Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Specialty Hosting and Markets : Game Servers : TCAdmin Help Please!

[jclutter]

I need to put up a web-site where people can order game servers directly and the ordering system sets up the game server in TCAdmin automagically. How can I do that?

[Defcon|Rich]

I'd suggest reading alot more on how to run a game server company and how to configure the software to do what your wanting to do. While tcadmin is a fine tool for hosting it's only a tool. (One of the several tools required) and cannot magically transform you into a GSP..

You will of course need to build a website, You will require a billing system along with several other tidbits. And the most important a good deal of knowledge in configuring game servers and dealing with your customers on the issues they have.

That's for starters.

TCAdmin's software was designed to aid in hosting games not as a GSP-in-a-box. If you lack the knowledge to properly set up and configure a game server manually then I doubt it will provide any benefit.

FYI, It looks like your idea of starting a new business is simply clicking an .exe file and all the sudden your a server provider.. That's not how it works friend. You actually have to know something about the business your getting into and if you want to last more then 30 days you need to know 'everything' about it.. Sorry to be harsh but it's the truth.

[XFactorServers]

Originally Posted by Defcon|Rich

I'd suggest reading alot more on how to run a game server company and how to configure the software to do what your wanting to do. While tcadmin is a fine tool for hosting it's only a tool. (One of the several tools required) and cannot magically transform you into a GSP..

You will of course need to build a website, You will require a billing system along with several other tidbits. And the most important a good deal of knowledge in configuring game servers and dealing with your customers on the issues they have.

That's for starters.

TCAdmin's software was designed to aid in hosting games not as a GSP-in-a-box. If you lack the knowledge to properly set up and configure a game server manually then I doubt it will provide any benefit.

FYI, It looks like your idea of starting a new business is simply clicking an .exe file and all the sudden your a server provider.. That's not how it works friend. You actually have to know something about the business your getting into and if you want to last more then 30 days you need to know 'everything' about it.. Sorry to be harsh but it's the truth.

Pretty much this. TCadmin is not a GSP in a box like Rich said all you are going to do is hurt yourself and hurt your clients by you wasting your time and money along with fooling your clients into thinking you know what you are doing. It's like going to take golf lessons but the man/women that is teaching you to golf has no clue what they are doing.

[Coolraul]

You are being mean Rich .

jclutter,

As Rich has said, TCADMIN just controls the gameserver startups and setups but you need to do several other things or you are going to be throwing a lot of money away.

1. You do need to install the games on the servers.
2. You need a panel like Tcadmin to be able to take an installed game and clone it for each of your customers
3. You need to buy a billing package that works with Tcadmin so that when a customer pays it will setup the server and if they don't pay it will stop the server. WHMCS does this as does BLESTA and others
4. You need an actual website
5. Which is actually #1 is you actually need a business plan, deep pockets, a thick skin and a bucket for all the sponsorship requests.

Rich is completely right that this is not for the faint hearted. Its a tough business. First just run one for your clan or for friends for a while to see then layer in all the tough stuff (like stealing mom's credit card and the chargebacks that come from it).

[jclutter]

Originally Posted by Defcon|Rich

I'd suggest reading alot more on how to run a game server company and how to configure the software to do what your wanting to do. While tcadmin is a fine tool for hosting it's only a tool. (One of the several tools required) and cannot magically transform you into a GSP..

You will of course need to build a website, You will require a billing system along with several other tidbits. And the most important a good deal of knowledge in configuring game servers and dealing with your customers on the issues they have.

That's for starters.

TCAdmin's software was designed to aid in hosting games not as a GSP-in-a-box. If you lack the knowledge to properly set up and configure a game server manually then I doubt it will provide any benefit.

FYI, It looks like your idea of starting a new business is simply clicking an .exe file and all the sudden your a server provider.. That's not how it works friend. You actually have to know something about the business your getting into and if you want to last more then 30 days you need to know 'everything' about it.. Sorry to be harsh but it's the truth.

No problem, I just prefer people get a bit of history about me before they attempt to know what my goals are with a simple post. Why would you even post such a worthless reply.

I actually own and run a hosting company for over 8 years now and am just looking at expanding my offerings by adding game servers. We have been up and running game servers for a little while now. We have a terrific billing system in place that works very well for us and people can easily place orders online right now for all our offerings but these. My admins and support staff who have many years of experience with game servers, and who helped me decide to expand with this line of offerings, create the game servers after the order is placed, within a reasonable amount of time though, and I would like to automate that creation. We could add this to our normal online ordering but I thought I could get some insight from people at WHT who have already done this. My web developers are already creating the web-site for this but I am doing some of my own research into the best way to accomplish that task.

