Input has anyone made the jump yet?

[andyxyz]

This looks to be a very interesting development. However, the additional licence at $10 per node is huge especially for VPS provisions (normal licence $3 pm)
Has anyone made a business case for going down this route?

 

[SteveITS]

We have Parallels Plesk Automation now. We signed on using their "number of websites" license. Meaning, the license had a maximum of 200, 500, 1000, etc. web sites in the system instead of buying one license per service node. We have a lot of smaller VPSs so at a per-node fee Parallels/Odin would have been making more money than us on the smaller ones (over half our price), unless we dramatically raised our pricing for smaller VPSs.

In other words for us the pricing to go to Plesk would increase dramatically, because it seems like Plesk is more geared towards a small number of high capacity shared hosting servers and that's the opposite of our needs.

 

[Reboot]

For example, I like to have the mail separate from the web hosting. Doing so would cost me (as a freelancer):

• 1 Server for the management node (€10/m)
• 1 Server for the webhosting (€20/m)
• 1 Server for the mail hosting (€20/m)
• 3 Plesk Licenses (3×€11,25/m)
• 3 Plesk Multi Server Licenses (€3×€9/m)

Which adds up to: (€10 + (2×€20) + (3×€11,25) + (3×€9)) = €110,75/m. Remember, this is only to have the mail isolated from the webhosting. That's €61 for the licensing alone. To keep two things separated. For freelancers, that's insane.

Now webhosting is cheap these days, so I roughly need at least 50 customers to break even.

Right now I have 2 servers, one running Plesk, one runs different mail server software. That adds up to €50/m. That's doable for me.

Plesk staff, are you reading?

 

[Anthony]

Hi @Reboot,

I'm not sure that Multi Server is a suitable solution for servers which have lower than 50 customers on one Plesk server.

My expectations are Multi Server owner have a couple of Plesk servers with 150-300 domains onboard. In this case, Multi Server solves the issue of global configuration and load balancing for all Plesk farm and used as one entry point for all customers.

Hi @SteveITS,

Could you please describe a scenario how do you use small VPSs? Is it servers with installed Plesk and domains, or servers which stores domains w/o installed Plesk? Do you use a small VPSs as dedicated servers for particular customers?

 

[Reboot]

I'm not sure that Multi Server is a suitable solution for servers which have lower than 50 customers on one Plesk server.

It's always a good idea to spread server load. Offloading email, while hosting say less then 50 websites, can still be beneficial. In many ways.

1. My expectations are Multi Server owner have a couple of Plesk servers with 150-300 domains onboard.
2. In this case, Multi Server solves the issue of global configuration and load balancing for all Plesk farm and used as one entry point for all customers.

1. And my expectations are a lot of Plesk users just want it the way I describe. It's not the first time that people, mainly because my reason earlier, don't use mail hosting on the same server.
2. If this is already policy, I don't see any added benefit from this survey.

Do you use a small VPSs as dedicated servers for particular customers?

That's quite a good idea actually, especially when using the orchestration method. Own server, but use the centralized DNS/Email/etc.

 

[malfunction]

Remember, this is only to have the mail isolated from the webhosting.

I think you are making this more complicated than it needs to be using Multi Server. Your solution for a single Plesk server with remote mail should be just that, a single Plesk server with remote mail. Plesk already supports a remote SmarterMail server if you're on Windows, on Linux you're going to have to roll your own for the time being but I think remote mail will come to Plesk Linux soon (as a result of what they are doing in Multi Server).

 

[Reboot]

(...)but I think remote mail will come to Plesk Linux soon (as a result of what they are doing in Multi Server).

"but I think..."

Currently, using the planned MultiServer feature to do this, it's only possible in the way I described first. Maintaining 2 separate servers as I do now is cumbersome and time-consuming.

@Anthony: As you liked the post above, are you planning to make it possible what he describes? If yes, what solution will you use? Or will it use Plesk's mailstack using a connector module?

 

[Anthony]

@Reboot,

re you planning to make it possible what he describes? If yes, what solution will you use?

Yes, we are planning to implement remote centralized mail support for Multi Server.
We look towards Smartermail server now, but I can't say definitely which solution will be used.

If you have any thoughts regarding this I'm glad to hear.

