Using this feature wisely and in conjunction with other security measures, such as strong passwords and regular backups, is essential.

What is Directory Privacy, and why is it important?

Directory privacy refers to restricting access to specific directories on a website. This is important for protecting sensitive information or files that are not publicly accessible.

What are the use cases of Directory privacy in cPanel?

Directory privacy in cPanel is a helpful feature that can be used in various scenarios to protect sensitive information or files that should not be publicly accessible. Here are some simple use cases:

1. User-specific content: Directory privacy can protect content only for specific users, such as employee data or confidential documents.
2. Test or development sites: If you’re working on a new version of a website or testing new features, you may want to password-protect the directory until you’re ready to launch it publicly.
3. Private storage: You may want to use your web hosting account to store personal or private files, such as backups or personal photos. Directory privacy can help ensure this content is not accessible to the public.
4. Client access: If you’re building a website for a client, you may want to use directory privacy to give them access to a specific directory without exposing the rest of your website.

How to Setup Directory Privacy in cPanel

cPanel makes it easy to set up directory privacy for your website. Here are the step-by-step instructions on how to set it up in cPanel.

1. Log in to your cPanel account.
2. Navigate to the “File Manager” tool under the “Files” section.

   

3. Choose the directory you want to protect by clicking on it.
4. Click Edit.
   
5. Under Security Settings, select the Password protect this directory check box.
6. In the Enter a name for the protected directory text box, type a name for the protected directory.
7. Click Save
   
   
8. Once you receive a confirmation message, click the Go Back URL.
9. Under Create User, type a username in the Username text box.
10. In the New Password text box, type the user’s password.
11. In the Confirm Password text box, retype the user’s password.
12. Click the “Save” button to activate the password protection for the directory.
    

Once you have completed these steps, the directory will be password-protected, and only users with the correct credentials can access its contents. It’s important to note that this feature is not a substitute for proper web application security practices.

Still, it does provide an additional layer of protection for sensitive files or directories.

ChemiCloud is always up-to-date with the latest industry standards and updates. Our hosting accounts include the new Jupiter theme so that you can enjoy all that cPanel offers.

You don’t have to wait to see what the new Jupiter theme looks like. You can easily switch your account to the Jupiter theme to get a feel for the new interface.

To do this, follow these steps:

1. Log in to your cPanel account.
2. In the right sidebar, under GENERAL INFORMATION, locate the Theme list box.
   
3. Select Jupiter. cPanel switches to the Jupiter theme automatically.

That’s it. Now your cPanel account will be using the Jupiter theme.

Our friendly and knowledgeable customer support team is available 24/7 to answer any of your questions.

The File Manager editors

When you edit a file using cPanel’s File Manager, you can make immediate changes to your website without uploading a new version of the file. cPanel has two editors that you can use to edit files directly on the webserver:

• A plain text editor for editing text files. This editor is used with plain text files, such as configuration files.
• An HTML Editor that is intended for use with HTML files. This editor provides WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) functionality. It provides many of the features that users of word processing programs are familiar with, such as spell check, formatting toolbars, etc.

Additionally, if you just want to view a file’s contents, you can do so without opening the file in an editor.

How to View a File Using cPanel’s File Manager

You may not always need to edit a file. If you just want to take a quick look at a file’s contents, you can view it without opening an editor.

To view a file in File Manager, follow these steps:

1. Log in to cPanel.
2. In the FILES section of the cPanel home screen, click File Manager: 
3. In the File Manager main window, select the file that you want to view.
4. Click the View icon:

   

    

   The file’s contents appear on a new page.

How to Edit a File Using the Plain Text Editor in File Manager

To edit a plain text file, follow these steps:

1. Log in to cPanel.
2. In the FILES section of the cPanel home screen, click File Manager: 
3. In the File Manager main window, select the file that you want to edit.
4. Click the Edit icon:
   

    

5. Select the character set encoding that the file uses. The default is utf-8 (Unicode).
   Make sure that you select the correct character encoding for the file. Otherwise, the file may become corrupted.
6. Click Edit. The file’s contents appear in a new page, ready for editing.
7. To save your changes, click Save Changes.
   If you do not want to save your changes, just close the page.
8. To close the editor, click Close.

That’s it! Now you know how to view or edit a file in cPanel using the File Manager’s plain text editor.

In this KB article we’re going to talk about Web Disks, which is cPanels implementation of the WebDAV protocol. Using a Web Disk, cPanel users can manage and edit files stored on the server using compatible applications on Mac and Windows devices, as well as some mobile devices.

What is WebDAV and What are Web Disks?

