Since I started using ssh remotely to manage servers like 12 or so years ago I have been in love with its power and what you can do with a few command lines. In the last 7 or 8 years many web based control panels have appeared making life easier for the end user. One would expect that ssh would go obselete now that you can do things with a few mouse clicks. Not really.

Last night I was trying to activate an IP by setting “Active in IWorx-CP” to yes under IP Management of Nodeworx but it gave me blank screen. There was no error. I could not see anything in logs. So I fired a ticket with interworx support and here was their response:

Try running this script and see if adds the IPs as expected:

~iworx/cron/ip.pex—sync

Yes, finally something to do via shell. So I did and it resolved the issue. Moral of the story, the real thing is still linux shell

Problem

When I try to open my control panel, I get a Page Cannot Be Displayed error.
I’m trying to open it using localhost on port 8086.

Solution

1.) Check the configuration tool, under the Website tab. What have you chosen from the dropdown box? If there is an IP chosen, then localhost may not work – only http://SelectedIP:8086

2.) If this is not the issue, then check the Page Not Displayed error. Is it a 500 error? If so, in Internet Explorer go to Tools, Internet Options and choose the Advanced Tab. Scroll down and uncheck the Show Friendly HTTP Error Messages box. Click OK, then refresh the page. You may get a different error. If this is the case, make sure you have MS XML 4.0 SP2 installed as specified in the Pre-Install Guide.

3.) Make sure that the IIS site (Helm Control Panel) is running in IIS and is not stopped.

4.) If you are running IIS 6, also make sure that ASP pages are set to “Allowed”, not “Prohibited”. To check this, open IIS and choose Web Service Extensions. You’ll see a list of properties on the right. Active Server Pages should be set to “Allowed”. If they aren’t, highlight them and click “Allow”.

4.) Make sure that the database is set up correctly in the Configuration Tool. Click the Test Connection button to confirm this is successful.

5) If any of the above checks don’t work, raise a ticket with your Helm provider (if you have a valid support contract with them).

Helm keeps giving ’ ValidateLicenceEx Invalid licence key. Licence has expired. ’ errors in the log

Problem

On occasions, the licence updater stays in memory and doesn’t end properly if ran from a scheduled task (you can see it running in the Task Manager as HelmLicence.exe). This then causes you to not be able to login to Helm.

Solution

1.) The problem is actually to do with Internet Explorer settings.

Take a look at the Windows scheduled task that runs the licence updater. This can be found here:

Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Scheduled Tasks

and is called Helm Licence Updater.

Right click it, choose “Properties” and make a note of the user that is set to run this. It is usually HELM_ADMIN, and the password is the password you chose when installing Helm.

Important Note:- If you changed the servername AFTER installing the control panel, you will need to alter it here. For instance if your server was called MYSERVER then the licence task would have been running under MYSERVERHELM_ADMIN. If you changed the servername to NEWSERVER then you need to make sure that the task also changed, so it is NEWSERVERHELM_ADMIN.

You can either keep this the same, or change it to Administrator or some other user you know the password of.

Next, login to the server as that user. So if the task was running under HELM_ADMIN, you need to login to the server as the HELM_ADMIN user. The password for this will be a) either known to you if you are running multiple servers because you will have needed to create this user on all of your remote servers or b) if you are running a single server, it’s the password you chose when installing Helm. If you forgot it, you can reset it in the System Identity tab of the Helm Configuration Tool (make sure that if you do this, you reset it on ALL remote servers that you have too!).

Now run the scheduled licence updater task (go to the task, right-click it and choose “Run”). You should find you get a internet explorer pop up box – click OK and tick don’t show this again. (if you have changed it to another user, you may not see this box as you may have already logged in some time ago and this pop up was clicked on before)

Now you can log out and back in as the normal user you log in as.

You can now see the problem – when the scheduled task ran as that user, the Internet Explorer pop up box was waiting for a confirmation click – however you never saw it and that task was held in memory. It must have been in memory and never ran again for more than 30 days – if it doesn’t run for 30 days, you get that licence error.
——-

2.) In the rare event that this doesn’t solve your problem – check the system date of the server. It should be today’s date. If it is set in the past or the future, it may cause issues with the licencing. Set it to today’s date, then try and log in.

—Alex

When I try to add a server to Helm, I get the error ’ Unable to add server. Can not obtain Licence From Server ‘.
Problem

When I try to add a server to Helm, I get an error saying:

Unable to add server. Can not obtain licence from server.

and I cannot add the server.

Solution

Ensure the following:

1.) The HELM_ADMIN user is on all machines that you are trying to add into Helm, with Administrator permissions.

2.) MS XML 4.0 is installed on all machines.

3.) File and Print Sharing is enabled on all machines (refer to the Helm Pre-Installation Guide on how to do this).

4.) The Remote Registry service is started on all machines (refer to the Helm Pre-Installation Guide on how to do this).

5.) Every machine can access every other machine’s C drive. You can test this by doing the following: – Go to Start > Run – Type RemoteServerIPC$
The remote server’s C drive should open on the server. If this isn’t the case, then there is a communication issue between the two servers which you will need to resolve.