Now, I would love to hear from people that actually have some insight into the question!!

[jclutter]

Originally Posted by XFactorServers

Pretty much this. TCadmin is not a GSP in a box like Rich said all you are going to do is hurt yourself and hurt your clients by you wasting your time and money along with fooling your clients into thinking you know what you are doing. It's like going to take golf lessons but the man/women that is teaching you to golf has no clue what they are doing.

Thanks, please see my additional comment to Rich's comment so you can see a little more from where I am coming from.

[jclutter]

Originally Posted by Coolraul

You are being mean Rich .

jclutter,

As Rich has said, TCADMIN just controls the gameserver startups and setups but you need to do several other things or you are going to be throwing a lot of money away.

1. You do need to install the games on the servers.
2. You need a panel like Tcadmin to be able to take an installed game and clone it for each of your customers
3. You need to buy a billing package that works with Tcadmin so that when a customer pays it will setup the server and if they don't pay it will stop the server. WHMCS does this as does BLESTA and others
4. You need an actual website
5. Which is actually #1 is you actually need a business plan, deep pockets, a thick skin and a bucket for all the sponsorship requests.

Rich is completely right that this is not for the faint hearted. Its a tough business. First just run one for your clan or for friends for a while to see then layer in all the tough stuff (like stealing mom's credit card and the chargebacks that come from it).

Thanks, I added some more about myself and what I am trying to accomplish farther down in this post. I have looked at WHMCS but not BLESTA. I will check that out! Finally good information!! I really appreciate that!!!

[Bryce|C]

Originally Posted by jclutter

No problem, I just prefer people get a bit of history about me before they attempt to know what my goals are with a simple post. Why would you even post such a worthless reply.

I actually own and run a hosting company for over 8 years now and am just looking at expanding my offerings by adding game servers. We have been up and running game servers for a little while now. We have a terrific billing system in place that works very well for us and people can easily place orders online right now for all our offerings but these. My admins and support staff who have many years of experience with game servers, and who helped me decide to expand with this line of offerings, create the game servers after the order is placed, within a reasonable amount of time though, and I would like to automate that creation. We could add this to our normal online ordering but I thought I could get some insight from people at WHT who have already done this. My web developers are already creating the web-site for this but I am doing some of my own research into the best way to accomplish that task.

Now, I would love to hear from people that actually have some insight into the question!!

While I am not trying to bag on you, but based upon your initial post of: "I need to put up a web-site where people can order game servers directly and the ordering system sets up the game server in TCAdmin automagically. How can I do that?"

That 8 years of hosting experience does kind of seem hard to believe. Now if you already have a billing system in place along with a website all you need to do is worry about automating TCAdmin with everything else. As for billing software I would strongly recommend looking at either WHMCS or ClientExec as both do have options for integrating with TCadmin, currently WHMCS has the best IMO, but both do work.

Now to help you a little more you might want to try posting specific questions, such as how TCAdmin licensing works, what kind of servers you need, what kind of files you need, how difficult is it, etc. But just saying you need help kind of makes it difficult for anyone to help you.

So if you can try and post some more detailed questions, and maybe provide a link to your existing hosting company of 8 years that would be great just to eliminate some confusion among many of us.

[PersonalJ]

WHMCS integrates with tcadmin, I believe there is documentation on tcadmin's website.

[Defcon|Rich]

Originally Posted by Coolraul

You are being mean Rich .

jclutter,

As Rich has said, TCADMIN just controls the gameserver startups and setups but you need to do several other things or you are going to be throwing a lot of money away.

1. You do need to install the games on the servers.
2. You need a panel like Tcadmin to be able to take an installed game and clone it for each of your customers
3. You need to buy a billing package that works with Tcadmin so that when a customer pays it will setup the server and if they don't pay it will stop the server. WHMCS does this as does BLESTA and others
4. You need an actual website
5. Which is actually #1 is you actually need a business plan, deep pockets, a thick skin and a bucket for all the sponsorship requests.

Rich is completely right that this is not for the faint hearted. Its a tough business. First just run one for your clan or for friends for a while to see then layer in all the tough stuff (like stealing mom's credit card and the chargebacks that come from it).

Just trying to inject a little honesty into the thread old friend

[vindointernational]

you can use WHMCS to automate all the process

[Stevie21]

Clientexec can also automate the game server creation process with TCAdmin. There's a great guide on the TCAdmin website, as well as the Newedge forums.