 

[Reboot]

@Anthony: Please use a solution that works on Linux. Since most linux-based mailserver packages are free, I recommend you to make a minified mail-only Plesk stack to install on the given server. Pros: Extensions like MagicSpam can still be applied.

I bet many webhosters running a Plesk Multi-Server linux farm aren't interested in placing a Windows server, just for mail. Take that into account please.

 

[malfunction]

I bet many webhosters running a Plesk Multi-Server linux farm aren't interested in placing a Windows server, just for mail. Take that into account please.

We certainly are. Our clients HATE Horde. I'm sure it's very capable but taking Windows clients that have used a solid web application like SmarterMail for ten years and telling them they have to use Horde now simply won't fly, even our clients who have always used Horde don't like it.

We have to be responsive to what our clients want and to what a webmail application looks like in the modern world (see Gmail, Yahoo mail, Outlook etc), choosing a mail stack just on the basis that all the components are free and you don't need a Windows license is not reflecting the needs of the people that actually use and pay for the system.

 

[Reboot]

@Anthony: Consider making an API for the whole Plesk mail part. Let users free to implement their own solutions.

 

[Janko1000]

Hi,
extern Mail is the most Important Thing for us.
We want to give all Customers the same Mailhostname no matter on which Server they are.
We tried it with NGINX MailSetup and it works for POP/IMap really nice but SMTP..... Nginx does not pass the password to SMTP.
Also Mailautoconfig is really important to us. 50% of all Customer Request are "How i add my Mail Account to Thunderbird/Outlook and so on..."

 

[SteveITS]

Could you please describe a scenario how do you use small VPSs? Is it servers with installed Plesk and domains, or servers which stores domains w/o installed Plesk? Do you use a small VPSs as dedicated servers for particular customers?

I don't think I got a notification of your reply/question so sorry for responding late.

We have been using Plesk Automation. If a customer wants a VPS, we create a new container in Virtuozzo and add it to PPA as a service node. Then we use attributes and a custom subscription template to tie that customer to that service node, so any webspaces or databases added are created on that node. A given node may have one or 100 domains on it, though I'd guess most of ours are 10 domains or less per service node.

 

[Anthony]

Hi @SteveITS,

Thank you for the response.

The support of smalls VPS'ses in plans. Also, we do not support custom attributes and resellers, so you can't to dedicate a Multi Server service node for a particular customer.

 

[SteveITS]

we do not support custom attributes and resellers, so you can't to dedicate a Multi Server service node for a particular customer

Hmmm, OK, I was afraid of that. But if everything was under one subscription would that "stick" to the one service node? For instance if they have a subscription that allows 50 web sites, Multi Server would not scatter those across service nodes would it?

I'm envisioning a scenario where we could create a new service node, create a subscription on it, and then immediately disable it (not sure of the exact terminology offhand) so Multi Server didn't assign any other subscriptions on that service node.

Otherwise it sounds like plain old Plesk would be the best way to assign a customer to a service node, and that would save $10 per server as well.

 

[Anthony]

@SteveITS

But if everything was under one subscription would that "stick" to the one service node? For instance if they have a subscription that allows 50 web sites, Multi Server would not scatter those across service nodes would it?

I'm envisioning a scenario where we could create a new service node, create a subscription on it, and then immediately disable it (not sure of the exact terminology offhand) so Multi Server didn't assign any other subscriptions on that service node.

Correct. All websites under one subscription will be located on the same service node. Moreover, you will be able to set the service node in 'Disabled' status right after subscription's creation, because all additional websites will be created on the service node directly and back-synced to the Management node.

The described scenario is fully applicable.

 

[SteveITS]

Thank you for verifying, Anthony. But overall, if we are are managing DNS slaves separately, and don't/won't have Windows support for our Windows service node (Question - Windows Linux mix), and have to manage subscriptions manually, basically what we get for $250/month for 25 servers is a single control panel that redirects users to their own server? That's convenient but I'm not sure it's worth an extra $3000/year...

 

[Anthony]

@SteveITS, if we do not take into account such features as CDNS, Cmail and automation subscription's balancing, I would like to add the following:

- Centralized settings management
- One entry point for billing system: it not required to add 25 servers to WHMCS, just enough to add the Management node only.
- Centralized extensions installation/management