Has anyone used Sphera's Hosting Director for Windows?

Any comments on pricing, likes, dislikes, and if possible comparison to it's competitors like Hosting Controller or Ensim would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Charles LaPadula

Another one to compare Sphere to: http://psoft.net

They aren't really Windows CPs. From what I've read, they run on linux machines and call ASP scripts on the windows servers. I'm going to start an argument and call that "ad-hoc". :D

Originally posted by Adam_S
They aren't really Windows CPs. From what I've read, they run on linux machines and call ASP scripts on the windows servers. I'm going to start an argument and call that "ad-hoc". :D

While you are technically right, I'd say who cares? You ( and your customers ) can use it to control the Windows based sites and that's what matters. Yes, the main CP is on a Linux box, also stuff like mail etc are handled from a Linux box ( not the Windows box ) but all these things are just positive if you ask me.

I mean, you won't need to throw out hundreds of dollars on a mail server for Windows.

My company are in the beginning of migrating our sites from HostingController. We looked at different options and setting up an extra Linux box to run the H-Sphere CP on doesn't cost that much, considering you don't have to buy email server software etc.

I represent Positive Software, so I kind of have first hand knowledge.

We do standard win2000 hosting with IIS, on win2000. It is pretty much the same as if you would do it yourselve.
It is 100% windows - there is no unix involved with web hosting.
We also do unix hosting - but on different servers, and it is apache based.

Why it is not considered purely windows, is because, you have to have at least one linux server to run of DNS, Mail & control panel.
Those services transparent to users, and most
DNS & mail servers are run on unix anyway.

You need only one unix server, for as many win2000 servers as you have got - as the dns, mail & CP will be used from central server for all of them.

You can run mail and dns on the linux box controlled from the win2k server. I don't really agree with your point about having to "throw out hundreds of dollars on a mail server for Windows"?

but.. i have a interesting question for you. Since the argument to go with the linux box has only been because of spending on mail software, if a Windows CP, using what windows can offer to the fullest, was on offer to you, that included mail serverware or the ability to interface to a linux box which offered a mail service, would you still stick to the linux solution or the windows one?

Adam, are you aware that decent mail server for Windows cost money?

H-sphere much more advance than simple one-server-cp. It is a multi-server control panel.

Peter

I'm fully aware! ;) ...and you just raised another point. Just because HSphere can use multi-servers doesn't mean that a Windows one can't. :D

What if a fully Windows based CP was developed that was able to control any number of servers of which each could be a/the mail, dns, webs servers etc? Would that be of interest?

We evaluated that option when building the H-Sphere. Most of the hosts with 3+ servers wanted DNS on unix. Most of the hosts with 5+ servers wanted mail on unix as well.
There are not that many Windows only shopts, and usually they are small. Most of the time we see people looking for Windows control panel without any Unix components - it is for dedicated windows hosting, or for very small windows hosts.

I maight be wrong, but we spend some time doing market research.

I am not sure that I am being clear.
I guess what I am trying to find out is:

(1) What is the cost structure per package - per server, per user, etc - and is it one time or residual.

(2) what are the advantages/what features requirements. If you have experience with the packages, which ones have you used and what did you think.

We already have NT based DNS servers and iMail 7.04 servers, so the Email server issue cost is not an issue. We have a Linux box, so we could certainly use it to host the controller apps.

(3) Do they integrate all aspects of site management - DNS. FrontPage, FTP, Email, protecting sub directories, etc.

Do they include billing features?
Can they be customized to work with our existing merchant account?
Can they support iMail?
Do they have a trouble ticket system?
Do they allow you to easily control and monitor space and bandwidth limitations?

Do they support reseller accounts?

Maybe iseletsk can answer for Positive - does anyone know about the others?

Thanks!

1) H-Sphere pricing: one time fees, per account (basically per user).
The upgrades can be purchased as anual subscription
More info: http://www.psoft.net/h_sphere2_pricing.html

2) http://www.psoft.net/h_sphere2_info.html

3) Yes to everything, complete automatization. The only thing that is missing right now is protecting sub directories on Windows (we support it on linux)

Integrated Billing - included (with recurrent billing & automated signups)
Existing merchant account - we support 10 payments gateways, and adding 2-3 new gatewas with each new release. In any case it should be posible to integrate.

iMail - no
Integarted Trouble Ticket system - yes
Space/Bandwith limits - yes (with notification emails when user are close to the limit)

We have private label reseller system integrated as well - with their own billing system integrated.

Originally posted by iseletsk
We evaluated that option when building the H-Sphere. Most of the hosts with 3+ servers wanted DNS on unix. Most of the hosts with 5+ servers wanted mail on unix as well.

So you developed HSphere for win2k hosts on linux to support DNS and mail on linux?

What if a fully Windows based CP was developed that was able to control any number of servers of which each could be a/the mail, dns, webs servers etc? Would that be of interest?

Ensim WP 2.5 does this.

But did I mention we found it buggy? :)

H-Sphere was developed for webhosting companies that want to do unix hosting or windows hosting, or windows & unix hosting at the same time.
It was done with the idea that most of the companies will be ok with running 1 unix server.

I will try to do full rundown, everything is integrated as one hosting system, but it has different components that you can manage.
When we say that we support win2000 it means that
everything will be done on that OS, there is nothing that is done on unix. Yes we tight different components together to achieve transparancy from admin standpoint. Yet all the features related to that particular system will be
there.
Here is breakdown (it is not complete):
H-Sphere is multi-server control panel that runs on unix.
It supports Mail & DNS on unix.
It supports hosting on Win2000
It supports hositng on Linux/FreeBSD (SunOS in beta)
Those two hosting types are different. Windows hosting has everything you come to expect from windows hosting, such as ASP, ODBC, datasources, frontpage... - all native.
Linux - is unix based hosting plus frontpage,
ASP (with ChiliASP - optional)...
Both of them have in common:
Support for dedicated IP & virtual hosting,
support for cgi scripts, php & perl.

It supports postgres & MySQL (on Linux/freeBSD)
It supports MS SQL on win2000
It supports RealMedia server on both Linux & Win2000
It supports ColdFusion on win2000.

Thanks iseletsk - all the information has been helpful.

I will look over the details on your site and the online demo and if I have any questions I'll PM you.

What about FTP? You haven't mentioned this service.

Does the FTP service run on the linux box or the win2k one? If it runs on the linux box then are you using the CP server as a file system too?

FTP, Virtual FTP & Anonymous FTP on both, Linux & Windows.
Sub-Ftp accounts (ftp account that points to specific directory inside main user directory) are available only on Unix.
Shell SSH access - as moderated option (user clicks on control panel to request it, admin clicks in admin interface to approve it) on unix only.
Jail support for shell access is comming soon.

So you setup the FTP accounts for the windows hosts on the windows servers rather than setting up the FTP accounts on the Linux server for both platforms?

Yes, they are independent, completly...
What you get is centralized management, mail & dns, but the web services itself are completly independent