Prepairing for hosting

[ovis]

Hello,

I can find enough documentation about a situation i am in:

I want to install the ISP-Config system on a server at home and then when i am ready, go to the big serverfarm and put my nice and newly setup 1U server in the rack.

Wat do i need to chance there?

All the certificates , SSL, POP, IMAP,
The hostname + ip adresses.
Wich configuration files
Mysql things ?

Is there documentation out there that describes this situation?

I think its a common situation that you configure your server at home or in your office, Than go to your colocation and leave youre server there.

So the question is what to change if i move the server to an other place.
Maybe there are things to be changed in the mysql database things i didnt think of.

A step by step route to take.
Maybe someone else allready took this route before, ill be glad to hear.

Thanks in advance

Ovis

[hairydog2]

I would set it up with the correct hostname and certificates when it is at home. I would also make sure it uses its final destination IP address as a temporary measure when it is at home.

Though I don't see much point in setting it up at home first. I've never seen any of our servers - or even been within a hundred miles of them!

[ovis]

I would set it up with the correct hostname and certificates when it is at home. I would also make sure it uses its final destination IP address as a temporary measure when it is at home.

Though I don't see much point in setting it up at home first. I've never seen any of our servers - or even been within a hundred miles of them!

Thanks for the quick reply.

Maybe becouce we build the 1U ourself and have to manually install it in the rack of our provider, we install it at home first. The only thing i know is that
the Common Name of a certificate should be the FQDN and maybe it stalles when booting from an other IP.

This probably makes good material for an FAQ, hopefully there more people with this exeperience,

Gr Ovis

[falko]

You must change the IP address (don't know which distribution you use otherwise I could tell you which file to edit), then have a look at your Apache configuration and at /root/ispconfig/httpd/conf/httpd.conf and replace the IP address if it is in there, also in /etc/postfix/main.cf, then in /etc/proftpd.conf and its included files (some of them have an IP address in their name so you must change the file name, too), and then in the ISPConfig web interface (under Management -> Server -> Settings). You can then check the ISPConfig MySQL database if the old IP address is still in there and replace it, if necessary.

[ovis]

You must change the IP address (don't know which distribution you use otherwise I could tell you which file to edit), then have a look at your Apache configuration and at /root/ispconfig/httpd/conf/httpd.conf and replace the IP address if it is in there, also in /etc/postfix/main.cf, then in /etc/proftpd.conf and its included files (some of them have an IP address in their name so you must change the file name, too), and then in the ISPConfig web interface (under Management -> Server -> Settings). You can then check the ISPConfig MySQL database if the old IP address is still in there and replace it, if necessary.

I made an inventory of the files on the harddisk that contains the ip address
of the installation location. I learned that thats the only thing that differ.

/etc/network/interfaces
/etc/hosts
/etc/apache2/vhosts/Vhosts_ispconfig.conf
/etc/proftpd_ispconfig.conf

And now the question : How will named react to a sudden change of IP ?

/var/lib/named/etc/bind/*
/etc/bind/*

Does this happen automagicly

Or do i need to do some CLI magic first ?

[falko]

And now the question : How will named react to a sudden change of IP ?

/var/lib/named/etc/bind/*
/etc/bind/*

Does this happen automagicly

Or do i need to do some CLI magic first ?
If named has zones with the old IP address, then you must change the IP address there, too, otherwise your domains will point to the old IP address.

[hairydog2]

You must change the IP address (don't know which distribution you use otherwise I could tell you which file to edit), then have a look at your Apache configuration and at /root/ispconfig/httpd/conf/httpd.conf and replace the IP address if it is in there, also in /etc/postfix/main.cf, then in /etc/proftpd.conf and its included files (some of them have an IP address in their name so you must change the file name, too), and then in the ISPConfig web interface (under Management -> Server -> Settings). You can then check the ISPConfig MySQL database if the old IP address is still in there and replace it, if necessary.

The server I'm running ISPConfig on has moved to a different rack, and has been assigned a new range of IP addresses. For now, the old IPs are being routed to the new location, but that will have to change soon.

I have three IPs to use. I want to use one for most of the public-facing sites, one for ISPConfig admin, running on the normal https port becasue port 81 gets blocked by too many places, and the other for a public-facing site that needs its own SSL certificate.

