HOW DO I ADD A DOMAIN FOR HOSTING IN THE PLESK CONTROL PANEL?

Answer by: Stuart Pierce, Aplus.Net Knowledge Base Support

The first step for hosting a domain name in the Plesk Control Panel will be to create a particular client in Plesk to assign the domain name to. Here is how to create a client in your Dedicated Server Control Panel:

• How do I create a new client in the Plesk Control Panel?

Once you have created a client, here is how to proceed with the addition of a domain name to your Dedicated Server:

1. Login to your Plesk Control Panel. Use the information provided to you when the server was setup.

2. Click on Domains from the navigation bar on the left.

3.  Click the Add New Domain icon.

4. Now, click on the client name you have created for this domain.

5. In the Domain name field, enter your registered domain name. The WWW checkbox, when checked, indicates that the WWW prefix can be used when addressing the domain as well as the domain name by itself. If the box is unchecked, then the domain can only be referenced by its name without the WWW prefix.

6. Click the OK button to proceed with the hosting setup.

7. Select Physical hosting type using the respective radio button and click OK.

You will be redirected to the Physical hosting setup page for your domain name. Please read below for information on the setup options you have:

• SSL Support checkbox - Secure Sockets Layer encryption is generally used for protecting transfer of sensitive data during online transactions on e-commerce Web sites that run on dedicated IP addresses. SSL certificates that participate in the encryption process are usually applied to a single domain name on a single IP address, therefore, each site that needs SSL protection must be hosted on a dedicated IP address. An exception to this is subdomains, which you can protect with a wildcard certificate. Installing an SSL certificate on a Web server that hosts several web sites with different domain names on a single IP address (shared or name-based hosting) is technically possible, however, it is not recommended: the encryption will be provided, but users will get warning messages on attempt to connect to the secure site. To allow SSL encryption for Web sites, select the SSL support check box.

• Use a single directory for housing SSL and non-SSL content - By default, when users publish their sites through their FTP accounts, they need to upload the web content that should be accessible via secure connections to the httpsdocs directory, and the content that should be accessible via plain HTTP, to the httpdocs directory. For the convenience of publishing all content through a single location – httpdocs directory, select the Use a single directory for housing SSL and non-SSL content check box.

• FTP Login and FTP Password - Specify the user name and password that will be used for publishing the site to the server through FTP. Retype the password into the Confirm Password box.

• Hard disk quota - allows you to set the limit for the maximum disk space in megabytes amount available for use by this domain.

• Shell access to server with FTP user’s credentials – This allows a site owner to upload securely web content to the server through a Secure Socket Shell connection, however, allowing shell access also poses a potential threat to the server security, so we recommend that you do not allow shell access. Leave the Forbidden option selected.

• FrontPage support - Microsoft FrontPage is a popular web site authoring tool. To enable users to publish and modify their sites through Microsoft FrontPage, select the FrontPage support and FrontPage over SSL support check boxes, set the FrontPage authoring option to enabled, and specify the FrontPage Administrator's login and password.

• Apache ASP support – check this box to enable the development of dynamic ASP web applications with embedded code.

• SSI support - SSI stands for 'server-side includes', a type of HTML comment that directs the web server to dynamically generated data for the Web page whenever information is requested. SSI can also be used to execute programs and insert the results; therefore they represent a powerful tool for web developers. If you will need SSI support, make sure a check mark appears in the SSI box.

• PHP support - PHP is a server-based HTML embedded scripting language used to create dynamic Web pages. If you will need to support PHP scripting in HTML documents, make sure a check mark appears in the PHP box.

• CGI support - CGI is a set of rules describing how a web server communicates with another piece of software on the same machine, and how the other piece of software (based on the CGI program) communicates back to the web server. If you will need to support CGI, make sure a check mark appears in the CGI box.

• Mod_perl support - Perl is an interpreted high-level programming language. Perl is very popular among System Administrators who use it for a vast number of automation tasks. Many CGI programs are written in Perl. If your client wants to support Perl, make sure a check mark appears in the Perl support checkbox.

• Mod_python support - Python is an interpreted, interactive, object-oriented, high-level programming language. Python is good for many system administration type tasks and for CGI programming and is also extensively used as a graphical user interface development aide. If your client wants to support Python, make sure a check mark appears in the Python support checkbox.

•  ColdFusion support – enables ColdFusion support only if it is supported by your Plesk license key. …

•  Web statistics - To allow domain/web site owner to view the information on the number of people visited his or her site and the pages of the site they viewed, select the Web statistics and accessible via password protected directory /plesk-stat/ check boxes. This will install the Webalizer statistical software, which will generate reports and place them into the password protected directory. The domain/web site owner will then be able to access Web statistics at the URL: https://your-domain.com/plesk-stat/ using his or her FTP account login and password.

• Custom Error Documents - When visitors coming to your site request pages that the web server cannot find, the web server generates and displays a standard HTML page with an error message. If you wish to create your own error pages and use them on your web server or allow your customers to do that, select the Custom error documents check box.