Control panel features for everything your server hosts

These are Dashmox's control panel features today, on every plan except API access, which comes with Pro and Business. If it is on this page, it is built, tested and running on a real server.

Websites: static, PHP, Node.js and containers

Every way a website runs, each one in its own Linux account.

  • Static websites served straight from disk.
  • PHP with a pool and account of its own for every website.
  • Several PHP versions installed side by side and chosen per website.
  • A php.ini per website, as a form of thirty-eight settings or as the file itself, with every line checked as you type: a value out of range, a misspelt setting or a timezone that does not exist is refused before it is saved. PHP hosting
  • PHP extensions per website, grouped by job rather than by package name.
  • Node.js applications started, restarted and put behind Nginx with WebSockets, their dependencies installed and their environment set from the panel. Node.js hosting
  • Container websites running an image an administrator approved, with no privileges and a read-only root filesystem. Docker hosting
  • A reverse proxy to one approved address, so anything on your network gets a domain and a certificate. Reverse proxy
  • The runtime is a setting, changeable later without rebuilding the website. Every runtime
  • Additional domains, subdomains and a temporary address before DNS moves.
  • Redirects from one address on a website to another, temporary unless you choose permanent.
  • An .htaccess is read, and the PHP settings in it this server can honour are applied to that website alone. The handful it cannot are named rather than ignored, so nothing looks applied that is not.
  • A dedicated IP address for a website that needs one.
  • CPU, memory and process limits, and storage quotas, per website.
  • Scheduled tasks with their output kept.
  • Website copies with their own database, for staging.
  • Suspend a website and bring it back when you are ready.
The websites list in Dashmox, with each site's runtime, certificate and status

Free SSL certificates, renewed before they expire

HTTPS without thinking about it, and without surprises when you do.

  • Let's Encrypt certificates requested and renewed automatically.
  • A domain added later joins the certificate within the hour of its DNS pointing here.
  • Your own certificate: a wildcard, one from your own authority, or one issued elsewhere.
  • Or a wildcard issued here, for a domain whose DNS Dashmox can reach. Cloudflare
  • Checked before it is installed, so a mismatched key or a reversed chain is caught, not deployed.
  • The names a certificate does not cover are shown, so no visitor meets a warning.
  • Keys stored where only root can read them, and never shown again.

Works with Cloudflare, down to the origin

Connect an API token and three things stop being manual: wildcard certificates, HTTPS before a domain moves, and keeping your server off the open internet.

  • Wildcard certificates, which need a DNS challenge and were not possible here before.
  • A certificate before the domain points here, so a migration cuts over with no gap in HTTPS instead of a scramble afterwards.
  • A scoped token, never a Global API Key. That one can reach billing and every zone you own; this asks for DNS on the zones you choose, and says which of your domains it covers.
  • Your DNS credential is not in the panel's database, so a copy of it carries no keys to your zones.
  • New websites get their records published, mail records included, and nothing is ever overwritten: a record that already says something else is reported rather than replaced.
  • Your customers connect their own accounts, and theirs is used for their own zones.
  • Lock a website to Cloudflare: it accepts only Cloudflare's published addresses and requires the client certificate only Cloudflare holds, so a spoofed address fails at the handshake. Hosting behind Cloudflare
  • It refuses to lock a website that would go offline, and names which addresses are not behind the proxy yet.

Email hosting with mailboxes at your own domains

Postfix and Dovecot, set up properly, managed from the panel.

  • Mailboxes at each customer's own domain, each with a size limit.
  • Forwarding, and a copy kept of what a forwarding address sends.
  • IMAP and SMTP over TLS on the standard ports.
  • Roundcube webmail in the browser, with nothing to set up.
  • DKIM signing for each domain, with the record published for you.
  • Spam refused during delivery, and doubtful mail filed into Junk.
  • mail. and smtp. of each domain, with certificates of their own.
  • Automatic setup answered for Thunderbird and Outlook.
  • MX, SPF and DMARC records shown, and published where Dashmox hosts the zone.
  • Each mailbox sends only as itself, and sending is rate limited.
Mailboxes for a customer's domain in Dashmox, each with its own size limit

DNS zones on your own nameservers

Authoritative DNS on PowerDNS, with your own nameservers.

