Webhosting Control Panels?

Rob Becker writes "I just started up a little webhosting company and I've noticed a lot of people have asked me if I have a Control Panel. After a little research I haven't found too many choices. The few that I come across are Plesk's Control Panel and CPanel3. I was wondering if any of the /.ers have used any of these or what they would recommend. I actually started to code my own, but unfortunatly I have another job and the time factor isn't there. It would be nice to have a premade one to take care of it for me." Now as much as tools like these can be a lifesaver in many situations, I have a hard problem with products that claim to do administration and that the users need "absolutely no Linux experience". Can these products really live up to that claim? Are there other, similar projects out there that are better than the two mentioned here?

Comments

Webmin? vhost?

[hattig]

Webmin and vhost might be suitable, I forget the URL for webmin, but vhost:

http://www.chaogic.com/vhost/

Updated today on Freshmeat. These tools are more for the administration side than the user side of course, but what do they want in a front-end? Maybe a web-based template based website creation tool? Web based email for their domain name? You are asking for an answer to a vague question...

CobaltRaQ

[Alioth]

It's probably too late now (since you probably already have the hardware), but CobaltRaQs have nice web-based admin software. The downside with the RaQ is that they are not secure out of the box (run a version of RedHat with exploitable BIND etc.) and Sun expects you to never use the commandline (in fact they say that commandline administration 'voids your warranty'. Bah, I do it all the same - it's the only way to secure the box!)