Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Hosting Software and Control Panels : cPanel will advertise third party services by default

[Kent Brockman]

Originally Posted by nibb

I also think cPanel has financial problems to came up with bundling such an ugly services as a default feature. Personally I tested myself Attracta and its offers nothing which I can consider of value. The free service and even paid one is worth nothing in my personal opinion. Its pure marketing and nice talk, they even advertise your site submitted to Yahoo, really? If its on Bing its already on Yahoo as well, so its all just bluff for newbie users.

Yep, I stated the same, maybe in a "tacky" manner:
forums.cpanel.net/f133/attracta-become-new-feature-cpanel-whm-q-264422-p2.html#post1106631

But they simply cannot answer to most of the questions, and deviate with nice talk. It's for newbies. So, I will try to write a script to uninstalling using postupcp events.

Although, the moderator at cPanel warned me to wait for the big announcement they are about to post... let's see what's on.

[Kent Brockman]

Originally Posted by KMyers

...
1) Privacy - Technically it is transmitting domain details to a 3rd party service
...

They add ads to opt-in users of the program AdDollars. Automatically? It seems so. They install a mod inside Apache:
attractaseo.com/partner_kit/technology.html

Does this mod install for every domain hosted whether or not its owner had signed up with Attracta? or the hook to the Attracta's js addon are installed only when user triggered a signup on their account? Don't know. One of the lines from the uninstall includes this:
perl /usr/local/cpanel/Cpanel/Attracta/Scripts/remove_apache_module.pl

Tada! automatic privacy invasion for free? wheee

Please don't label me as assuming without facts, I just have my doubts founded in what I can see after googling the brand a bit.

[quantumphysics]

well, time to cancel the few cpanel accounts i have and never sign up for any more

~

[net]

and cPanel thinks this thread doesn't affect them: http://forums.cpanel.net/f133/attrac...ml#post1113912

Hmmmm.... let's see.

[xeno007]

They will see they're wrong when they will see they start to lose customers.
I am personally not against Attracta and it's cooperation with cPanel.
I love addons. I think there should be an addon for cPanel that makes your regular website a adult website automatically, with few clicks. Also an addon that makes you coffee in the morning with only a click. Why not, options are good.
The way I see it, our problem is that cPanel will install automatically and enable by default an third-party app which we may or may not love it. That is for the sysadmin to decide. Just don't INSTALL it on my server unless I specifically choose to, like I do for Munin, @mail, other third-party addons. That is all we want. Enable it to be easy to install/use, that is good. Just don't install and enable it by default.

[sniperscope]

Troy and Aaron told that they are ready and answer any question in cPanel forum. But they keep silence.
I told this in their forum and i am telling here as well.

It should be OFF by default.

[quantumphysics]

Originally Posted by sniperscope

Troy and Aaron told that they are ready and answer any question in cPanel forum. But they keep silence.
I told this in their forum and i am telling here as well.

It should be OFF by default.

i read the whole thread the other day, the answers consisted of "ATTRACTA IS SUPER MAGIC IT WILL WORK WITHOUT PROBLEMS WHO NEEDS PRIVACY POLICIES THIS IS NO PROBLEM WHO CARES ABOUT DATA PROTECTION LAWS THERE IS AN INTERSTITIAL" and comical marketing crap

[KMyers]

Originally Posted by quantumphysics

i read the whole thread the other day, the answers consisted of "ATTRACTA IS SUPER MAGIC IT WILL WORK WITHOUT PROBLEMS WHO NEEDS PRIVACY POLICIES THIS IS NO PROBLEM WHO CARES ABOUT DATA PROTECTION LAWS THERE IS AN INTERSTITIAL" and comical marketing crap

+1 and they never answered the questions from hosts who already offer in-house SEO solutions

[cd/home]

Either way what ever people object to cPanel will only do as they please, Just let them get on with it and stop the stir...

[kpmedia]

Originally Posted by xeno007

I love addons.

Me, too! --- but only when they're good/useful.
But Attracta is about as useful as pre-used toilet paper.

I'm not exaggerating when I say it's the most half-baked crap "SEO" service I've seen in years. It reminds me of the kind of garbage I saw in 2005. Even current spammy Indian "SEO" is better than some of the nonsense I saw in the Attacta "tools" (if you can even call them that).

This whole page of "How It Works" -- attracta.com/how-it-works.jsp -- is essentially saying "We make XML sitemaps! We're the smartest, S-M-R-T!"

Unless you're running some ancient horrible site, most CMS have built-in XML or XML mods/plugins readily available. That anybody would consider this service useful is almost surreal, as far as I'm concerned.

[Steven]

Create file:
/usr/local/cpanel/scripts/postupcp

Place:
#!/bin/sh
perl /usr/local/cpanel/Cpanel/Attracta/Scripts/remove_apache_module.pl
perl /usr/local/cpanel/Cpanel/Attracta/Scripts/remove_attracta_cron.cgi
perl /usr/local/cpanel/Cpanel/Attracta/Scripts/remove_apache_module.pl
rm -rf /usr/local/cpanel/base/3rdparty/Attracta
rm -rf /usr/local/cpanel/Cpanel/Attracta
rm -rf /usr/local/cpanel/3rdparty/Attracta/
rm -f /usr/local/cpanel/whostmgr/docroot/cgi/addon_attracta.cgi
rm -rf /usr/local/cpanel/whostmgr/docroot/cgi/Attracta/
rm -f /usr/local/cpanel/base/frontend/x3/dynamicui/dynamicui_attracta_*
/usr/local/cpanel/bin/rebuild_sprites >/dev/null 2>&1
rm -f /usr/local/cpanel/hooks/rvskinindex/showTable
/usr/local/cpanel/bin/register_hooks >/dev/null 2>&1


save it.

chmod +x /usr/local/cpanel/scripts/postupcp

This will make sure its good and removed after every upcp.
Ref: http://cdn.attracta.com/static/downl..._attracta.bash

[Kent Brockman]

Originally Posted by Steven

This will make sure its good and removed after every upcp.

Great!!! That's what I wanted. Thanks

[IGobyTerry]

Originally Posted by othellotech

Only a complete moron would put a server live without configuring it first, and one of the things you'd do at that stage is turn off the mountain of extraneous junk that any application/control-panel/whatever installs/enables.

"clever" admins will 'rewrite' the optionswith something else and do their own upselling

Rob,

I totally agree. We looked becoming an Attracta partner before. It wasn't for us. Now those clients who do want to use it, do have that option. For those who don't want to use it, cPanel makes it really easy to turn off.

[linux-tech]

Originally Posted by bear

Disgraceful way to behave.

As I said in their thread, absolutely correct.
It's amazing how thoughtless they've become. This has nothing to do with server automation, which is what their whole product is about. Someone, somewhere paid cPanel a LOT of money for this inclusion. I don't care what they say about not being paid, that's about as easy to believe as bear being a real, live, bear.

Originally Posted by IGobyTerry

For those who don't want to use it, cPanel makes it really easy to turn off.

Yes, but how many clients will this interrupt? How much money will cPanel cost their own clients before this is realized?
The point is that this is not cPanel's job or responsibility, and they WILL eventually end up stepping on the wrong toes here. What, you don't think that this won't compete with their clients? A good few of them I'm sure, offer their OWN SEO services. Now, because they don't know this is included (really, who visits cPanel's forums frequently and reads the announcements frequently??), and opted in by default, these people just cost their client more money. Talk about a load of BS

[bear]

Originally Posted by linux-tech

that's about as easy to believe as bear being a real, live, bear.

Now you're just being mean.