  • A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, TXT, SRV, CAA and NS records.
  • Your own nameservers with their own addresses, set from the panel.
  • A zone created with each website, with its address and www record.
  • Mail records added for you when a domain starts receiving mail.
  • IP addresses added to and removed from the server in the panel.
  • A zone can only be claimed by the website that owns the domain.
DNS records for a domain in Dashmox's authoritative DNS

MySQL, MariaDB and PostgreSQL databases

A server is built on MySQL or on MariaDB, and can run PostgreSQL alongside either. Each website's databases are kept to themselves.

  • Databases and accounts isolated per website.
  • SQL import of dumps up to 64 MB from the browser.
  • Up to ten backups per database, downloadable and restorable.
  • Storage limits per database.
  • MySQL or MariaDB, chosen when the server is built. MySQL is the default, so a dump from a server you are leaving imports without being edited first.
  • phpMyAdmin for when you want to look inside one of those databases.
  • PostgreSQL for applications that ask for it, alongside the other, reachable from a container website over the server's own socket.
A website's MariaDB databases in Dashmox, each with its size, its limit and its own accounts

File manager and SFTP access

Edit in the browser, or connect the tools you already use.

  • A file manager to upload, edit, rename and delete.
  • SFTP per website, locked to that website's own files.
  • Extra file transfer accounts for people who need only files.
  • A shell for a website, jailed to its own files, for an editor that works over SSH.
  • Nothing runs from a folder an application writes to, so an upload cannot become a script.

Backups, recovery points and off-site copies

On the server for speed, off it for safety.

  • File snapshots of a website, taken whenever you want one.
  • Recovery points that capture every database, then the files, in that order.
  • Daily or weekly schedules that keep up to seven.
  • A backup server of your own that receives only the parts of an archive that changed.
  • Off-site copies to S3-compatible storage or an SFTP server, for anywhere else you already keep them.
  • Download or restore any of them from the panel.
  • The panel itself backed up and restored from the command line.
Website backups in Dashmox: file snapshots, recovery points and a schedule

Eleven applications in one click

WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Moodle and six more, each at the version its publisher has today.

See all ten and what each one needs

  • Installed into a website, or into a folder of one beside what is already there.
  • The release the publisher has now, checked against the checksum they publish for it, or their signature where they sign instead.
  • The administrator account created, with the password shown to you once.
  • WordPress keeps itself updated, and the panel shows what it is waiting on.
  • The rest are named, not guessed: the panel reads the version each runs and says which release it is behind.
  • A copied website gets its own database and secrets, so staging never touches live.
Installing WordPress or Joomla into a website from Dashmox

Customers, hosting packages and billing

Host for other people without handing them your server.

  • Customers with their contact details and a login of their own.
  • Hosting packages that set what a customer may create.
  • Allowances for websites, databases, mailboxes, backups and scheduled tasks.
  • Roles: administrator, customer, developer and read-only.
  • Access to one website granted without the rest of a customer's account.
  • Sign in as a customer to see what they see, recorded as you.
  • API access for scripts and billing systems, with Pro and Business.
  • Billing modules for WHMCS, FOSSBilling and Blesta, so an order creates the account and the website.
  • An activity record of who did what.
Hosting packages in Dashmox with allowances for websites, databases and mailboxes

Migration from the panel you use now

Start with the websites you already have.

  • Pull over SSH from any Linux server you can sign in to.
  • Archives and account backups read and explained before anything is created.
  • What the website needs, before it is restored: the PHP version the old host recorded, the applications inside it, the extensions they want, and whether its PHP was encoded by a tool that needs a version this server does not have. A migration that copies everything and then serves an error has not moved the website.
  • Whole servers from the most widely used hosting panel, one customer per account, queued one after another.
  • WordPress, Joomla and the most widely used billing application pointed at their new database, wherever in the account they live.
  • Encoded PHP runs: the loader those applications need is installed, and where the files themselves were built for an older PHP the migration says so instead of leaving you a blank page.

Everything about migrating

Security: every website isolated from the rest

Safe settings on from the start, and a score for the rest.