I decided to try moving just one site to the new IP to start with. I thought that I would be able to do it this way:

1. Add the new IP addresses on ISPConfig | Management | Server/Settings | Server/IP List

2. ISPConfig | ISP Manager | <website> | Basis | IP Address | choose the relevant IP from the drop-down list.

3. ISPConfig | DNS Manager | <domain name> | Domain | new.ip.address

4. ISPConfig | DNS Manager | <domain name> | Records | IP-adresse | new.ip.address

But I've done all that, and it doesn't work. The connection times out.

What should I be doing?

[till]

1. Add the new IP addresses on ISPConfig | Management | Server/Settings | Server/IP List

2. ISPConfig | ISP Manager | <website> | Basis | IP Address | choose the relevant IP from the drop-down list.

3. ISPConfig | DNS Manager | <domain name> | Domain | new.ip.address

4. ISPConfig | DNS Manager | <domain name> | Records | IP-adresse | new.ip.address

But I've done all that, and it doesn't work. The connection times out.

What should I be doing?

Thats all correct. Be aware that it may take up to 48 hours until your changes in the DNS settings are propagated.

[edge]

What I normally do is get the server as far ready as needed (just before installing ISPconfig), and put the server in the datacenter.

Then when I get home I login (SSH), and install the rest (ISPconfig).

When doing it this way, make sure you run "screen" in SSH, cause when the SSH connection breaks, you can still get back in the 1st install.

Have fun!

[hairydog2]

Thats all correct. Be aware that it may take up to 48 hours until your changes in the DNS settings are propagated.

The problem is that I've waited more than 48 hours already, and pinging the name goes for the right IP, but fails as well. I wonder if there is a problem with routing that IP to the machine.

[falko]

Then there seems to be a problem with your IPs, with the routing, firewalls, etc...

[hairydog2]

Yes, I've discovered that I'd forgotten to update /etc/network/interfaces What will I need to restart after changing that?

[till]

You must restart the networking.

On Debian it is:

/etc/init.d/networking restart

[3DPeruna]

I've recently changed the IP address, in all the suggested places I hope, on my ISPConfig server. However, a very odd thing is happening. Some of the IP in the /etc/apache2/vhosts/Vhost_ispconfig.conf file revert back to the old file. I'll change them, modify seemingly unrelated items in the ISPConfig admin and the Vhost file is back where it was, but for only some of the IP addresses.

Thoughts?

[till]

Please open the configuration of these sites in ISPConfig and click on the save button.

[patrick3853]

I recently changed the IP addresses of a server running ISPConfig 2 and stumbled upon this thread. Since the server was hosting many sites, I was looking for a more effecient way to update the IP for all the sites in ISPConfig. Thought I would share my solution in case anyone else has this issue.

Please note: this worked for me on ISPConfig 2 running on Ubuntu 8.10. Location of config files my be different depending on your system.

After you change the IP on the system, log into ISPConfig and replace the IP address under Management > Server > Settings. Then replace the IP address in config files:

xxx.xxx.x.xx represents new IP
yyy.yyy.y.yy represents old IP

Bind9
perl -pi -e 's/yyy\.yyy\.y\.yy/xxx.xxx.x.xx/g' /var/lib/named/etc/bind/*

Apache
perl -pi -e 's/yyy\.yyy\.y\.yy/xxx.xxx.x.xx/g' /etc/apache2/vhosts/*

Now, log into MySQL, use the ispconfig database, and run the following queries to update the IP in ISPConfig:

DNS Manager
UPDATE dns_a SET ip_adresse = 'xxx.xxx.x.xx';
UPDATE dns_isp_dns SET dns_soa_ip = 'xxx.xxx.x.xx';

ISP Manager
UPDATE isp_isp_web SET web_ip = 'xxx.xxx.x.xx';
UPDATE isp_isp_domain SET domain_ip = 'xxx.xxx.x.xx';

Of course, you will need to restart apache and bind. Now all sites should load and when you log into ISPConfig you will see the new IP for each site and all your DNS records. Go to one of your sites under ISP Manager, make a minor change and hit save so that ISPConfig rewrites the config files. Then verify that ISPConfig is using the new IP and you're good to go.

[Grey]

I did the perl ones, too. But if you do that while transferring to another rack, datacenter or even another machine, you can ease up the DB bit.

I just dumped the db_ispconfig db with all necessary parameters (encoding etc.), did the perl one-liner again (on the sql file) and just reinserted it. It' fast and you even have a backup consisting the new IPs in it. :)