How To Install vcPanel - VPS Control Panel

Introduction

vcPanel is a vps control panel for managing VPS servers around the globe from one portal. It
is mainly written in PHP + MySQL so you can install it on any hosting server.

vcPanel has an auto installer script but that supports only Centos 5.x distributions. In general
vcPanel can be installed on any operating system having Apache + PHP5.2 + MySQL5.

Requirements

Softwares required for vcPanel

Webserver (Apache and compatible web servers)

PHP (version 5 or later)
MySQL (version 5 or later)

PHP modules and functions required

 PHP server API must be apache module ( no suphp , no cgi php ). You can check it by creating
a phpinfo page
 php-ssh2 (http://pecl.php.net/package/ssh2)
 php-libxml2
 php-curl
 IonCube Loader
 php.ini configurations
o display_errors= Off
o register_argc_argv= On
o exec function enabled

Install vcPanel

Note: Please install vcPanel as per the procedure given below, make sure your server meets
the requirements. If you would like to install and secure your control panel by our team
please contact us from here. So that we can do it for you.
Download vcPanel

Please dowload the vcPanel from http://vcpanel.net/Download and upload the tar file to your
sever. Then extract it.

Configure vcPanel

You may need to edit two files, config.php and adminauth.php.

config.php contains the following. You may need to edit the required fields, all are self-
explanatory.

define("_DB_HOST", "localhost"); // vcpanel db host

define("_DB_NAME", "vcpanel_db"); // vcpanel db name
define("_DB_USER", "vcpanel_dbuser"); // vcpanel db user
define("_DB_USER_PASSWORD", "vcpaneldbpasswird"); // vcpanel db user
password
define("_DOC_ROOT","/path-to-vcpanel-installation ") ;
// vcpanel document root no trailing slashes eg :
/home/user/public_html/vcpanel
define("_PHPCLI_PATH","/usr/bin/php");
// Path to php client binary,no php-cgi paths. remember php-cli path
define("SSH_KEY_TYPE","ssh-rsa");
//ssh key type for rsa it will be "ssh-rsa" , if it is dsa it will be
"ssh-dsa"
define("SSH_PRIVATE_KEY","/path-to-key/id_rsa");
//path to private key. Remember make it out side document root , eg :
/home/user/key/id_rsa
define("SSH_PUBLIC_KEY","/pathto -key/id_rsa.pub");
//path to public key . Remember make it out side document root ,
// eg : /home/user/key/id_rsa.pub

Now you may need to edit adminauth.php. This contains the admin login name and password.
Make it harder.

define("_ADMIN_USER","admin"); // admin username

define("_ADMIN_PASS","pass"); // admin password make it very hard , very very hard

Set permissions

You may need to set the following permissions:

chmod 666 vadmin/.htaccess

chmod 777 tmp/

chmod 777 vadmin/uploads/plan

chmod 777 vadmin/uploads/template

chmod 777 languages/

Create Database

Now create a MySQL database with the database user name and database user password that
you use in config.php. Give privileges to above database with the user name and password.
Now restore the database vcpanel.sql to your database.

Create SSH Keys

Now you may need to create ssh public and private keys and upload them to your installation
server, to a folder outside your document root. Make sure to secure the folder. Don't allow
anyone to access it. Only give permission to vcPanel scripts to access that folder. If you don't
know how to do it please contact us. To know how to create ssh keys please proceed with the
following steps.

1) ssh to your server:

# ssh vcpanel@server.yourdomain.com

2) Generate keys:

# ssh-keygen -t rsa

Now hit the ENTER key until you get the command prompt back. Please remember that
there's no need to give a password for the ssh key.

3) Now copy the keys id_rsa and id_rsa.pub from ~/.ssh/ to your key folder.

# ls -al ~/.ssh/

# cp -v ~/.ssh/* /path-to-your-key-folder-for-vtonf/
Login to admin Panel

You can login to admin panel from http://yourvcpanelinstallationurl/vadmin/

Install Product Key

You will get your product key from our license portal as soon as you signed up. If you are a reseller
you can use the same product key in all vcPanel installations. Update the product key with vcPanel ->
Product key.

Basic Settings

Make sure you may need to set up the basic settings and admin account from vcPanel admin.

Secure vcPanel access

You must limit access to your admin panel from certain IPs. Go to vcPanel -> Secure access.

Set up Cron

You may need to setup a daily cron job as follows:

0 1 * * * php /path-to-vcpanel-install/script/backupcron.php /path-to-

vcpanel-install

Node Preparation

Note: You must follow the instructions given below for building a node (hardware node) for
deployment. Please remember at this time vcPanel is only supporting Openvz virtualization
technology. If you have any difficulty in configuring your node, please contact us. We will
build your node.

Hardware Requirements:

You need a good server for a live node, with lots of CPU and RAM. Also select high speed
hard disk for better performance. Its DISK partitioning must be as follows:

/ = 10 GB
/vz = Big space for creating vps.
/backup = It must be 2x size of /vz for taking backups.
Remember to use a second hard disk for /backup. Some operating systems will not use /vz as
vps home folders. If so you may need to make soft links to /vz and /etc/vz/conf.

Software Requirements:

We recommend to use CentOS 5.x operating system on your node. This will help you to
configure bandwidth monitoring options easily. vcPanel supports any Linux operating
system. Remember don't customize your /etc/bashrc. Some operating systems/datacenters
have such customizations which will prevent OpenSSH communication protocols.

OpenVZ installation:

Now you may need to install OpenVZ. If you already have it please skip this step.

A lot quick installation guides are available; please read some below:

 English: http://wiki.openvz.org/Quick_installation
 Spanish: http://wiki.openvz.org/Quick_installation_(Spanish)
 Arabic: http://wiki.openvz.org/Ar/Quick_installation

Note: If you still see an issue with installing Openvz please contact us.

Install vcPanel Tools:

This is very important. You must download the following script and run it in this node. This
will create stats (bandwidth, load, resource usage, etc.) generation scheme in your node. It is
very important for hosting.

# wget http://download.vcpanel.net/vcpanel/setupnode.tar.gz
# tar -xzf setupnode.tar.gz
# cd setupnode/
# bash install

Set up Openssh Public key:

This is very important to set up public key access from vcPanel to this node. Otherwise
vcPanel is not able to communicate with your server. Download the same public key you
configured in vcPanel config.php and do the following:

# cd ~root/.ssh
# touch authorized_keys
Now copy your public key to authorized_keys and save it.

# chattr +ia authorized_keys

Add node inside vcPanel:

Now go to vcPanel admin panel and add node from Node Management -> Add Node.

Create IP Pool:

For creating a VPS inside this node you may need to register the IP pools. Go to vcPanel
admin IP Management -> Add IP(s) to Node and add your IPs.

Upload Plans:

Now you need to upload your vps plans to the /etc/vz/conf folder. Or you can sync them from
the vcPanel control panel: VPS Plans -> Sync Plan

Upload Templates:

Now you need to upload your OS templates to the /vz/template/cache folder, or you can sync
them from the vcPanel control panel: VPS Templates -> Sync Template. It will take more
time depending on the size of the template.

References:

ServerManagementt.Com

vcPanel Docs