  • Two-factor sign-in with recovery codes.
  • Password and sign-in rules for everybody on the server.
  • Protection on every website against scanners, uploaded scripts and password guessing.
  • A firewall that cannot lock you out of your own panel.
  • A security overview that scores what is switched on.
  • Signed updates that snapshot the panel before they start.
Dashmox's security overview for a server, scoring what is switched on

How Dashmox is secured

Running the server from the panel

Know whether the server is well without opening a terminal.

  • A health page with a Fix it button wherever there is a fix.
  • Alerts by email for the problems worth waking somebody for.
  • Seven days of CPU, memory, load and disk, and each website's own usage.
  • Services started, stopped and restarted from the panel.
  • Server logs readable in the browser.
  • Whether the operating system itself needs attention: how many updates are waiting, how many are security, and whether a restart is due and which packages asked for it.
  • Updates offered in the panel and installed with one button.
  • Search the whole panel: a domain, a customer or a setting by name.
  • A command line that checks, repairs and backs up the panel.
  • Stylesheets and scripts are compressed for every website on the server, and for the panel itself. A stylesheet that leaves as 30 kB arrives as 10.
  • Light on the machine: the panel and its agent use about 26.7 MB of memory between them, idle, on a server hosting websites, mail and DNS. The readings.
One website in Dashmox with its tools: files, databases, mail, DNS, SSL and backups

On a phone it is an app

The same panel, laid out for a screen you hold: nothing to pinch, nothing sideways to scroll.

  • A bar along the bottom with the overview, your websites, the search and the menu, where a thumb reaches.
  • Websites as cards rather than a table squeezed sideways, each saying whether it is up, what it runs and how much space it is using.
  • The navigation as a drawer, with sections you open and close, closing itself as soon as it has taken you somewhere.
  • Dialogs as sheets that rise from the bottom, with fields big enough to type in and no zooming when you tap one.
  • Add it to your home screen and it opens like any other app, with its own icon and no browser bar around it.
  • On every plan, in every language, with nothing to install.
Dashmox on a phone: each website a card, with the overview, websites, search and menu along the bottom
Dashmox on a phone with the navigation open as a drawer over the page

Appearance: dark mode and four palettes

A panel somebody looks at all day should be one they can stand to look at.

  • Light and dark, one button in the header, with every surface and state coloured for each.
  • Four palettes: forest green, ocean blue, indigo and slate.
  • Contrast measured in the browser, in both themes and every palette, against WCAG AA.
  • Kept per person, so your choice changes nothing for your colleagues or your customers.
  • Your phone follows it, painting its own bar to match the panel.
  • On every plan, the free one included. See the themes.
The Dashmox server overview in the dark theme

The panel in four languages

English, French, Serbian and Simplified Chinese, chosen by each person for themselves.

  • The interface and the answers: buttons, labels and tables, and the messages the server sends back.
  • Per account, not per server, so a customer reads it in Chinese while you read it in English.
  • Kept on the account, so the panel is in your language on the next machine you sign in from.
  • Never half blank: anything not translated yet shows the English rather than a gap.
  • Translated by people who speak them, not by a machine. The Chinese came from a customer who offered.
  • On every plan. How to change it.

Questions

About the features

Does Dashmox include email hosting?

Yes. Mailboxes at your customers' own domains with IMAP and SMTP over TLS, Roundcube webmail, DKIM signing, spam filtering, forwarding and a size limit per mailbox. Dashmox publishes the records mail needs where it hosts the domain's DNS, and answers the automatic setup Thunderbird and Outlook look for.

Does Dashmox install WordPress?

Yes. WordPress and Joomla install into a website, or a folder of one, from a download checked against its published checksum, with the administrator account created for you. Copying a website gives the copy its own database, so a staging site is a real staging site.

Can my customers sign in to Dashmox?

Yes. Each customer gets a login that sees only their own websites, within the allowances of the hosting package you give them. People can also have narrower roles, such as a developer or a read-only account.

Your servers, with nothing on them counted.

The whole panel is free on one server, with no limit on websites, mailboxes, DNS zones or customer accounts. Pro carries five servers and Business as many as you run.