H-Sphere is a scalable multiserver web hosting solution. It has many advanced features and a sophisticated billing system to automate and improve your web hosting tasks. H-Sphere was designed to work on many servers and can be scaled by adding more web servers, mail servers, database servers, and DNS servers without any downtime. It provides a simple, easy-to-use web interface that can be maintained from any computer with internet connection. H-Sphere was written in Java and works with any SQL-compliant database. It runs only industry standard software.

 

H-Sphere is the easiest way to set up highest level web-hosting operations. The software contains:

• Complete hosting automation for Linux, FreeBSD and Win2000 platforms.
• Easy to use, extensive user Control Panel interface.
• Admin, Tech Support and Sales Control Panel interfaces.
• Automated Sign-ups
• Integrated billing package with support for recurrent billing and email invoicing
• Automated credit card charging (Support for Authorize.net, CyberCash, Payflow Pro, Paradata, and Link Point)
• Integrated online help with Trouble Ticket System
• Easy to change look and feel.
• Multiple plans.
• Support for large number of computers controlled from one central location.
• Easy way to add new computers (Web Servers, DNS, Mail or any others) into the H-Sphere network without shutting down any other services.

H-Sphere follows true centralized model to allow highest level of manageability. The data is stored in the centralized database. Control Panel server dispatches commands (using ssh or http protocols) to different servers. New servers can be added on the fly.

H-Sphere consists of several parts:

• Central Control Panel server (Linux, FreeBSD)
• Internal Database (Oracle or PostgreSQL)
• DNS/Mail servers (Linux, FreeBSD)
• Web Servers (Linux, FreeBSD or Win2000)

The heart of H-Sphere is the Control Panel Server. It knows about every other server in the configuration. Control Panel Server manages all new machines, users, domains, and events behind the scene. When a user enters the system and creates a new account, the control panel server dispatches commands to DNS, Mail, and Web servers to configure themselves. It also writes all the information about user into its database. From this moment on, H-Sphere knows which computers the account resides on, the properties of the account, how it is billed and any other information it might need to know. All settings are configured in real time.

H-Sphere was created to provide most feature-rich web hosting service possible. Currently it has the following features available:

• Centralized Control Panel
• Linux, FreeBSD and Win2000 hosting
• Completely branded reseller solution
• Multiple skin support for user's control panel
• Multilingual support (English, German, Dutch, French, Italian, Spanish & Russian) and mailing lists.
• Automatic DNS management
• Automatic domain name registration with OpenSRS
• Domains, Sub-Domains and Domain aliasing support
• Parked domains and no domain hosting
• Virtual Hosting (shared IP) and IP Based Hosting (dedicated IP) with one click migration option.
• ODBC support (Win 2000 only)
• FTP and Shell Accounts
• Virtual FTP and FTP sub-accounts
• Anonymous FTP
• RealMedia hosting (NT and Unix)
• MySQL, MS SQL and PostgreSQL hosting
• Miva and OsCommerce Shopping Cart support (NT and Unix)
• SSI, PHP, ASP, ColdFusion, CGI support
• SSL Certificate Upload support
• Shared SSL Certificate support
• FrontPage extensions
• MIME types management
• Error Document management
• Support for Authorize.net, CyberCash, Bibit, ePDQ, Payflow Pro, Paradata, LinkPoint, PayAndShop, SecurePay, PSiGate & CardReady
• Traffic and Disk Quota management
• Web Statistics (Webalizer and ModLogAn)
• Support for Urchin traffic statistics pachage
• Access to raw log files
• POP3 mailboxes, Web Mail, Mail Forwarding, aliases, auto responders
• SqWebmail and IMP support
• User e-mail notifications
• Sending mass e-mails to customers
• Preinstalled CGI scripts (guestbook, forum, chat and counter)
• Preinstalled CGI script manager
• Crontab support
• Client shell access support with admin's request authorization
• External affiliate program support

The complete list of features of H-Sphere is too long to list here, but we encourage you to try them out by going through our free online demo.

Important: The support of RealServer, OpenSRS, Miva Merchant, MS SQL, ColdFusion and other commercial packages does not include licenses to them. You need to purchase these products and licenses to them separately to offer them to your customers.

See also the Latest Features Reference

Click here for features in development.

