Server management solution ?

[canuck]

I'm new since Monday and have a VPS1 solution on and running. I must admit that it has been a busy week and a lot is so new for me coming from a shared server reseller solution.

I have my VPS1 setup and working with a few clients on it today. All this thanks to the wonderfull support staff at PowerVPS.

I'm wondering for new people like me what would be the best management solution for maintaining my server ? Should I look for a third party solution or kepp on learning as I go along. It's mostly the next few months that worries me.

Are these VPS servers much in need of maintenance and upgrades besides whatever the support staff does or they should work fine from this point on ?

Just looking for some advice !

Thanks
Steve

[haligi]

I would second that post. At the moment I'm thinking, okay, I've got most of my clients transferred. Is there anything I should worry about? Should I be watching out for something?

I guess I'll be looking out for responses on this thread.

[Robert]

Hi there!

If you have absolutely no desire to want to login to SSH or learn about your server, then you might want to consider a 3rd party maintainence company to help you out.

However if you don't mind pulling up a SSH prompt and digging around inside of your control panel (WHM or Plesk's login area, etc)... then by all means I would say you would be fine learning on your own.

The easiest way to learn how to administer a server is to actually start logging in yourself.

Our support team has no problem helping answer questions you might have. In addition, if you see something you're curious about and don't quite understand... try and google search it.

The CPanel forums (http://forums.cpanel.net) and Plesk's forums (http://forums.sw-soft.com) are a great place to start frequenting. I would also recommend www.webhostingtalk.com as well. You'll find lots of other people to chat with and share expierences and concerns.

[canuck]

Well I've learnt a lot this week and I will be hanging in there and going solo on this server management. Learning a bit more every day with SSH.

Anyways, again, the support team has been the best for setting me up.

I was mostly concerned about keeping an eye out on the server performance and possible security issues. After all, most certified techs have studied for quite a while and I by no means wish to compare myself to them. They are the ones keeping us "new" resellers going !

Thanks

[Chris]

I would second that post. At the moment I'm thinking, okay, I've got most of my clients transferred. Is there anything I should worry about? Should I be watching out for something?

I guess I'll be looking out for responses on this thread.

I would suggest that probably the most important thing you can watch is your resources via the PowerPanel and your email box itself for notifications of brute force attacks. I've had a couple clients forget their password and I had to manually delete their IP from the banned list. Some of the other Cron jobs such as updating cpanel and the like are good to watch to see what "sticks" and what doesn't.

Also, I like automating so I setup a cron to automatically update fantastico also . . . there's a post somewhere.

I'm also regularly using WHM to check my mail queue to ensure it's not backed up. I had one period where the forwarding server a client was using no longer accepted the emails and they were 15 hours backed up.

[haligi]

Well I've learnt a lot this week and I will be hanging in there and going solo on this server management. Learning a bit more every day with SSH.

Anyways, again, the support team has been the best for setting me up.

Yeap, been spending a lot of time with WHM. I think I'm learning, but things are a bit overwhelming at the moment.

[nadzri]

Canuck, best wishes to you, and others who are learning to manage their servers.

May I suggest that as you learn, you document the steps that you take to manage and secure your servers? Not the micro steps, but rather the things you do e.g. (1) Install rootkit (2) Install APF (3) Review log files etc.

These can be reviewed by the experts including the support staff and they can chip in with their ideas and tips, and other newbies can use this as a starting point.

I know this has probably been done on other forums, but hey, this is our forum! :)

[canuck]

Thanks nadzri !

I like the SIM (System Integrity Monitor). It gives me a heads up on what may be wrong. Also rkhunter seems good too.

Also found this site R-fx Networks to be a gold mine of info R-FX Networks (http://www.rfxnetworks.com/index.php)