Even if you’re new to the hosting space, cPanel may not come across as an unknown name. Established in the year 1996, cPanel has become the industry standard when it comes to hosting platforms. The cPanel hosting platform provides a graphical interface and essential tools that will allow a user to run and control his website.
cPanel comes with a plethora of tools that simplifies the entire website management process. These processes include management of files, domain names, email, databases, security, etc. While there are many cPanel tools for website management, we’re only going to touch upon some of the key ones that will make managing your website a breeze. Let’s dive in.
Softaculous Apps Installer
Softaculous is hands down the most essential tool within the cPanel. Softaculous gives you access to hundreds of web apps and the ability to quickly install them on your hosting package with just a few clicks. Whether it is installing a content management system like WordPress or an eCommerce solution like PrestaShop, Softaculous has got you covered.
Manage Varnish
If you’ve used cPanel with another hosting provider, you may not have seen this tool. That’s because our Linux Shared Hosting and Cloud Hosting (India) products support Varnish caching and we’ve customized cPanel to add this tool. If this feature is enabled, Varnish accesses your hosting server to cache the page and then all future requests to the same page are served by Varnish. This means that your content is delivered lightning fast with fewer server resource requirements.
Email Accounts
This tool enables you to add and manage your email accounts for all your domains. You can set up the quota mailbox quota for each email address and also change the password from this tool.
Site Publisher
Site Publisher is a tool that will help you to build your website quickly, even if you are a beginner. You can use the inbuilt templates and create a web page with just a few clicks. Check our comprehensive guide to learn more.
Addon Domains
With this tool, you can add any additional domain that you would like to host. This feature is only applicable to hosting packages that support multiple domains (Baby and Business Plans in the case of HostGator India).
AWStats
AWStats is a web analytics reporting tool that gives you a lot of information about your website. It displays the daily, weekly and monthly details about your website’s visitors in the form of graphs and tables. You can also get information about where your visitors are coming from and also determine if the traffic is genuine or not.
SSL/TLS
This tool allows you to generate and manage SSL certificates which enhances a website’s security. An SSL certificate encrypts the data and keeps it away from the hands of hackers. Initially, an SSL certificate was only required for sites that dealt with sensitive information such as credit card details. But with Google’s new update, browser Chrome will start giving security warning for sites that do not use https. Hence, you must get one installed on your site. Here’s a detailed guide on how to setup SSL certificate for your site.
IP BLocker
Don’t be fooled by this simple tool because it can seriously help in protecting your website. As the name mentions, it can block IP Addresses or domain names from accessing your website. There is a high possibility that a hacker can try and gain access to your website using a brute force attack. You can identify these attempts from AWStats and add their IP address in the IP Blocker tool, thus improving the security of your website
Backup Wizard
This tool allows users to backup all or a part of the website. You can also use the wizard to restore from any backups that you might have taken in the past. This tool comes handy especially when you’re moving from one hosting provider to another albeit both providers need to have cPanel access. If you want a more comprehensive backup solution that will automatically take backups for you, then you must check out CodeGuard
Now that you’ve understood cPanel, it’s time you get your hands dirty and build your website. We’ve only scratched the surface to what tools that cPanel has to offer. We recommend that you check out the other tools and see how it help you improve your website.
