Knowledge base

This guide explains how to access phpMyAdmin with a Web Hosting.

Access phpMyAdmin

In order to access web hosting in the Databases section:

1. Log in to the Infomaniak Manager (manager.infomaniak.com) using a web browser such as Brave or Firefox
2. Click on the icon in the top right corner of the interface (or navigate through the left sidebar menu, for example)
3. Select Hosting (Web & Domain universe)
4. Click on the name of the relevant object in the displayed table
5. Click on Databases in the left sidebar menu
6. Click on the Users tab
7. Click on the ⋮ action menu to the right of the user concerned in the displayed table
8. Click on Log in to phpMyAdmin (password required)

On the phpMyAdmin login page:

• The correct server and user are automatically filled in
• The password to enter is the one associated with the database user (the one you chose when creating the MySQL user to be reset if forgotten)

This guide explains how to manage Memcached and particularly how to determine if this memory caching system is functioning correctly on your hosting.

Prerequisites 

• install Memcached on Managed Cloud Server

Check Memcached Execution

To verify Memcached is running correctly:

1. Copy the following code into a PHP file:
   // connect to the local memcache server
   $fp = fsockopen("localhost", 11211);
   if ($fp) {
   // request stats
   fwrite($fp, "stats\n");
   while (!feof($fp)) {
   $buf = rtrim(fgets($fp));
   if (preg_match('/^STAT curr_items ([0-9]+)$/', $buf, $matches)) {
   // number of stored items
   print $matches[1] . PHP_EOL;
   } elseif (preg_match('/(END|ERROR)/', $buf)) {
   // end of stats
   break;
   }
   }
   fclose($fp);
   } else {
   print "Error: cannot connect to local memcached server: $!" . PHP_EOL;
   }
2. Upload the PHP file to your hosting
3. Execute the PHP file

The script will return the number of items cached in the server's memory.

Enable Memcached on a CMS

Prestashop

This guide is about IP addresses, including:

• those assigned to sites/hostings/servers, dynamic or static IPs, shared or dedicated
• those assigned by your Internet Service Provider (ISP) when establishing an Internet connection to your Infomaniak product

The benefits of a dedicated IP for a website

A dedicated or static IP address for a website is a permanent IP address specifically assigned to it. Unlike a shared IP address, which is used by multiple websites, a dedicated IP address ensures that only that platform is associated with that address. Dedicated IP addresses for websites are often used in cases where stability, customization, and security are important, such as server hosting, firewall configuration, or SSL certificate activation (although it is possible to proceed without a dedicated IP address to install an SSL certificate).

Here are the main advantages:

• configure a PTR entry or reverse DNS on dedicated IPs, useful especially for setting up a mail server as some email providers verify the PTR record before accepting emails sent from a server
• better connection stability
• reduced risk of bad reputation associated with websites sharing the same IP address
• easier configuration of certain technical aspects
• a dedicated IP can improve a website's SEO (although there are differing opinions among SEO specialists)

Add a dedicated IP to the website

To add a dedicated IP to your website, read this guide.

In case of issues if you redirect web traffic to a specific port, read this guide.

Blocking the IP address (Internet connection)

If you can no longer access:

• all your email addresses you own with Infomaniak (which usually work fine) and this with email software from the same Internet network (i.e., from the same IP address provided by your ISP)

or if you have unfortunately performed this type of operation:

• repeated unsuccessful connection attempts via FTP, SSH, or on access points such as WordPress login
• requests returning too many errors such as mass 403 errors

your access to Infomaniak servers may be blocked due to the banning of the IP address (banip / ipban) from your Internet connection.

To unblock the situation, contact Infomaniak support by email and specify the domain concerned and especially your public IP address involved.

Permanent unblocking (IP whitelist)

With a Cloud Server, you can request to permanently allow the concerned IP address so that the blocking never happens again regardless of the situation. To do this, you must:

1. have a dedicated IP associated with your Cloud Server 
2. be aware that Infomaniak will no longer block any attacks originating from this IP; attacks or malicious access attempts from this address will no longer be automatically blocked by security systems
3. confirm by email and from a contact address associated with the account (owner or administrator) that you understand and accept full responsibility in case of attack originating from this IP

This guide explains the purpose of the "MySQL Prefix" option in the settings of a website and its implications for the operation of your web applications (CMS) and PHP scripts.

Definition

When the "MySQL Prefix" option is enabled for a website, it is no longer necessary to add the "wxyz_" prefix in front of the name and users of your MySQL databases. A PHP script can connect to MySQL with the user "myuser" and a database "mydatabase," and access will automatically be done with the user "wxyz_myuser" and the database "wxyz_mydatabase."

