Virtual Hosting Company has moved development on the IRC Provisioning Module to phase two. We've been using a custom-coded module, designed to operate just with our specific design/setup, working closely with our WHMCS Installation, to allow the automatic provisioning of client accounts (IRC and IRCd based solutions), as well as support ticket generation for our ZNC provisioning (ZNC does not currently have an auto provisioining capability). Our code, while sufficent and well written, is too specific to Virtual Hosting Company for easy distribution. As such, our coding team has begun re-writing our Provisioning Module to accommidate distribution to the masses in the future (for those interested, anyway).

We're working hard to make sure the new module will be able to accommodate the needs of anyone that may have interest in it. We're taking suggestions on what to include, what to skip, and what to really make stand out.

Our current plans are as follows:

  1. Setup to allow the provisioning of BNC (Support Ticket Notification0, IRC, and IRCd accounts.
    1. Due to limitations on ZNC and psyBNC, the creation of accounts still requires manual interaction.  The Provisioning Module will generate a new Support Ticket requiring an Administrator to manually create, suspend, release (un-suspend), terminate, and change passwords.  As soon as a Web-based API is made available for ZNC, we will work on integrating it as an option.
    2. IRC and IRCd Accounts will auto provision based on the cron jobs set up on the Automation System.  Accounts can automatically be created, suspended, released (un-suspended), terminated, and have their passwords changed.
    3. Account creation for IRC and IRCd accounts will include the ability for the Administrator to set Process, Connection, and Storage limits per-account.  These limits will be utilized in the Reporting functions of the Automation System.  Overages will be notified to the Administrator (as set up in the Automation System configuration).  Additionally, we will have billing capabilities with Storage limits being accounted for through the Whmcs Billing System.
  2. Automation System Reporting
    1. Hourly reports of any user(s) over the limits set forth in their account at the time of provisioning.
    2. Daily reports of the overall system activity, including process listing, storage usage, and listening ports.
    3. Weekly reports of system activity, including details from daily reports, along with a directory tree listing of the first two levels of the user account.
    4. Monthly reports of system activity, including details from the weekly reports, along with a directory tree listing of the first three levels of a user account.  Additionally, the activity from the previous months' bash history will be archived.
    5. Yearly reports of system activity, including full monthly reports, plus a full directory listing for the user tree.
  3. Set-and-Forget configuration allowing Administrator to set up the product and not have to work with it again unless they are upgrading to a new version (Note: Updated provisioning modules will include notes on what administrators need to look out for).
We're looking forward to the copletion of the new Provisioning Module, and we look forward to providing some Screen Shots of both the Provisioning and Reporting system in the coming weeks.




Tuesday, August 6, 2013





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