Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS

About Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS

Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS is a module that introduces centralized management and automated provisioning of cloud servers into your WHMCS. Our product enables your clients to order, supervise, and manage ready servers directly in your WHMCS client area.

• Admin Area Features:

✔ Create/Terminate Server

✔ Change Package

✔ Change OS

✔ Change Server Image

✔ View Server Status And Details

• Rackspace Cloud Control Center Features:

✔ Create And Configure Products/Product Groups With Auto Installer:

✔ Choose Server Images

✔ Set Pricing

✔ Overview And Assign/Reassign/Unassign Servers From Server Monitor

✔ Set Automated Servers Resize

✔ Send Email Notification Upon Server Resize

✔ Configure Client Area Features Per Server

✔ Enable Rackspace Terminate Server Hook

✔ Send Email Notification Upon Rackspace Terminate Server Hook Call

✔ Run API Connection Test

✔ Update License Key

• Client Area Features:

✔ Reboot Server - Soft/Hard

✔ Reset Root Password

✔ View Server Details

✔ Refresh Server Status

• General Info:

✔ Integrated With Advanced Billing For WHMCS - Server Resource Usage Billing (read more)

✔ Supports Next Generation Cloud Servers Based On OpenStack API

✔ Supports Bandwidth Billing Functionality

✔ Supports PHP 5.4 Up To PHP 7

✔ Supports WHMCS Templates Five and Six

✔ Supports WHMCS V6 and V7

Installation

In this short tutorial we will show you how to successfully install Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS. We will guide you step by step through the whole installation process.

Before you proceed, please make sure that you have the Rackspace Managed Cloud account and your API User account is active.

1. Log in to your client area and download the module.

2. In the downloaded file you will find two packages that support different PHP versions. As presented on the screen below, the first one is dedicated to PHP 7, while the second one is aimed at PHP 5.4 up to PHP 5.6. It does not apply to open source versions. Note: You can check current PHP version in your WHMCS. To do so proceed to 'Utilities' → 'System' → 'PHP Info'.

3. Extract the downloaded file and choose the one with the right PHP version. Upload and extract the PHP file into the main WHMCS directory. The content of PHP version files should look like this.

3. When you install Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS for the first time you have to rename 'license_RENAME.php' file. File is located in 'modules/servers/rackspaceCloud/license_RENAME.php'. Rename it from 'license_RENAME.php' to 'license.php'.

4. In order to configure your license key, you have to edit the previously renamed 'license.php' file. Enter your license key between quotation marks as presented on the following screen. You can find your license key in your client area → 'My Products'.

5. Login to your WHMCS admin area. Click 'Setup' then choose 'Addon Modules'. Next, find 'Rackspace Cloud' and press 'Activate' button.

6. Afterwards, press 'Configure' , tick 'Full Administrator' and press 'Save Changes'.

7. Go to your newly activated addon and assign privileges to your admin to access the module from 'Addons' → 'Rackspace Cloud'. Next, in configuration window you need to authenticate with Rackspace API. After you enter required data press 'Test Connection' button. If you see a green notification 'Login Successful', press 'Save'.

8. Now let's configure your Rackspace Public Cloud products in your WHMCS System. Choose 'Auto Installer' from the menu in Rackspace Cloud Control Center. Press 'Continue' and enter your products group name. Now you can set up regular backups and images. Note that the following screen does not contain all available images.

9. The last step is setting up your products. Here you can enable/disable particular servers and manage the pricing. For the purposes of presentation the '512 server' and '1GB server' have been disabled. Note: Following screen does not contain all available products.

10. After pressing 'Finish Configuration' you will see a screen as shown below. Congratulations! You have just successfully completed installation process of Rackspace Public Cloud products in your WHMCS system.

11. Now you can login to your WHMCS and check your products. Move to 'Setup' → 'Products/Services' → 'Products/Services'. You will see a following screen which means that products have been successfully set up in your WHMCS.

Good job! You have just installed and configured your Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS.

Configuration and Management

Your Rackspace public Cloud is now ready to use. read the below sections to see how you can configure and the manage your products.

