OpenVZ is the open source, and limited version of “Virtuozzo”. Virtuozzo is commercial, and like CM Pro is a PAID product with tons of extra features.
One thing I always think people should note about this forum…
@Joe who responded earlier, is a “developer” of both Virtualmin and Cloudmin. Despite not being paid for their GPL versions, the developers themselves DO actively parse and respond in this forum.
Find any other company who does the same
I dare you!
*** other companies offer support, but the developers themselves typically are not involved directly in the conversation. the fact that @Joe and the others DO involve themselves make a world of a difference. ***
I’m also surprised by your good level of support. Makes me want to use you and be loyal. The biggest downside with Webmin is the user interface, so I want to make a cPanel-style theme for Webmin and Virtualmin (and Usermin? Still learning, I’m not sure yet how to get to the user-side).
Webmin/Virtualmin would be a viable replacement for cPanel/WHM for regular users IF it had a good interface, which it presently does not. So I want to see if I can help skin an interface.
Oh, but it does. @Ilia put a lot of love over multiple years continually evolving the UI. If there’s something missing or that could use some work on, he’ll be happy to take suggestions.
I myself DO NOT work for Virtualmin, though perhaps I should… Haha
*** I do have some extra privileges given my commitment to the projects, and trust developed between the myself and the developers. So I suppose you could say I’m a bit more connected then the average user though, I’m just here to help. ***
Nah, I am an active user, with over 2 decades of tech background and have watched the Min products evolve over that time from Webmin to Cloudmin.
I’ve garnered a lot of respect from this community, and have had the opportunity to build a business from a few of it’s users over the years.
That’s awesome. What the UI needs is an easy-to-use cPanel/WHM-like interface that looks identical to the Retro theme (which I reskinned already which looks modern) for users, which is going away soon (for a HORRIBLY-designed theme cPanel is forcing named “Jupiter”, what were they thinking?!) and the now-defunct WHM theme that they just redesigned, but I have an old box still running the old version so I have the theme.
I need to make a skin so that the UI looks and works like cPanel.
And as far as I’m aware, Webmin doesn’t have a replacement for cPanel’s EasyApache 4? And Engintron also is not compatible so having NGINX in an easy-to-use way that just works is another essential.
Well, I agree cPanel has historically had some nice UI features, I wouldn’t completely change the Min products to look identical personally, cause well… Haha Min is a billion times better IMHO.
I’ve worked with nearly all the most popular panels at some point or another in one incarnation or another… Granted they all have something good about them typically, but overall… Min KICKS BUTT.
But hey, you can do some adjustments to the way the panel looks, might take some late nights and a few coffees to pull off some of it, but anything is possible. Heck, you could hack the source code if you wanna completely change things, though it’s a bit of a battlefield. Just ask @Ilia who in the early days of developing the Authentic Theme had to do a lot of “hacking” to get things working as intended…
I don’t want either-or. I use both. I use NGINX for faster serving of pages, but Engintron makes it so I don’t have to touch NGINX, I can configure everything easily in Apache, which makes managing it easier and more streamlined.
I could go on about how Apache can pretty much do most of what Nginx began it’s existence off doing better, but well… We could be at this for days, weeks, months, or years.
Anyways, back to more productive matters. I believe we’ve spent plenty of time addressing your initial question at this point, gotta make some money
If you want Virtualmin to look identical to cPanel, you’ll have to do it yourself. We are not making cPanel, nor are we making a cPanel copy. If you so strongly prefer cPanel/WHM, we would encourage you to use cPanel/WHM.
If Virtualmin’s unique features are not enough to get you to switch and your ideal control panel is cPanel/WHM, you probably shouldn’t switch.
I just want to be clear, that we’re not having the conversation of “why aren’t you like cPanel/WHM?” or “here’s what you should do to be more like cPanel/WHM”. We’ve built an alternative to cPanel/WHM that is superior in many ways. I understand that folks have preferences and what you’re used to. But, we have 25 years of development and a million or so users (of Webmin, 100k+ Virtualmin users). We’re not going to change the UI or our philosophy in fundamental ways.
If Virtualmin’s unique features are not enough to get you to switch and your ideal control panel is cPanel/WHM, you probably shouldn’t switch.
It’s not that simple. cPanel jacked up their prices and keeps raising them, it is outrageously priced now. And most people don’t have the time to relearn a new software to switch. But in my view, if it can look and function the same, and therefore be as usable with a low learning curve to switch, more people will be able to switch.
We’re not going to change the UI or our philosophy in fundamental ways.
I’m not asking you to. It’s great if some people want the current theme. I am trying to help appeal to the broader market who WON’T switch if it doesn’t improve the UI. I want cPanel to suffer and lose their market share (for their robbery-pricing) and want the world to have easy access to an easy-to-use GPL software.
Webmin is not easy to use and does not have a simple UI and therefore it does not presently appeal to the broader market. IF it had a cPanel-like theme, then it would, as it is functional, just hard to use due to the poor interface.
That’s like telling Apple to make MacOS look like Windows… There is no reason, nor desire to do so. You switch because you WANT change… Whatever that change is to you… There will always be a few things that don’t exactly look, feel, or work the way you want them to… That’s the nature of “change”.
Anyways, the original topic related to Cloudmin has been resolve I believe. So let’s leave it at that.
Me personally, I can deal with it. But I want others who will not otherwise switch to have an incentive to leave cPanel for good. I want to burn cPanel to the ground by making Webmin’s interface just as good as cPanel (used) to be.
Understand the implications. I am not talking about me. I am talking about appealing to a millions-of-people userbase who WANT to leave cPanel, but can’t find anything as good. DirectAdmin is going to get most of them, not Webmin, and the UI is the ONLY thing stopping most of them, IMO.
So that’s why I proposed helping to skin it. Myself. And make it an open-source theme with your GPL. I have a strong background in web and graphic design, an unusual combo for a server admin. So I think that my experience and design acumen can benefit Webmin and the world.