Managing the MySQL Prefix Option

To access the management of the website:

1. Log in to the Infomaniak Manager (manager.infomaniak.com) using a web browser such as Brave or Edge
2. Click on the icon in the top right corner of the interface (or navigate through the left side menu, for example)
3. Select Website (Web & Domain universe)
4. Click on the name of the relevant object in the displayed table
5. Click on the blue button Advanced Settings
6. Click on the PHP tab
7. Enable or disable the MySQL Prefix option
8. Click on the blue button Save
9. Make the necessary adjustments in the configuration files of your web applications and PHP scripts

Implications and Adjustments to Make

After disabling the MySQL Prefix option for a website, some PHP scripts or CMS may no longer work. To restore the connection to your databases, you will need to update the following information in the configuration file(s) of the affected scripts:

• The name of the MySQL database: you will need to add the prefix of your server
  • Before: mydatabase
  • After: wxyz_mydatabase
• The user of the MySQL database: you will need to add the prefix of your server
  • Before: myuser
  • After: wxyz_myuser

This guide explains how to resolve anomalies that may occur with a Web Hosting if it has undergone changes to its IP address (such as a server relocation) and your computer still holds the old location in its DNS cache.

Clearing the DNS Cache

When you visit a website, your computer stores an association between the domain name and its IP address in the local DNS cache. This speeds up the DNS resolution process for future visits to the same site because the computer can avoid querying the DNS servers again for the IP address.

By clearing the DNS cache, you force your computer to query the DNS servers again to obtain the latest up-to-date information on the IP addresses of the sites you visit.

on Windows

1. Open the Start menu
2. Type cmd
3. In the search results, click on Command Prompt
4. Run the command ipconfig /flushdns

on macOS

1. Open the Terminal
2. Run the command lookupd -flushcache (if it fails: dscacheutil -flushcache)

on Linux

1. Open the Terminal
2. Run the command sudo systemctl restart nscd or sudo /etc/init.d/nscd restart to restart nscd

This guide is about MySQL/MariaDB, focusing on index analysis and queries with Web Hosting.

Slowlog for Long Queries

The MySQL slowlog is enabled on all MySQL servers and contains queries that take more than 5 seconds* to execute. If your queries are well-constructed, you should never see these files. Otherwise, check them regularly to identify and fix any issues to ensure your site operates correctly.

Contact Infomaniak support in writing to obtain them (except for old v1 hosting, which can be accessed directly from the FTP Manager file manager, one level above /web, in the /logs directory).

And the Logs?

No MySQL logs are created (except slow logs) because MySQL servers cannot handle the load of generating millions of simultaneous logs. If needed, Infomaniak can activate MySQL logs for 5 minutes to allow you to analyze them with EXPLAIN and determine useful indexes, for example. To do this, please contact Infomaniak support in writing.

_____

* elapsed time. Regarding locks, the documentation provides the following clarification: "The time to acquire the initial locks is not counted as execution time."

This guide helps resolve a potential 530 error by reducing the number of simultaneous FTP connections to Web Hosting.

Resolve a 530 Error

The error message 530 Sorry, the maximum number of clients (25) for this user are already connected usually appears as a result of multiple and simultaneous connections with an FTP software that handles disconnections poorly or attempts to open multiple connections at once in an attempt to speed up downloads.

Once you have received this error, you should close the FTP program and then wait for 30 minutes so that the server terminates active connections and you can reconnect.

You can also create a new FTP user and connect with it.

To avoid this situation with FileZilla, go to the Edit -> Settings menu, then under the Transfers tab, set the number of simultaneous transfers to 2.

It is recommended to use the FTP Manager file manager.

This guide explains how to change the password for an FTP or FTP/SSH account on an Infomaniak Web Hosting.

Changing the Password of an Existing User

To access Web Hosting and modify FTP access:

1. Log in to the Infomaniak Manager (manager.infomaniak.com) using a web browser like Brave or Firefox.
2. Click on the icon at the top right of the interface (or navigate using the left-hand side menu, for example).
3. Select Hosting (Web & Domain universe).
4. Click on the name of the relevant object in the displayed table.
5. Click on FTP/SSH in the left-hand side menu.
6. Click on the action menu ⋮ to the right of the relevant object in the displayed table.
7. Click on Edit
   
8. Enter the new password that will be used for FTP or SSH access directly.
9. If necessary, you can generate a strong password.
10. Confirm the changes
    

This guide explains how to remove a domain alias from a web hosting. The main domain name of the web hosting will no longer be associated with any other domain name.

