Getting Started

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So you're getting started with a new Ubiquity web hosting account, huh? Congratulations, you made a great choice of providers!

First, you may be wondering How Long Will it Take to Setup My Hosting? It's our most common question, even on accounts that get set-up instantly, so if so, read that page.

Contents

Preparing your account

  • After you've ordered and received your welcome email with information on accessing cPanel or WHM, you're ready to get started
  • cPanel/WHM will provide you with a web-based control panel that will command just about every aspect of your account from your website to email to statistics
  • If you are a standard / shared web hosting client have all you need! Move to the next section!
  • If you ordered reseller web hosting, virtual private server, or dedicated server, login to WHM so you can Create cPanel accounts for your websites!


Your Domain Name

  • If you registered a domain name with us - congrats, you're all set! It may take up to 24 hours to resolve a new domain, but we took care of DNS for you. Move on!
  • If you have a domain name previously registered somewhere else - you will need to change your DNS servers with the company you registered your domain with.
    • If you already have a website, it's strongly recommended to move your website BEFORE changing DNS settings to avoid unnecessary downtime
    • See your welcome email or What are my DNS Servers? for how this should be set-up, and allow up to 48 hours for it to propagate.
    • If this is not a feature available in their web interface, It may be necessary to contact your domain registrar's support system for this.


Starting a new website

Uploading Files

  • There are two ways to upload files to your account.
  • Files placed in the root of your public_html folder will appear at the root of your domain name.
  • Files placed in the level above public_html will not be accessible via the web and can be used to store data privately.
  • Files named index.php, index.htm, or index.html, placed in the root level of any folder, will resolve at the root level of that folder by default


Instantly Installing Scripts with Fantastico

  • Did you know you can install complicated scripts for free in the simple click of a button at Ubiquity?
    • By scripts, we mean..
      • a blog
      • a photo gallery
      • a discussion board / chat forum
      • a content management system
      • an e-commerce shopping cart / storefront
      • a wiki (like this one!)
      • project management tools
      • polling and survey tools
  • In cPanel, choose the blue Fantastico De Luxe icon under Software / Services (that little happy face you see below)
  • Select which script you'd like to experiment with, enter in the folder on your account you'd like to install it and some basic configurations, and click Install!
  • The scripts in Fantastico are free, and most of these scripts have their own communities of developers to help you use them.
  • These communities often share custom skins and modifications that you can upload directly to your account without any web programming knowledge at all!



Moving a website

  • Migrating a website always occurs in 4 phases:


Method 1: Migrating Using the cPanel Backup Wizard

  • If your previous hosting provider used cPanel and didn't use the common sly trick of disabling the backup feature, the easiest method is to use this
    • Login to your old host's cPanel, and choose Files > Backup Wizard. Generate a full backup following the prompts, and download it.
    • Login to your Ubiquity cPanel, Files > Backup Wizard, Upload and restore your backup files.
  • Please note that residential internet providers generally have substantially more downstream capacity than upstream - it may take longer to upload to our servers, and it's not because we're in any way slower. (  :
  • This will restore your files, databases, email addresses, and more than likely, keep database and file paths consistent so that few if any configuration changes in your scripts will be necessary


Method 2: A Manual Migration

When All Else Fails


Move the Files

Option 1: The quick and lazy route (for a smaller site)

  • Download all of their files through FTP
  • Upload all of their files through FTP


Option 2: Tar and SCP

  • If you have shell access to the old server, tar up your public_html directory on the old server
    • You can also get a similar result from using most web-based backup tools if your host had one, or request a host do this for you
  • Upload the tarball to the new server by entering in the new server's information here: 
scp backup.tar.gz root@new.server.ip.ip:/home
  • Extract the .tar in a new home directory using shell. Navigate to the directory you want to compress to, and: 
tar xvzf filename.tar.gz


Move the Database(s)

Option 1: Move a database from phpMyAdmin (will work for most databases, better for smaller ones)

  • Find phpMyAdmin in your old server's control panel
  • Select the right database from the top left corner
  • Click on the Export tab
  • Select the save to file option and leave all of the default settings
  • Now login to the new server, create a new database in it's control panel, and enter phpMyAdmin
  • Choose that database in the top right corner. Click the Query tab, and upload the file with the MySQL dump.
  • You're done!


Option 2: Move a database from shell (needed for very large databases, or if there's no phpMyAdmin)

  • Some databases are too big to export via phpMyAdmin (generally those 2GB or larger). You will need shell or cooperation from your old host in this case.
  • Log into the previous server, and execute this command (using a working database and user name - create a new user if you don't have the password) 
mysqldump databasename -u username -p > database.sql
  • It will then ask for a password for the database user. Enter it, and wait.
  • Once it's done, execute this command to send it over to the other server's /home folder (or to a specific location if you like) 
scp filename.sql root@ip.ip.ip.ip:/home
  • Now, create a new database / user in the control panel of the new server. Execute the query using shell: 
mysql databasename -u username -p < /directory/backupfilename.sql
  • Again, enter the password. Wait, and you should be all set.


Adjust the Script

  • PHP scripts generally have a file, or two, for configuring two major pieces of information
    • Database connection information (can be set or reset via cPanel)
    • The path to your files on the server (in cPanel, it's /chroot/home/user/public_html)
  • This file, or files, may go by a few names, but should be fairly obvious:
    • settings.php
    • config.php
    • server.sett.php
  • You may need to dig through folders to find all of them
  • To be sure you've found them, this Google phrase should save you almost 100% of the time:
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