WebDAV, or Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning, is an extension of the HTTP protocol that allows clients (which are browsers or other applications requesting the content, not people) to perform remote Web content authoring. The protocol provides a framework for users to create, change, and move documents on a server using a supported application. The most important feature about WebDAV perhaps is it includes the maintenance of properties about an author or modification date, namespace management, collections, and overwrite protection.

In essence, WebDAV allows a web server to act as a file server, enabling authors to collaborate on content. This could be compared to an early version of Google Docs, but if you were all editing code at the same time in different places of the file, rather than a Document, Presentation, or Spreadsheet.

The WebDAV protocol is also the foundation for other protocols, including CalDAV and CarDAV. CalDAV enables a client to access calendar and scheduling information on a remote server, while CardDAV is an address book protocol that allows users to access and share contact data on a remote server.

While you could compare WebDAV to something like GIT or SNV, it’s important to note that WebDAV’s versioning capabilities are not as robust as those available in Git. If you are looking for a modern code version control system, you should check out cPanel’s Git integration instead.

Web Disk is cPanel & WHM’s implementation of the WebDAV protocol. cPanel automatically creates a Web Disk account for users to manage files in their home directory remotely. It provides tools for configuring Web Disk accounts and users can create additional accounts as needed to share directories within their home folder.

WebDAV vs. FTP vs. SMB

While WebDAV is similar to other remote file management protocols, WebDAV has strengths that make it better suited to a very particular set of use cases. Let’s examine WebDAV as it compares to FTP and SMB:

• FTP is an ancient file transfer protocol. FTP has no native support for encryption, therefore authentication details and data being transferred are visible to anyone monitoring or snooping on the connection.
• SMB (Samba) is useful for sharing files on local networks, but it’s not advisable to use it over the public internet due to major security and performance concerns unless you are using a VPN.
• SFTP (Secure File Transfer Protocol) is much more secure than the older and unrelated FTP but it’s not great or ideal for collaborative workflows.

By comparison, Web Disks use HTTPS to provide secure, encrypted file transfers and because it’s designed for collaborative editing, it features file locking so users sharing the file can’t make simultaneous conflicting edits to the file, avoiding any problems down the line with publishing.

Common Use Cases for WebDAV Include:

• Managing and editing web server files on a local computer.
• Collaborating with developers, designers, and content writers working on a site.
• File-sharing within an organization.
• Network-attached storage accessed via local machines or other servers.

How To Configure WebDAV on cPanel

All cPanel accounts have a Web Disk account based on their home directory, assuming the server administrator has enabled Web Disks in the WHM Feature Manager.

You won’t have to configure the login information for the default account since it uses your cPanel username and password for authentication. This means you can use this login information with any WebDAV app of your choosing, such as:

• Cyberduck
• GVfs
• GNOME Files
• SmartFTP
• WebDrive
• WinSCP
  • And for mobile, Documents for iOS and WebDAV Navigator for Android.

cPanel also includes Client Configuration Instructions for the native WebDAV integration available in macOS, Windows, Linux & BSD OS’, and Mobile OS such as iOS and Android.

Accessing the cPanel Client Configuration Instructions

Step 1: Log in to your cPanel. Once logged in, look under the Files section for Web Disk.

Step 2: Click “Configure Client Access” beneath the Main Web Disk Account section.

Step 3: Locate the Operating System are using and click the drop-down beneath the logo to choose a Version and download the Configuration Instructions.

These configuration scripts will configure the system’s file browser after which you will be able to view and edit files on the remote server, depending on your user permissions, as if the files were stored locally.

Sharing a Specific Directory With Another User

Sometimes you may need to grant another user, a developer, for example, access to a specific directory. You can use the instructions below to do this.

Step 1: Login to your cPanel. Once logged in, look under the Files section for Web Disk.

Step 2: On the Create an Additional Web Disk Account, you have several options. Let’s review them.

• Username will be the username of the user to whom you’re granting access.
• Domain will be the domain to which the user will belong.
• Password will be the security credential the user will use to login.
• You can use the Password Generator to create a secure password.
• Directory will contain the path to the new users directory. You can specify a custom directory here, as well.
  • Please note: it is not advised to place the new users directory inside of your public_html folder as this will make the contents of this users directory public.
  • If you wish for them to be able to access your entire home folder, you can specify this as well by entering / in the directory field.
• Permissions will give this user either read and write permissions or read only permissions.
• Enable Digest Authentication typically isn’t required, however if the server you are on does not have a SSL Certificate signed by a recognized certificate authority, you will need to enable this feature.

Use the blue Create button to add the new user.

After clicking Create, cPanel will create the Web Disk and the user and they will be able to access files using their remote WebDAV app of choice.

Deleting Additional Web Disk Users

If you have given a new user access and they have completed their task and no longer need access, you can (and should) remove their access to your account.

