Helm is a
'control panel' that greatly simplifies the management of Internet Information Services (IIS).
In short yes. You must use Helm to at least create any domains. Once created You can enable stats and create FTP and mail users from within Helm. If you have manually created a domain using IIS manager, you will be unable to install stats or create any FTP users therefore it is essential that you create any domains (web sites) using Helm.
We recommend that you use the helm control panel to do as many tasks as possible. This helps to ensure consistency, improves security and reduces the chance of human error. However, some advanced tasks are not possible via Helm, these include setting NTFS permissions and creating virtual directories outside the root of the Web site, therefore in these instances using the IIS manager is recommended.
The free domain can be used in a number of useful ways. For example a company called Zen Cars would receive a domain something like zencarw01.hosting.zen.co.uk with their managed server. The domain has a wild card record already specified so requests for anything in this domain will be resolved to their server. So 'rdp.zencarw01.hosting.zen.co.uk', 'dev.zencarw01.hosting.zen.co.uk', 'south.zencarw01.hosting.zen.co.uk' would all resolve to the primary address of the server. Not only does this provide you with an easy to remember name to connect to your server but means you can also use variations on the above as host headers for domains on your server.
See what is the best practice for naming domains in helm
See I have a Web site I wish to move to my server but don't want any down time!.
Zen hosting recommends that you create domains in helm using the domain name that they will be publicly addressable by. In the above example you would use www.zencars.co.uk . This sets up the domain on the server and puts in place all the necessary host headers.
The simplest method is to login to Helm using your reseller user. From the main screen select reports from here there are a number of standard reports that are available for use including 'customer bandwidth usage' .
In this instance Zen Hosting recommends creating your domain again using the same publicly addressable name e.g. www.zencars.co.uk . Then, using your free domain, setup a domain alias (host header) for the site. E.g. new-site.zencarw01.hosting.zen.co.uk . You can now test the site using the host header you specified to connect to the web site . Once you are happy that the site is working simply change the
'A' record for www.zencars.co.uk to point to your new servers IP address. After a few days all traffic should be directed to your new server / site. Once this has been confirmed you can close your old site down.
Zen Hosting strongly advises that all frontage installs are initiated through the Helm control panel. The FrontPage extensions option can be found under the domain menu for your domain. To install FP just click install, then note down the username and change the password to something familiar. Please note that the username created by Helm will only allow you to publish to the web site and not administer the site in anyway.
To configure FrontPage server extensions on virtual directories you will first of all need to connect to the FrontPage administration site. http://{servername}:8899/fpadmin.dll?page=fpadmin.htm replacing the servername with the actual name of the server. The username for the main administration site and your domain administration site is 'FrontpageAdmin', the password will be in your information pack.
The current design doesn't allow executables to run, you will need to notify Zen Hosting of the relative path to the executable so an exception can be added. Once done, simply schedule the task in the normal way.
It is possible to secure folders using both Helm and Windows. However, the two deployments are configured separately and are in no way connected. Helm based secure folders are a simple yet effective way of creating a secure area within a site. Simply enable the feature from within Helm and add in all the necessary users and groups. However this method has its limitations, it is not possible to specify permissions for users they either have access or they do not. If you wish to create secure folders and specify permissions for the users then Zen Hosting recommends setting NTFS permissions on the site in the normal way.
Zen's FTP server is a centralised server that handles all FTP connections for our customers. By utilizing a central FTP server the load on your server is reduced along with reducing the number of open ports or 'attack footprint'. Zen's FTP server is:
ftp.hosting.zen.co.uk Simply specify the username and password as specified in Helm.
Under the domain menu within Helm, click the statistics option and then click enable, once Livestats are enabled you can view your stats in more detail by following the link below.
We ask that you notify us of any major works that are being carried out on your server. We constantly monitor your server and should you stop a service (i.e. IIS or SQL) we will be notified and our engineers will respond immediately. In order to prevent this and the ensuing confusion simply send us an email to hosting@zen.co.uk detailing any scheduled maintenance times.
For security reasons all non-essential services are disabled (incl SMTP and Task Scheduler). If you require a service starting simply contact us and we'll enable it for you.