This allows, in particular, the possibility of creating a new web hosting or a separate site for the domain name that has been unlinked.

Prerequisites

• have dissociated the synonymous domain name from the main domain name if there was an association previously

Remove the domain alias

In order to remove a domain alias from your site:

1. log in to the Infomaniak Manager (manager.infomaniak.com) using a web browser such as Brave or Firefox
2. click on the icon at the top right of the interface (or navigate through the left sidebar menu, for example)
3. select Hosting (Web & Domain universe)
4. click directly on the name of the relevant object in the displayed table
5. click on the relevant site (in the Sites section)
6. click on the action menu ⋮ on the right of the alias that is to become the main domain (in the Domains section)
7. choose Unlink
8. confirm the removal of the alias (without deleting the corresponding entries in the DNS zone)

This guide explains how to format and then mount the volume dedicated to storing your data on Linux/Unix Cloud VPS.

Names of Disks and Partitions

Cloud VPSs come with two volumes:

• 1 volume for the operating system of your choice
• 1 volume for storing your data

The volume for storing data must be formatted and then mounted by the client.

In Linux systems, disks and partitions are referenced by names, which vary depending on the Linux distribution, such as:

• /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, …
• /dev/vda, /dev/vdb, …
• /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2, …

These names are not static and may change depending on various factors, such as the driver used (e.g., virtio-scsi or virtio-blk) or kernel and udev updates.

Therefore, it is recommended to use the UUID (Universal Unique Identifier - read more below) of a partition rather than its name when referencing it in the filesystem configuration file (/etc/fstab).

Formatting the Storage Volume

If you choose XFS, for example, it is necessary to install the appropriate tools (if not already present):

sudo apt install xfsprogs

Then format the volume with the following SSH commands:

sudo mkfs.xfs -f /dev/[device]

And if you choose EXT4:

sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/[device]

If necessary, you can format the volume with another filesystem supported by your distribution.

Mounting the Storage Volume

Attention: if you mount your data volume in /home, you will no longer be able to connect to your server via your private key on the next reboot (because SSH will look for the keys in the .ssh folder in the home directory of the user, and if the data volume is mounted on this folder, the keys are lost). Therefore, it is necessary to copy the data to be retained beforehand. Help for SSH connection

For example, as root:

mkdir /mnt/home
mount /dev/[device] /mnt/home
rsync -rlptgoDHAX /home/ /mnt/home/
umount /mnt/home
mount /dev/[device] /home
rmdir /mnt/home

What it does in order:

• create a temporary folder
• mount the volume to the temporary folder
• copy the contents of the original /home directory to the root of the volume while preserving permissions, owner, group, etc. (note that you may need to install the rsync package depending on the chosen Linux distribution)
• unmount the volume from the temporary folder
• mount the volume to the /home directory
• remove the temporary folder

This way, you should be able to mount the volume on /home while retaining the initial configuration that will be installed. However, we always recommend setting a password for root to avoid losing control in case of error. The password can be removed later.

Alternative Solution: Do Not Mount in /home...

This is a standard location for mounting the data volume because users typically work and store their data in /home. A user without special rights will normally be limited to their /home/user directory. It is possible to specify a different default directory for a user (but the configuration will no longer be "standard").

Another Alternative Solution: Automatic Mounting of the Volume at Startup...

A mount does not survive a reboot. If you want to make the modification persistent, you can add your volume to the /etc/fstab file (Debian documentation on this subject) for example:

/dev/md0 / ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 1
UUID=181A-4B53 /boot/efi vfat errors=remount-ro,nofail 0 0
UUID=181B-AED3 /boot/efi2 vfat errors=remount-ro,nofail 0 0
UUID=[UUID1] /srv/node/sda xfs noatime,nodiratime,nofail,logbufs=8 0 0
UUID=[UUID2] /srv/node/sdb xfs noatime,nodiratime,nofail,logbufs=8 0 0

After formatting the disk, find the UUID and add it to the fstab.

Getting the UUID of a Partition

To get the UUID of a partition after formatting it, use the blkid command. This command displays the UUID as well as other information about all partitions detected by your system.

Adding the UUID to fstab

Once you have obtained the UUID of the partition you want to mount automatically at startup, you can add it to your fstab file. To do this, open the fstab file with a command line text editor (e.g., nano or vi) and add a new line for your partition using the example above as a template. Replace [device], [UUID1], and [UUID2] with the appropriate values for your configuration.