6.) If all of this is correct, please follow this article to reset and then update your licence key:

http://support.webhostautomation.com…details&_i=148

7.) Also try rebooting the two machines in question.

—Alex

If you are using MSDE for the Helm system database, it can be backed up using the backup tool which is available for download here at:

http://www.webhostautomation.com/members/download_redirect.aspx?id=19

You can use other methods such as IIS Metabase backup to backup IIS and other data, and for domains you can use a simple copy/ftp backup process using MS Backup/Veritas or whatever you use to do backups normally.
—Alex

Suspending user accounts doesn’t disable DNS, FTP or email
Problem

When I go into a User account and choose Suspended then save it, it only stops that user’s website in IIS. It doesn’t pause/suspend DNS, Email accounts or FTP accounts.

Solution

This is because some of the software products supported by Helm don’t offer the ability to suspend accounts. Therefore offering the generic ability to each of these under a user account isn’t possible at this time.

—Alex

Helm keeps giving ’ ValidateLicenceEx Invalid licence key. Licence has expired. ’ errors in the log

Problem

On occasions, the licence updater stays in memory and doesn’t end properly if ran from a scheduled task (you can see it running in the Task Manager as HelmLicence.exe). This then causes you to not be able to login to Helm.

Solution

1.) The problem is actually to do with Internet Explorer settings.

Take a look at the Windows scheduled task that runs the licence updater. This can be found here:

Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Scheduled Tasks

and is called Helm Licence Updater.

Right click it, choose “Properties” and make a note of the user that is set to run this. It is usually HELM_ADMIN, and the password is the password you chose when installing Helm.

Important Note:- If you changed the servername AFTER installing the control panel, you will need to alter it here. For instance if your server was called MYSERVER then the licence task would have been running under MYSERVERHELM_ADMIN. If you changed the servername to NEWSERVER then you need to make sure that the task also changed, so it is NEWSERVERHELM_ADMIN.

You can either keep this the same, or change it to Administrator or some other user you know the password of.

Next, login to the server as that user. So if the task was running under HELM_ADMIN, you need to login to the server as the HELM_ADMIN user. The password for this will be a) either known to you if you are running multiple servers because you will have needed to create this user on all of your remote servers or b) if you are running a single server, it’s the password you chose when installing Helm. If you forgot it, you can reset it in the System Identity tab of the Helm Configuration Tool (make sure that if you do this, you reset it on ALL remote servers that you have too!).

Now run the scheduled licence updater task (go to the task, right-click it and choose “Run”). You should find you get a internet explorer pop up box – click OK and tick don’t show this again. (if you have changed it to another user, you may not see this box as you may have already logged in some time ago and this pop up was clicked on before)

Now you can log out and back in as the normal user you log in as.

You can now see the problem – when the scheduled task ran as that user, the Internet Explorer pop up box was waiting for a confirmation click – however you never saw it and that task was held in memory. It must have been in memory and never ran again for more than 30 days – if it doesn’t run for 30 days, you get that licence error.
——-

2.) In the rare event that this doesn’t solve your problem – check the system date of the server. It should be today’s date. If it is set in the past or the future, it may cause issues with the licencing. Set it to today’s date, then try and log in.

—Alex

Hey everyone,

Que – How to install Frontpage on Plesk Control Panel ?

Ans -

Plesk 8 supports FrontPage and to have it installed on a linux vps with plesk reloaded, do the following:

login to vps as root

wget ftp://download1.swsoft.com/Plesk/Ple…586.rpm.tar.gz

tar zxf psa-8.0.1-centos4.2.build80060713.16.i586.rpm.tar.gz

rm f psa8.0.1-centos4.2.build80060713.16.i586.rpm.tar.gz

cd psa-8.0.1-centos4.2.build80060613.20.i586.rpm/dist-rpm-CentOS-4.2-i386/opt/fp/

rpm Uvh frontpage5.0-72psa.centos4.2.i586.rpm

and remove the psa-8.0.1-centos4.2 directory later. Once installed, login to Plesk and go to Servers – Components information and check if Frontpage is present.

Best Regards,
Shane Bewick
Enjoy

Restoring mail configuration

Mchk is an internal utility intended for use by Plesk Control Panel. However, as administrator, you can use it for restoring the Qmail and Courier-imap configuration by internal Plesk database when needed. By default mchk is running in the background mode, to execute it in the foreground, use the -v option.

Example: /usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/mchk -v

NOTE
You may not wish to restore SpamAssassin settings for mail accounts, as it requires running Perl interpreter. To speed up restoring use the—without-spam option.

Regards,

Alex

Tune apache with php & mysql

Use following links to refer to HOW TO TUNE APACHE for plesk server.

http://forums.ev1servers.net/showthread.php?s=897e8dd8f1b35f0a5c2bd704ac7b0053&threadid=38027

http://forums.ev1servers.net/showthread.php?s=897e8dd8f1b35f0a5c2bd704ac7b0053&threadid=9895

Enjoy .. Alex