Strange webserver directory structure

The user does not have the right to create any domains at all, nor should he :)

I'm creating the user and domains from the root account at this time. (I suppose that root can do anything, right?)

[UPDATE] I just found that a subserver would be totally wrong actually, they are not supposed to manage new domains (they could add subdomains if they want, that's all). So, I need to give the same user multiple virtual servers, no subservers. I'm not sure how to do this, I guess I'll take another look tomorrow.

True that it matters only to the domain owner, but they already have to jump through too many hoops. (I'm serving the less knowledgeable end of the spectrum, so I need to make things as simple as possible for my users.)

There's a showstopper there, too: if the first domain goes away, when I delete the first virtual server, the subservers will be deleted, too. Ouch. I could work around that (simply leave the first server active but disable it, for example), but (a) that would irritate users, and (b) Virtualmin might maintain other connections between main server and subservers, now or in the future.

That all leads me to believe that subservers are just a bad idea for my use case.

How do I create a server as top-level server?

When I select an existing user and click on "Add new virtual server, owned by:", I get a subserver.

Every "For use by" checkbox in the templates is checked, still I can't choose Top Level Server.

I have "Add new Server, owned by:", the drop-down list, "Import virtual server", and "Migrate Virtual Server". When I click on "Add new Server" and have a user selected, I get the "Create Virtual Sub-Server" screen.

[UPDATE] Or is "Create new virtual server" a separate option somewhere?

> do you have the blue virtualmin framed theme selected?

That was it.

Hmm. That new top-level server needs a new user name. That's not what I need - one user may own multiple virtual servers.

So I guess for user joe I'll have to create joe.hoster.com as top-level-server that's never deleted (and never too useful), and Joe's domains will live as subservers.

This should actually work, just not the directory structure I want.

Here's what I want:

home
joe
awstats
cgi-bin
logs
mailusers
public_html
joe.hoster.com -- dummy domain
joes-family.org -- Joe's first domain
joes-company.com -- Joe's second domain


Here's what I get:

home
joe
awstats
cgi-bin
logs
mailusers
public_html
joe.hoster.com
domains
joes-family.org
awstats
cgi-bin
home
joe
domains
joes-family.org
public_html
joes-family.org
logs
mailusers
joe-inc.com
awstats
cgi-bin
home
joe
domains
joes-inc.com
public_html
joes-inc.com
logs
mailusers


The webserver thinks that the root directories are at /home/joe/domains/public_html/joes-family.org and /home/joe/domains/public_html/joes-inc.com, respectively, which don't even exist.

Now this is utterly confused.

Symlinking would also need to be done manually, and it would confuse FTP clients, or the users sitting in front of them.

Creating the top-level server does not create a domains subdirectory in /home/joe, it does create a /home/joe/public_html directory.

It also generates the DocumentRoot as /home/joe/public_html/joe.hoster.com, which does not exist as a directory.

Further, running Virtualmin's validation gives:
Home directory : Sub-directory public_html/joe.hoster.com under home directory does not exist
Apache website : Missing Apache block for HTML directory /home/joe/public_html/joe.hoster.com
The second message is probably just a symptom (and the situation is harmless anyway), the first seems to point to some misconfiguration / incomplete implementation in Virtualmin.

Is there a good way to get a listing of all configuration changes from the installation default?

that sounds like a misconfiguration or a bug which you can submit to the bugtracker.

Where is the bug tracker? It seems to be more than two clicks away from http://virtualmin.com, at least I didn't find it there.
...found it: it's under "issues" if you're logged in. (Things being hard to find - is that a recurring theme? I was having trouble with that in Webmin and Virtualmin, too.)

I'm currently reinstalling Virtualmin but I have a backup of the settings in an archive file. So I could submit a bug report, I just won't be able to follow up with new information if requested - does it make sense to submit under these circumstances?

Seeing the error, do you have subdomains enabled in the "system settings - module config - advanced options"?

Don't know, I'm currently reinstalling Virtualmin from scratch.
(I could look it up in the archived configuration, but I don't know how to map Virtualmin page elements to Virtualmin configuration file lines.)

I advice to turn that off.

Why?

I have seen the advice against it in the Virtualmin docs ("little benefit and confusing to users"), but it can be useful to put e.g. forums under forums.domain.tld.
It is confusing and without benefit if forums.domain.tld is under .../domains/domain.tld/forums/, but put the forums in a separate .../domains/forums.domain.tld/ and everything is fine for both domain owner and visitors.