Configuration of Rackspace Cloud Control Center

Configuration of this module is very simple and intuitive. 1. In Rackspace API Authentication section you need to provide your account base, username and API access key. 2. In order to enable 'Auto Confirm Resize' you will have to set up cron task to run the script. 3. You can disable specific functionality of the module like reboot or reset root password. 4. Here you can call a rackspace_terminate_server hook instead of Terminate action. Notification email will be sent to an admin.

Configuration of Rackspace Public Cloud Products

Our Auto Installer allows you to set up basic products options like names or pricing. You can configure additional options of your products in your WHMCS. We will show you configuration on the example of '256 server' but you can obviously configure any of your servers. For this purpose choose 'Setup' → 'Products/Services' → 'Products/Services' and click on the icon as shown on the screen below.

After you click the icon you will see the following screen. You can configure here everything you need. You can for example set a welcome email, configure pricing, set stock control, manage packages upgrades or enable auto termination.

Configuration of Rackspace Public Cloud Products With Auto Installer

You can easily configure your products with just a few clicks with the use of our Auto Installer. To do so click 'Auto Installer' in Rackspace Cloud Control Center and then click 'Re-Install Group'.

In a very convenient way you can change here products group name, set up both regular backups and images and manage pricing.

In the next step you can enable/disable particular products, change their names and set up pricing. Pressing framed icon on the screen below will reset pricing.

After you press 'Finish Configuration' button, you will see a following screen with confirmation about successful configuration. If you would like to create a new group, simply click 'Create New Group'.

Management of Server Monitor

Server Monitor allows you to view and assign your servers. Please keep in mind that status update in Server Monitor is not instant. Sometimes you will need to wait a moment until the necessary updates are visible.

Active accounts are being monitored thanks to configured synchronization of server in WHMCS with Rackspace. Here you can assign/reassign/unassign servers in WHMCS to the Rackspace servers. On the screen you can see active but unassigned server in WHMCS. Let's assign it to Rackspace server.

To assign server in WHMCS to Rackspace server, simply press 'Assign' button and choose your Rackspace server from the dropdown menu. 'Assign' means that WHMCS server ID field is linked correctly with Rackspace server owing to which customers have the full functionality in client area.

Management of Servers In The Client Area

You can manage your Rackspace server with ease in your client area. To do so login to your client area, then find and view details of your product. 1. You can check your server status here. 2. Immediately reboot your server from this panel. 3. By pressing 'Backups Management' you can set up your backups with just a few a clicks. 4. You can reset your root password here.

Reboot server. Reboots are divided into soft reboot and hard reboot.

Manage your backups:

Management of Billing

When you combine Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS with Advanced Billing For WHMCS, you will be able to set up additional billing options. Module allows you to charge your customers basing on the server resources used by them.

With Advanced Billing module, you can also display your customers the current server resource usage and their cost.

Tips

1. 'Backups Management' functionality is not available for Rackspace next generation servers.

2. Bandwidth Billing Functionality works the same as Disk Space and Bandwidth Overage Billing. Here you can find more information how to configure it.

3. Bandwidth Billing Functionality works with Rackspace next generation servers only.

4. Bandwidth Billing Functionality is implemented inside the Rackspace Public Cloud For WHMCS module and it doesn't have external display place in the module interface.

5. Details of the server are updated only when the page is refreshed/loaded/reloaded. This operation is complex and requires 4 queries to the server, so when you refresh or reload a page 4 queries are sent to the server.

6. BW value is displayed in order page after running cron.

7. Your customers can view their current disk space usage and bandwidth usage at their client area in 'Product Details' section. You can monitor those values in your WHMCS → 'Client Profile' → 'Product/Services' . This is how it looks like:

Common Problems

1. When you have problems with connection, check whether your SELinux or firewall does not block ports.

2. If, after installation, you get an ionCube encoder problem (wrong version), please open a support ticket. We will provide you with a different version of the module encrypted with the older version of ionCube.

3. The current version of our module allows to download servers only from Chicago (ORD location). It is not supported for other locations.

4. If changes made in 'Groups/Products' list in 'Auto Installer' section of addon do not save properly for all items, especially these at the end of the list, open php.ini file located in your apache2 directory and change the max_input_vars from default value to 5000 or more. For instance: max_input_vars = 5000;