Getting Started with cPanel

Knowledgebase Article

Getting Started with cPanel

What is cPanel?

cPanel is a simple graphical dashboard, which allows you to manage every aspect of your web hosting account.

This includes your files, databases, E-Mails, security settings, and web applications.

How to login to cPanel?

You should find the login link, username and password for your control panel in the welcome email that we sent you when you opened your account.

Typically that would be by using: http://www.your-domain.com/cpanel

The cPanel login page should looks like this:

You could also login directly though your MyKualo client area. Go to My Services >> View Details >> Login to cPanel

The cPanel Interface

Once you have logged in, you should see a screen similar to the one below:

The cPanel interface exists in four sections:

1 - Navigation bar:

* The navigation bar provides the currently-active account information and provides controls that allow you to change settings and log out of your account.

* Use the Search Features text box to quickly find the interfaces that you need.

* Click your username to manage your preferences - Password, Language, Contact Information.

* Click the notification icon () to see any messages, warnings, and errors on your cPanel account.

2 - Shortcuts:

Here you will find shortcuts to several commonly used cPanel functions, as well as direct links to your MyKualo client area and our Knowledgebase.

3 - Find function:

The Find function allows you to easily filter through the features and quickly select the one you need.

4 - Features list:

The cPanel interface displays the list of all of your account's available features in groups for different types of functionality.

At the top of this list, you can use the Find functions quickly by typing here... text box to search for the desired feature.

How does my web site work?

Your web site consists of a group of files and directories, similar to the Documents folder on your home computer. To understand how directories and files function, consider the File Manager.

Contents of the “/home/johndoe” directory.

In the example above, there are three main directories:

/home/johndoe/ - This is your home directory. This directory contains all of your files. Files that you place in this directory will not be visible on the internet. When you view your files with FTP, Web Disk, or the File Manager, you will begin in this directory.

/home/johndoe/public_ftp/ - This is the directory used for anonymous FTP access. Anyone can download the files in this directory if FTP access is enabled.

/home/johndoe/public_html/ - The public_html directory contains the files for your site. Files in public_html and any subdirectories of public_html will be viewable by anyone on the internet. “/home/johndoe/www/” is the same directory as “/home/johndoe/public_html/”.

WARNING: When adding files to your site, it is important that you add them in the right place. For example, you will need to place files you wish to be visible on the Internet within public_html or a subdirectory of public_html. If you placed them in “/home/johndoe/” for example, no one will be able to view them.

Add Files to Your Site

To allow visitors to access your site, you must add files to it. You can add files with the File Manager, Web Disk feature or by FTP.

The File Manager

The File Manager allows you to upload, view, modify, and delete your web site’s files.

You can access this feature from the Home interface when you click on the icon or typing File Manager at the Find function:

In the File Manager, click on to upload files to your site.

Web Disk

If you need to move a large number of files at one time or if you often make changes to your site, you can set up a Web Disk account to easily access your site.

Web Disk allows you to manage, upload, and download your web site’s files as though they were local to your personal computer.

FTP Accounts

FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. It allows you to upload files to your site. To do this, you must create an FTP account in the FTP Accounts interface. Then, to connect to the account, download an FTP client that works with your operating system.

There are a number of different FTP programs available, check out this article for full details.

E-Mail Accounts

E-Mail accounts will allow you to receive email messages from customers or other visitors to your web site.

The Mail section functions will allow you to do different tasks related to your email accounts.

This includes creating and removing email accounts, forwarding email, etc.

Email Accounts: Allows you to manage the email accounts that are associated with your domain. Create, delete, change password and quota.

Forwarders: Allow you to send a copy of all mail from one email address to another. For example, if you have two different email accounts, user@example.com and user1@example1.com, you could forward example.com to example1.com so that you do not need to check both accounts. NOTE: The original address will still receive the forwarded mail.

MX Entry: Allows you to change the MX records for your domain and define on which server to deliver the messages.

Autoresponders: Automatically send a message back to anyone who sends an email to a specified account. Possible scenarios in which you may use autoresponders include when you are on vacation, unavailable, or if you have a generic message that you wish to send from a support email address.

Default Address: The default email address receives any mail that is sent to an invalid email address for your domain or returns an error to the sender stating that such email address does not exist.

Mailing Lists: Mailing lists allow you to use a single address to send email, newsletters, and other updates to multiple email addresses.

Track Delivery: This interface displays reports about email message delivery attempts from your account and allows you to trace message delivery routes. You can also use this feature to trace an message's delivery route, which can help you to identify message delivery issues.

Global Email Filters: Manage and test filters for your main account.

Email Filters: Manage filters for each user. Each user filter is processed after the main account filters.

Authentication: Email authentication helps prevent spam. It allows you to enable SPF and DKIM to include additional details in the message headers to prevent spam also stop spammers who forge messages that claim to be from your domain(s).

Address Importer: Allows you to import E-Mail addresses or forwarders from comma-separated values sheet files (.csv) or Excel spreadsheet files (.xls).

Encryption: Allows you to encrypt messages in cPanel. GnuPG keys use the public key approach for encryption. Servers that use GnuPG keys encrypt outbound messages with a public key. Only the intended recipient, who has the private key, can decrypt the message.

Remote MX Wizard: Allows you to configure the MX records and other services of your mail provider in few clicks. You can easily enable Google Apps for your domain using the wizard.

Professional Spam Filter: Allows you access to the SpamExperts enterprise grade spam filtration solution.

Learn more:

How to create an email account in cPanel

How to setup email forwarding in cPanel

How to use webmail from within cPanel

How to configure your email client on Windows, Mac, iPhone, iPad and more

How to install a script using Softaculous

How to use the SpamExperts Spam Filter

Managing Domain Names

The DOMAINS section of your cPanel is where you need to add a domain name you have purchased, manage subdomains, Aliases (Parked domain names), redirect a domain name to another web site or manage the DNS zone records for the already hosted domains.

Addon Domains: An addon domain is a fully functional domain that can be created from within your cPanel control panel if your web hosting plan allows it.

Subdomains: A subdomain is a subsection of your web site that can exist as a new web site without a new domain name. Use subdomains to create memorable URLs for different content areas of your site. For example, you can create a subdomain for your blog that is accessible through blog.example.com and www.example.com/blog

Aliases: Domain aliases make your website available from another domain name. For example, you can make www.example.net and www.example.org show content from www.example.com. For more information, read the documentation.

Redirects: A redirect allows you to make one domain redirect to another domain, either for a website or a specific web page. For example, create a redirect so that www.example.com automatically redirects users to www.example.net

Simple Zone Editor: DNS converts domain names into computer-readable IP addresses. DNS zone files configure domain names to the correct IP addresses. This feature allows you to create and edit these zone files.

Advanced Zone Editor: Create and edit zone records to control how DNS functions. For example, if you want a subdomain to point to another domain, add a new CNAME record.

Using the App Installer

Softaculous is an "auto installer" application which allows the installation of more than 370 great scripts such as WordPress, Joomla, Magento, Drupal and etc. and 1115 PHP Classes by the click of a button.

It comes for free with every web hosting plan.

To access Softaculous, you need to login to cPanel, locate the SOFTWARE section and click “Softaculous Apps Installer”:

For more information, read the Softaculous Getting Started article.

You are good to go!

This is the end of the tutorial.

You now know how to get going with some of the most important functions in cPanel.

If you have any questions or need help with more advanced features, be sure to check out our knowledgebase, or do not hesitate to open a ticket via your MyKualo client portal.