Step 1: Login to your cPanel. Once logged in, look under the Files section for Web Disk.

Step 2: Scroll down to the Manage Additional Web Disk Accounts.

Click Delete to delete the user and web disk account.

cPanel will ask you to confirm the action, just click Delete Web Disk Account and the user will be removed!

And that’s it!

What is an “inode”?

In simple words, each inode usually equals one file, folder, email, or Unix object in a file system. The number of inodes on your account equals the number of files and folders you have on it.

We have a set inodes limit for our shared hosting services to maintain the best performance for our file system. The limits are the following:

Shared Hosting and WordPress Hosting plans:

1. Starter  – maximum 250,000 inodes
2. Pro  – maximum 350,000 inodes
3. Turbo – maximum 500,000 inodes

Are you running on a Turbo plan and requiring more inodes? We’ve got you covered!

Our disk space add-on allows you to quickly increase your Turbo hosting plan’s storage space by an additional 20 GB. Bonus: you’ll receive 200 000 additional inodes.

Reseller Hosting plans:

1. Kickstart – maximum 250,000 inodes
2. Grow –  maximum 250,000 inodes
3. Expand – maximum 250,000 inodes
4. Established – maximum 250,000 inodes

Your website or email service will be affected if the above limits are reached. Your site will display a 503 error, and the emails might not be delivered and sent. New files might not be uploaded.

How to check the number of inodes in cPanel

You can check the number of inodes in cPanel in the following ways:

If you are a ChemiCloud customer, our custom Inode Usage plugin has you covered. If you are not a ChemiCloud customer, please scroll down the page to find an alternative solution.

ChemiCloud customers:

1) Log into cPanel

2)  To see the general Inodes Usage, move to the Statistics section on your right-hand side:

3) If you wish to see detailed statistics, navigate to the Files area and click on Inode Usage.

The Inode Usage tool provides an overview of inode consumption in your account. It displays total inodes used, breaks down usage by directory, and allows you to expand directories for detailed inode counts.

Additionally, on this page you can see your cPanel account inode limit and directly access File Manager for quick navigation, helping you manage your quota effectively.

Non-ChemiCloud customers:

1) Log into cPanel

2)  To see the general Inodes Usage, move to the Statistics section on your right-hand side:

3) If you wish to see detailed statistics, navigate to the Advanced area and click on Terminal.

This interface provides command-line access to your account on the server. The terminal will default log you inside your account’s home directory (above public_html).

4) To get a list of the inodes usage for every directory in the directory you are currently in, execute the following command:

 echo "Detailed Inodes usage for: $(pwd)" ; for d in `find -maxdepth 1 -type d |cut -d\/ -f2 |grep -xv . |sort`; do c=$(find $d |wc -l) ; printf "$c\t\t- $d\n" ; done ; printf "Total: \t\t$(find $(pwd) | wc -l)\n"

This command will display the number of inodes in the left column and the corresponding folder on the right, as in the example below:

Detailed Inodes usage for: /home/cchostingdemos
12401 - public_html
6 - blestadata
12 - blestadatafasdad
623 - .cache

As per the example above, the highest number of inodes comes from the public_html directory.

To browse to the public_html directory from your terminal, execute the following command:

 cd public_html 

The next step is to execute the command again from Step 4). 

How to reduce the inodes usage

1) Delete Unnecessary Files And Folders

Based on your inodes usage audit, consider removing unnecessary files and folders. For example, if a specific file or folder stores old backups or is created for testing or staging purposes, you may remove it or download it locally via FTP.

2) Clear Old And Spam Emails

If the inodes usage is related to the mail folder, you have a high number of emails. So, in this case, removing old emails will help decrease the inodes usage. If you are using cPanel as the control panel, you can take advantage of the Email Disk Usage feature, which will help remove emails based on specific criteria. If you prefer to do it manually, you can do so from your Webmail or preferred mail client.

3) Clear The  Cache Files

Major CMS, such as WordPress, Joomla, etc., use a caching system that may create cache files. So it’s recommended to keep an eye on the cache folders and to clear/purge the cache from time to time.

Conclusion

That’s it; now you know how to check the number of inodes in cPanel and get a detailed report on the usage. Based on this, you can take the necessary measures and reduce the number of inodes.

If removing files from your account is not an option, you can upgrade your plan to a higher one with higher inode limits or consider purchasing a VPS Hosting service where we don’t count the number of inodes.

However, in the course of development work, you may encounter a situation in which you must temporarily disable ModSecurity, like a false mod_security rule triggered.