Hardware Requirements

H-Sphere can be installed on any number of computers. A minimum configuration can be installed on one box, but more is recommended.

An H-Sphere configuration includes the following servers:
Server #1: Control Panel
Server #2: Unix Web Server (can be more than one)
Server #3: Mail Server (can be more than one)
Server #4: DNS Server (two is recommended, any number is supported)
Server #5: MySQL Server - Unix/Linux (for database hosting)
Server #6: Unix RealServer
Server #7: PGSQL Server (for database hosting)
Server #8: Win2000 Web Server (for NT hosting)
Server #9: MSSQL Server - Win2000 (for database hosting)
Server #10: Windows RealServer
Server #11: Zeus server
Server #12: VPS server

You can put servers 1 through 6 to one or more boxes combining them any way you want.
The Control Panel server is required; other servers can be installed at later times.
You need more than one box if you are going to offer one of the following:
1) Windows hosting: Win2000 web, MS SQL, and Windows Real servers are set up separately on Windows 2000 platform and can also be combined in any possible way.
2) PostreSQL database hosting: PGSQL server for user database hosting can't share the box with the control panel server, because the latter runs with system PG SQL database.
3) VPS hosting: Virtual Private Servers require special software that is installed on a separate RedHat 7.3 box.

If you are going to install H-Sphere to only one computer, make sure it is at least Pentium II, 200MHz, 256RAM, 1GB HDD free. This will allow to host only a small number of customers. Adding SiteStudio will require at least 500MHz and 512 RAM.

You may also want to take a look at how to configure servers for the H-Sphere installation.

Other Requirements

- Full control of DNS, mail, web and other hosting servers is a must while installation and testing.
- H-Sphere can be installed only on public IPs.
- Control Panel can use either PostgreSQL or Oracle.
- You will also need a Full Access account at OpenSRS to provide domain registration services.

To accept credit cards in real-time, you will need a merchant account and gateway access through one of the following:

• AuthorizeNet (ADC Relay)
  
• AuthorizeNet (SIM Protocol)
  
• Bibit (version 2.09 and higher)
  
• CyberCash
  
• Echo
  
• Ematic
  
• ePDQ (version 2.09 and higher)
  
• IonGate (version 2.3 RC4 and higher)
  
• Link Point
  
• Paradata
  
• PayAndShop (version 2.09 and higher)
  
• PayReady (version 2.1 and higher)
  
• Payflow Pro
  
• Payflow Pro with SSL Support (version 2.3 and higher)
  
• Plug'n Pay (version 2.3 RC4 and higher)
  
• PSiGate (version 2.1 and higher)
  
• SecurePay (version 2.09.5 and higher)
  
• Skipjack (version 2.3 RC4 and higher)
  
• Surepay (version 2.3 RC3 and higher)
  
• InterCept (version 2.4 and higher)
  
• Secure Trading (not yet released)

Control Panel Operating Systems:

• RedHat Linux (7.2, 7.3)
  Note: Earlier versions of RedHat Linux as well as version 8.0 are not supported with H-Sphere!
• FreeBSD

WebServers:

• Apache 1.3.x (Linux and FreeBSD)
  • CGI support
  • FrontPage Extensions 2000
  • PHP 3.x and 4.x
• IIS 5.0 (Win2000)

E-Commerce:

• Miva Shopping Cart (Linux, FreeBSD and Win2000)
  • Miva Empresa

Database Hosting:

• MySQL server
• MS SQL server
• PostgreSQL

DNS Servers:

• Bind 8.2.x

Mail Servers:

• Qmail and vpopmail,
• POP-before-SMTP,
• ezmlm

Other:

• RealSystem Server ISP

Internal Database Support:

• Oracle 8.x
• PostgreSQL 7.x
• MS SQL

Java 2.0 and servlets support is required for control panel. Perl 5.x is required by Unix servers.

H-Sphere ensures data and transaction security at all levels, including:
- Site performance under site owner (both Unix and Windows);
- SSL / shared SSL certificate support for individual domains;
- SSL encryption for the entire control panel.

However, we find it important to emphasize that the security of the server at the lowest level must be provided by the system administrator.

Tips on how to increase H-Sphere security are available here (courtesy of Dynamic Net™).

The software can be licensed at $4.50 per account one time fee.
There is additional nonrefundable $95 setup fee.
Read more about pricing here