 Show All. If you are viewing a reduced list, click Show All to revert to the complete list

of objects.

 Customize View. Upon clicking this link, a pop-up window opens, where you can do

the following:

 Specify the number of items of the list to be displayed per page.

 Select the columns to be displayed:

 Select the check boxes of columns you want to be displayed;

Introducing Plesk Expand 19

 Clear the check boxes of columns you want to be hidden.

By default, all columns are selected.

 Migrate. To move one or several objects, select the objects in the list (select the

corresponding check boxes to the right of the table) and click Migrate. You will be

taken to the New Migration Wizard, where you should specify all other details for the

migration.

 Enable. To activate (unsuspend) one or several objects, select the objects in the list

and click Enable.

 Disable. To deactivate (suspend) one or several objects, select the objects in the list

and click Disable.

 Assign Selected. Plesk Expand objects or users can be assigned to Expand clients or

resellers, and also to central servers. To assign items, select them in the list and

click Assign Selected. Confirm assigning on the confirmation page that appears.

 Deassign Selected. To deassign items, select them in the list and click Deassign

Selected. Confirm deassigning on the confirmation page that appears.

 Reload. To refresh data about certain items in the list, select them and click Reload.

On the next page, select which data should be refreshed. This option might be

useful if you have applied some changes to these particular Plesk Expand objects

or users, and wish to refresh these data immediately, without having to wait for

Plesk Expand to do this automatically.

 Remove Selected. To remove items from the list, select them and click Remove or

Remove Selected. Confirm the deletion on the confirmation page that appears.

 Log in. To log in to a particular Plesk object‟s administration page in the Plesk

control panel, click the Login icon next to the corresponding object. It takes you

straight to this object on the Plesk server where it resides. The Plesk control panel

opens in a separate browser window. No login is required.

To proceed to the administration page of a certain item in the list, click its name in the

list.

20 Introducing Plesk Expand

Action Bar

When a certain action is being executed in Plesk Expand, the state of its performance

is displayed in the action bar at the bottom of the page. If you don‟t see the action bar,

click on the small triangle to the left of the Action Bar title in the bottom tray of the Plesk

Expand screen. The action bar shows actions recently performed in Plesk Expand and

their statuses:

Figure 6: Action Bar Screen

The status of an action can be indicated by one of the following icons:

The action was executed successfully;

The action failed;

The action is running;

The action is scheduled for execution.

Note: Actions are temporarily stored in the action bar. When the action bar is filled to

capacity, older actions are replaced by more recent ones. When you log out of the

control panel, the action bar is automatically cleared.

 To view the detailed information on a certain action, click this action name.

 To proceed to the action log, where you can view the list of all users‟ and system‟s

actions, click the Action Log shortcut.

 To refresh the data on the actions, click Refresh.

 To hide the action bar, click the small triangle to the left of the Action Bar title. To

show the action bar, click this triangle again.

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