It has been a while since I’ve had time to post on here as I have been very busy as of late. As I am still very busy, I’ll keep this post brief.

Various additions/fixes have been made to the VPS Control panel since the last update:

• Added: Completed per-IP bandwidth monitoring for Xen!
• Added: TUN/TAP enabler button for OpenVZ users
• Added: Ability for user to clear lock files
• Added: Alpha version of VPS traffic graphs in admin section
• Changed: Tweaked OpenVZ quota algorithms
• Changed: Billing system has migrated to new server/subnet – Reverse DNS servers now accept connections from new IP
• Bugfix: Fixed bug in bulk mailer causing blank subject under certain circumstances
• Bugfix: Bandwidth was not being collected for some OpenVZ servers due to PATH not being set correctly
• Bugfix: Output buffering during various actions
• Bugfix: OS Reloads for OpenVZ failed when powered off by SSH

We have many exciting new features planned for the future – stay tuned!

- Provide big warning notice that all data will be wiped
- Only perform OS Reload if user types “I AGREE, ERASE MY DATA”
- Only perform OS Reload if user has shut down VPS
- Upon completion, display VPS name, new root password, primary IP address, E-mail

In the future we will add an option to select a different OS and re-send the user a welcome e-mail.

UPDATE: OS Selector done

A new screenshot our our system is also available:

http://www.xenvz.co.uk/images/VPS_control_panel.png

Updates to Reverse DNS on IP addresses are now queued for processing upon the client submitting the PTR record via the control panel.

Currently, the queue is processed every 5 minutes in order to ensure the system works as efficiently as possible.

• Fixed bug where additional IPs would not bind when VPS powered on/restarted by non-admin user

• Add IP address management

• Add Reverse DNS management

We fixed a bug where additional IPs would not bind when VPS were not powered on/restarted by non-admin users.

IP address management has been added for end users. This will allow the user to list their IP addresses and add IPs if their quota allows. When adding IPs, users can select from a list of upto 10 available IP addresses. Justification for IP use it also gathered from the user during this process.

Reverse DNS manager is now in place. This allows the user to list and edit Reverse DNS for their IP addresses. Please note that at this stage only the frontend + database structure is in place: we do not actually set the PTR records. We will have PTR records in sync with our Reverse DNS database very shortly.

Also added by popular demand is the “Power User” flag which users can enable on VPS. This flag will prevent our control panel from mounting your file system and writing network configuration files at VPS boot time. For our less experienced users it is important that our control panel can automatically write these files to allow for provisioning, IP changes and various other updates/changes.

A toggle flag for power user will be available within our control panel shortly. In the mean time, customers may request a member of staff to enable the power user flag via our contact form.

Coming next by popular demand and in no particular order:

• Automated additional IP allocations
• Reverse DNS control
• OS reloads

We are currently working extensively on provisioning/configuration of Xen accounts. We can currently deploy Xen+Debian/Ubuntu VPS directly from our control panel. RAM/IP address additions are now also applied at reboots/power on via our control panel.

OpenVZ provisioning will be coming soon.

Ultimately this will lead to automated or quicker provision times for new customers and instant OS reloads/upgrades for new customers.

We will be changing how users can request more IP addresses. Customers will be able to apply for IP addresses via our control panel out of their existing quota (or purchase more if required) and enter justification for IP use directly into our database.

Updates/Additions:

• Added complete traffic accounting for OpenVZ with history
• Secure communication channels between control panel and host nodes via lightweight, security-tight python scripts. No daemon software installed on host nodes and no ability to run dangerous commands (i.e. “command whitelist with regexp”)
• Various UI changes
• Improvements to HyperVM migration script
• Now fully integrated with our billing system. Purchased an add-on? Have it available instantly! Extra IP? No problem..
• Pending Provision list for manual fraud checking
• …and more!

No screenshot this time, sorry Folks! Check our older posts for previous screenshots.

So far we have implemented

• IP Pool manager with Reverse DNS
• VPS Server manager
• OS Template manager
• VPS Account manager
• Product resources and quotas
• Migration script from HyperVM

For those of you interested in a sneak preview, check out this censored screenshot.

Set up multiple IPs by separating them with a space like follows in the domU config:

vif = [ 'ip=78.129.140.250 78.129.140.251' ]

You can also add more IPs to the domU without having to restart it using the following syntax replacing 78.129.140.1 with your gateway and vif101.0 with the interface name associated with the domU in your dom0:

ip route add 78.129.140.251 dev vif101.0 src 78.129.140.1

Your domU should now be able to use the extra IP!

In my case, I was trying to forward the IP to an OpenVZ VE within a domU -- this works perfectly fine with the above and no further configuration is required within the domU (other than obviously adding the IP to the OpenVZ container).