How to Disable ModSecurity in cPanel

1. Log into cPanel
2. Scroll down to Security and choose ModSecurity
   

   

3. Choose the domain you are developing with and change its status to OFF.

That’s it; you know now how to disable ModSecurity in cPanel.

In this article, we will show you how to check an account’s disk usage in cPanel.

The Disk Usage feature offers a quantitative overview of the disk space being occupied by each directory within your domain. This can help you manage your available space, perform clean-ups or request more disk quota if needed.

How to Check Account Disk Usage in cPanel

1. Login to your cPanel account.

2. From the Files section, click on Disk Usage.

From this page, you can monitor the space used by each directory from your domain’s root folder, hidden subdirectories, mailing lists etc. If you click on any of the available folder names, you will be redirected to the File Manager. There you can see in more detail what files are contained by each individual folder. If necessary, you can delete some unnecessary files to free up some space.

If you need more clarifications with regards of the individual directories and other info, feel free to get in touch with our Support department. We’d be glad to help!

]]> https://chemicloud.com/kb/article/check-disk-usage-in-cpanel/feed/ 0 https://chemicloud.com/kb/article/how-to-disable-directory-browsing/ https://chemicloud.com/kb/article/how-to-disable-directory-browsing/#respond Wed, 04 Jul 2018 17:50:19 +0000 https://chemicloud.com/kb/?post_type=article&p=1157 This is useful if you have a big list of files in a directory with no index file and you don’t want visitors to be able to browse through all of those.

How to Disable Directory Browsing

Just add the following line in the site’s .htaccess file located in the root directory of your website.

Options -Indexes

If you are a ChemiCloud customer, we have you covered. By default, the directory listing is disabled on our servers.

You can set a command or script to run at a specific time every day, week, etc.

How to Setup and Manage Cron Jobs in cPanel

1) Log into cPanel, scroll down to the Advanced section, then click the Cron Jobs icon

2) You can have cron(s) send an email every time it runs a command which produces output.

3) You must define exactly when and how often you want the cron job to run. This is made easier by using one of the pre-defined or common settings

This also helps you understand what each field means. For this example, we’ll choose the cron to run Once per day. 

4) Next, enter the command of the script you want to run, including the path. You can find the most common binary paths here.

Remember to add a space between the binary and the path. In the example below, note the space between ‘php’ and ‘/home’.

/usr/bin/php /home/username/script.php

If you want to stop cron jobs email notifications, add the following code at the end of your cron job:

/dev/null 2>&1

5) When you’re done, click Add New Cron Job button.

That’s it! The cron job has been added with success. You can either create additional cron jobs, and edit or delete existing ones, under the Current Cron Jobs area.

How to Log in to cPanel From Your Client Area

This option will allow you to access your cPanel directly from your client area.

To access your cPanel account from your Client Area, please follow the steps below:

1. Go to chemicloud.com/login and log in to your account.

2. While in your Client Area Dashboard > Active Services, click the cP button on the right side, and you’ll automatically be logged in without needing a username and password.

That’s it! This action will log you in cPanel automatically.

How to Log in to cPanel Using Your Domain Name

This option will allow you to access your cPanel directly from your web browser by using a username and password.

If you are an existing ChemiCloud customer and have your domain DNS pointing to our servers, you can access the cPanel via your domain name.

1. Navigate to the following location in your browser: http://yourdomain.com/cpanel

Your login screen should look like this:

2. Enter your cPanel username in the Username text box. Then enter your password in the Password text box.

3. Click Log in.

How to Log in to cPanel Using Your Server’s IP Address

If you do not yet have your domain DNS pointing to our servers, you can still access the cPanel or WHM  using the IP address in your welcome email.

• http://YOUR.SERVER.IP/cpanel

If you cannot locate your server IP and do not have access to the welcome letter sent to you upon signup.

If you cannot locate your IP address, reach out to our chat support, and they will be happy to provide you with that information!

Once navigated to the cPanel page, you should now be able to log in!

Troubleshooting cPanel access issues

• Your login user or password doesn’t work.

Solution: contact our Support team to reset your cPanel account password.

• I get a 404 error or blank page when I type: http://www.mydomain.com/cpanel

This may happen if you change your DNS Name Servers and wait a few hours until your domain fully propagates worldwide.

You can also try to log in using the server IP, as you see below:

http://YOUR.SERVER.IP/cpanel

• The Login Page Fails to Load

There are two possible causes for this:

1. Your local office or network administrator may be blocking port 2082 or 2083: You will need to troubleshoot your network connection to allow this port or point your domain to our server and connect using http://cpanel.yourdomain.com, which works over port 80.
2. You may be being blocked by our firewall: This generally occurs when many failed login attempts occur in a row. If you were accessing the panel and are no longer able to do, this is the likely reason.