Virtual Hosting FAQ

V i r t u a l H o s t i n g F A Q

Please find below the answers to commonly asked questions we receive about Virtual hosting. We hope this helps you better understand Virtual Hosting, its benefits, and its limitations.

Q: Is Virtual hosting supported on all of the Virtual Server accounts?

Yes. Virtual Hosting will work on all of the Virtual Server accounts (Basic, Advanced, and Pro). Virtual Hosting will not work as well on a Basic account because you won't be able to create FTP accounts for the Virtual Hosts. Thus you (as the administrator) will have to upload all of the files for your clients. However, you will still be able to allow for a cgi-bin and e-mail aliasing for the Virtual Hosts on a Basic account. We only *recommend* that you use Virtual Hosting on the Advanced and Pro Virtual Servers accounts There is no technical limitation to doing Virtual Hosting on a Basic account, only inconvenience.

Q: To use the Virtual Host for www.myclient.com, am I correct to assume that my client needs to register with InterNIC? If that is the case, will you provide the registration service?

Yes... You will still need to register any additional domains with InterNIC or other domain registries. They will charge you their standard registration fees and we have a one-time DNS configuration fee.

If you need a new domain name for a Virtual Server you administrate, you can use our online domain registration form.

Q: If the Virtual Host package cannot offer telnet access (a shell account), how can our Virtual Hosted Clients upload their data to the server?

You will want to offer FTP access and POP accounts for your Virtual Hosts by creating accounts using the vadduser command. When prompted for the "home" directory for the FTP account, you will want to specify the same value that you use for the DocumentRoot definition. This will allow your subhosted client to publish web content to their Virtual Host.

Please remember that FTP and POP capability is only available on the Advanced and Pro Virtual Server accounts. Multiple FTP/POP/IMAP accounts are not supported on the Basic Virtual Server account.

Q: Is there any way to restrict disk usage for the Virtual Hosting subdirectories and mailboxes?

Yes. When you grant FTP or mail privileges to your clients using the vadduser command, give them FTP and/or mail service and specify the FTP and/or mail quota when prompted.

Q: If I have a customer that wants a Virtual Host but doesn't want its own domain name, can I create a Virtual Host like "user.my-virtual-server.com"? I assume that needs DNS setup too?

Yes. It is possible to add canonical names (CNAMES) to your domain name and have them configured to point to subdirectories of your own Server. For example, if you wanted to make your company look real cool by appearing to have all kinds of web servers. You could in addition to your "http://www.my-virtual-server.com" URL, configure "http://support.my-virtual-server.com", "http://search.my-virtual-server.com", and "http://sales.my-virtual-server.com" as virtual hosted CNAMES on your Virtual Server. Each CNAME would point to a different directory with different content. If you need a new CNAME name for a Virtual Server you administrate, send e-mail to service@digitaldaze.com.

Then, to configure the "http://support.my-virtual-server.com/" to point to a subdirectory of your virtual server, you would add something like the following to your httpd.conf file:

As you can see, Virtual Hosting is a versatile tool, but it has its place and comes with several limitations. It is a very good solution for potential clients that just want to "get their feet wet" on the Internet and not spend too much money. Later, you can up-sell your Hosted clients to Virtual Servers as they recognize the power of the Internet.

There are probably hundreds of small businesses around your town or neighborhood that could benefit from this. They are a little apprehensive about the Internet at first, want a low start-up cost and see how it goes. Willing to pay a few hundred in some HTML/CGI consulting... you get the picture. After you provide a small site and proof of concept, you can then provide additional consulting services (web design, e-commerce, etc) and make a greater profit. Virtual Hosting allows you to get your foot in the door of many small businesses.

Q: If a Virtual Host has their own CGI-BIN, are the CGI scripts allowed to play with the directory system of the Virtual Server or do they operate safely with their own "sandbox"?

Scripts executed in a Virtual Hosted cgi-bin will run as your user account with all its rights and permission. Therefore, you will have to be a little careful about security issues. For example, if your subhosted client uploads a CGI script that executes the command "rm -rf /" (which recursively deletes all files on your Virtual Server) there is nothing in place to stop them from doing such an action.

In most cases however, it is likely that not only are you providing your clients with hosting service, but you are also designing their web content and writing their CGI scripts as well. So this may be a non-issue. If you are allowing your subhosted clients to upload their own CGI scripts, then you will want to be very careful. Please see Virtual Hosting and Security Issues for more information.

Q: Are there limits to the amount of Virtual Hosts I can place on a single Virtual Server?

In order to maintain the highest performance standards possible, we recommend the following as the maximum number of virtual hosts you should maintain on each virtual server account type:

Server Type Virtual Domains

Basic 5

Advanced 25

Pro 60