Automate setup of Virtual Hosting

Hi there:
I've been working for a web hosting company for more than 3 years, and not too long ago I realized that there must be a way of automating several redundant daily tasks that I have been doing throughout this time.

Therefore, I sat down and thought to myself, I would like to make it possible for the sales people to add new hosting clients to our server themselves. So I don't have to go in with the vi-editor and make changes to the httpd.conf file and adduser several times per day. But, since they don't know any UNIX, I would like to have them login to a secure backroom, made by php or something similar.

Once they are in the backroom, then they would have the ability to type in the new hosting clients domain name, 5 email usernames and passwords, ftp username and password, and submit it.

Then the php page would execute a bash or perl script or something else, that make proper additions to the apache's httpd.conf file, adds the ~/virtual_folder where the site is going to be located on the server, add a generic splash page, add ftp l/p, add up to 5 email l/p.

Is this something that can be made? Would somebody have any suggestions or information that could be useful?

Maybe any places on the web where I could find valuable info?

I found this article which is very helpful, but lack some other things that I would think is useful.

http://www.freebsdzine.org/attic/199903/isp.txt

For example, how would I run that script with php?

Also, a friend of mine sent me some perl scripts that could be used for this purpose, however, how would I use them with php? exec()?

Maybe this should be integrated with MySQL?

All help is greatly appreciated.

Sincerely Yours,
Ponch

Ponch,

Here is some code I put together a while back. Maybe you can get some ideas from it. If you need further explanation, let me know. This was designed for a Linux box running Apache and Bind DNS.

Bob
====

#!/usr/bin/perl
###########################################################
# Usage: newdomain.pl arg1 [arg2...]
# Arguments should be domain name plus extension as
# it will appear in DNS.
#
# Created: 05/11/01
# Updated: 05/11/01
#
# By : Bob Mullaney
###########################################################

$wwwdir = '/var/www';
$dnsdir = '/usr/local/bind/zones';
$templates = '/var/www/default';
$passwd = '/etc/passwd';
$named_conf = '/etc/named.conf';
$apache_conf = '/usr/local/apache/conf/virtual.inc';
$apache_cont = '/usr/local/apache/bin/apachectl';
$hostmaster = 'hostmaster.abc.com.';
$dnsdefault = 'dns.abc.com.';
$ipdefault = '192.168.1.100';

chomp ($DATE = `date +%D`);
$domains = 0;
foreach $arg (@ARGV) {
print "\n### Beginning Processing for $arg.\n";
$USER = $arg;
$USER =~ s/\.com//;
$USER =~ s/\.org//;
$USER =~ s/\.net//;
$length = length $USER;
if ($length > 8) {
$USER = substr($USER,0,8);
}

print "# Creating user...$USER.\n";
open (FILE, "$passwd");
@users = <FILE>;
close (FILE);
$userinc = 0;
USERCHK: foreach $exist (@users) {
chomp $exist;
my @elements = split (/:/,$exist);
$uc_element = uc($elements[0]);
$uc_user = uc($USER);
#print "Comparing $uc_element with $uc_user.\n";
if ($uc_element eq $uc_user) {
print "Username $USER already taken!...";
if ($length < 8) {
$USER = "$USER$userinc";
print "Will try username $USER\n";
}
else {
chop $USER;
$USER = "$USER$userinc";
print "Will try username $USER\n";
}
#last;
$userinc++;
redo USERCHK;
}
}
system ("/usr/sbin/useradd -c \"$arg - $DATE\" -g 80 -d /home/$USER -m -s /bin/bash $USER");

print "# Setting up files...\n";
system ("mkdir -p $wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin");
system ("mkdir -p $wwwdir/$arg/html");
system ("mkdir -p $wwwdir/$arg/logs");
system ("mkdir -p ~$USER/ftp");
system ("ln -s $wwwdir/$arg ~$USER/www");
system ("chown $USER:80 $wwwdir/$arg");
system ("chown $USER:80 $wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin");
system ("chown $USER:80 $wwwdir/$arg/html");
system ("chown $USER:80 $wwwdir/$arg/logs");
system ("chown $USER:80 ~$USER/ftp");
system ("chown $USER:80 ~$USER/www");
system ("cp $templates/cgi-bin/index.cgi $wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin/index.cgi");
system ("chmod 755 $wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin/index.cgi");
system ("cp $templates/html/template.shtml $wwwdir/$arg/html/index.shtml");

print "# Updating Web Configuration...\n";
open (FILE, ">> $apache_conf");
print FILE "\n";
print FILE "<VirtualHost *>\n";
print FILE " ServerName $arg\n";
print FILE " ServerAlias *.$arg\n";
print FILE " ServerAdmin webmaster\@$arg\n";
print FILE " DocumentRoot $wwwdir/$arg/html\n";
print FILE " ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ \"$wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin/\"\n";
print FILE " Loglevel warn\n";
print FILE " ErrorLog $wwwdir/$arg/logs/error_log\n";
print FILE " CustomLog $wwwdir/$arg/logs/access_log common\n";
print FILE " <Directory $wwwdir/$arg/html>\n";
print FILE " Options Includes\n";
print FILE " </Directory>\n";
print FILE " <Directory $wwwdir/$arg/cgi-bin>\n";
print FILE " Options ExecCGI\n";
print FILE " </Directory>\n";
print FILE "</VirtualHost>\n";
print FILE "\n";
close (FILE);

print "# Updating DNS Configuration...\n";

if (-e "$dnsdir/db.$arg") {
print "File Already Exists!\n";
}

open (FILE, ">> $named_conf");
print FILE "\n";
print FILE "zone \"$arg\" {\n";
print FILE " type master;\n";
print FILE " file \"db.$arg\";\n";
print FILE "};\n";
close (FILE);

open (FILE, "> $dnsdir/db.$arg");
print FILE "\$TTL 900\n";
print FILE "@ IN SOA $dnsdefault $hostmaster (\n";
print FILE "2000010101 ; serial date\n";
print FILE "3600 ; refresh every hour\n";
print FILE "1800 ; retry every half hour\n";
print FILE "604800 ; expire after one week\n";
print FILE "9000 ) ; minimum TTL of 12 hours\n";
print FILE "\n";
print FILE "@ IN NS $dnsdefault\n";
print FILE "\n";
print FILE "@ IN A $ipdefault ; Answers for domain.com.\n";
print FILE "* IN CNAME @ ; Answers for all names which are undefined.\n";
print FILE "\n";
close (FILE);

print "# Done...\n";
$domains++;
}

# Restart Servers
print "\nCreated $domains new domain(s).\n";
print "# Restarting Servers.\n";
system ("$apache_cont restart");
system ("kill -HUP `cat /var/run/named.pid`");

exit;