Ah. I finally came around to reading Joe's explanation.
Yeah, the way cPanel handles it is confusing; however, Virtualmin is quite confusing here, too:

• Virtualmin says "sub-domain" where it means "cPanel-style sub-domain"; I understood the term to mean "DNS subdomain", which is part of what a cPanel-style sub-domain is, so the mistake wasn't even immediately obvious. (Suggestion: rename the option to "cPanel-style sub-domain", and change the explanation of the option to mention that the subdomain gets to reside in a subdirectory of the superdomain, which is a bad idea in general unless you need to accommodate cPanel migrants.)
• Virtualmin creates a "domains" directory for subservers. This is just silly - why should one server live in public_html/domain.tld, but all other servers in public_html/domains/other_domain.tld, public_html/domains/forums.domain.tld, etc?
• Virtualmin's "virtual servers" aren't virtual servers at all. Or, put another way, Virtualmin is introducing yet another meaning to the term "virtual server" above and beyond what we already have (chrooted virtual servers, VM'ed virtual servers, name-based Apache virtual servers, IP-based Apache virtual servers, DynDNS virtualization of IP address). In my eyes, Virtualmin is offering a way to manage domains and associated webspace, mail service, and FTP access - and that's exactly what our users need, who couldn't care less about what kind of server is providing these services. (Of course, I know that changing terminology now is probably infeasible, and it's really just a nit to pick. Still, I find it a bit strange that Virtualmin is promoting its terminology as being cleaner and superior to cPanel's terminology - it's just the opposite, only that Virtualmin offers better directory organization which is more important anyway.)

Aaahh... right... I correct:
The main domain should be under /home/*/domains, too.
Or maybe Virtualmin should do away with the notion of a main server, and promote all subservers to a "normal server" status.

Let me sum up my line of reasoning:

• Deleting the main server deletes all subservers.
• Users may acquire and drop domain names in any order. So the first domain name that the user acquires cannot be assigned to the main server, because as soon as the user drops that domain, all other subservers and hence domains of that user will be deleted together with the main server.
• So the main server needs to be assigned a dummy domain name that has two functions: 1) ensure that the subservers stay in existence, 2) provide default settings for subservers.
• A conceptually easier way to handle this would be to demote the main server into a list of default values, and promote the subservers to "normal server" status. The distinction between main server and subservers would go away.

So I'm wondering why Virtualmin is still having that notion of main server and subservers.

So it's /home/server.tld/public_html

Only if you make server.tld a Unix user name. Unless you really meant /home/joe/public_html/server.tld.

Also you can choose where your main server resides, I believe this is done in the module config or in the server template, change /public_html to /domains/public_html

Hm... yeah, I could do that.

It would also keep all the auxiliary directories and files (awstats, .awstats-htpasswd, cgi-bin, logs, homes, .stats-htpasswd) out of the home directory.

I still don't see how to create subservers as toplevel servers. I don't have any host files here, bind runs as a caching-only server and relies on external nameservers to resolve the locally hosted domains. (Less interference that way because we're managing DNS through an external provider.)

This is one of the strong points of virtualmin, you can set it up the way you want.

No, I can't do away with the "domains" subdirectory ;-P (I think it's hardcoded.)

The main point is that the index.php resides in public_html not /public_html/server.tld/index.php

Yep, that was clear. I was just surprised to see /home/server.tld/public_html . I have Virtualmin set up so that it takes the first part of the domain name as the default user name, and are currently settled for establishing a standard domain such as username.testdomains.hoster.tld so they have somthing to play with.

If you cannot create subservers as top-level domains, I think you have a bug or misconfiguration still. You don't have the link on top of the screen as in my image I posted above?

I have the link, but I can't create a top-level server for an existing Virtualmin user account: it's asking me to enter a new user name, or generates one from the domain name if I don't enter a name, or bails out with an error if I explicitly enter an existing user name.

As for the auxiliary files, I dont know about that as I haven't tried to switch /public_html to /domains/public_html myself

Oh, right. That would make moving the top-level server to a different directory pointless. I'll try that then.

Resolving should still work if you have an A record pointed to your server at the registrar or your dns provider.

Of course. That's the registrar, and wholly unaffected by Virtualmin; DNS is not causing any issues here. I'm trying to set up things in a way that (a) all domains of a user can be created and deleted independently (b) all domains of a user reside in the same subdirectory.