That depends on which “panel” you’re referring to.
I have limited access to the VistaPanel control panel. I have reseller level access to it, but the only official customization option is the ability to add advertisements to the panel. Fortunately, these ad blocks allow arbitrary code so I can do some manipulations in the panel. But enabling and disabling features is not a feature of VistaPanel.
The client area on the other hand is completely custom built, and is exclusive to InfinityFree. While for many features, it’s restricted by what iFastNet provides, but that doesn’t mean it can’t offer exclusive features. Right now, the free SSL is the best example of an exclusive feature like that.
In the past we also had an affiliate program (discontinued), different website builder (also discontinued) and different file manager (iFastNet adopted that software too). And I have some ideas for new features for the panel, which are primarily creative applications of existing possibilities.
thats great to hear! well… even with / without SSH for me is ok but i still like infinityfree as the whole thing and willing to see more from infinityfree in the future!
ifastnet do have SSH on their business plan… if infinityfree got SSH that means it will have to relate to ifastnet needs to change their business plan too! i mean admin could request but dont think the rate will be high!
see admin’s post
You can conclude, that InfinityFree will not be getting SSH anytime soon. If you really want SSH, you will need to pay for it. It‘s not possible to have everything for free.
Please do keep in mind that Composer also supports custom scripting hooks, which would need to be disabled or contained in some way as well. Just Composer is not as safe as you may believe.
Not necessarily. I’ve been considering to build an external git deploy system. So you can push your Git repository to an InfinityFree service, the service collects the files and Composer dependencies, and pushes the files over FTP to your hosting account.
Portability with cPanel is a bit of an obstacle, but it’s not impossible.
Only iFastNet can implement SSH access, because it must be run directly on the servers. Git deploys and Composer could be run outside the hosting servers by using FTP, which means it’s possible to implement this independently.
The thing is that the feature request was originally “we want SSH access”, which is not possible. Then it was watered down to “we want SSH access for Composer”, which is also not possible. But if you narrow this down to “we want Composer”, this is possible.
Finally we are getting somewhere! I was at the point of thinking that this thread was already dead and I was at the point of abandoning it until you finally budged. If I find an alternative for SSH, is it possible for me to post it? Also, I am really exited about the external git deploy system you are working on. Be sure to tell us about when you are going to release it and if you are considering of adding a beta program (you really should ). By the way, are you saying that you could add anything to InfinityFree as long as it doesn’t have to do anything with iFastNet?
Yes, everything that InfinityFree has is free, but giving you every possible feature that any web host could ever include for free is literally impossible. It has to be paid for somehow, after all, hence why some features (like SSh access) simply don’t exist here.
I hate to say it, but it might not ever be fully independent. As someone who has tried iFastNet’s MOFH service before, I don’t know if there was a feature to export or transfer client’s hosting accounts to another service (it’s been a few years however, so even there wasn’t it could’ve changed but perhaps not). Also, running a hosting service on your own servers yourself is expensive, hence why the Admin chose to work with iFastNet in the first place (explained earlier by them).
Just to be clear: the idea I shared was just a thought. I think it could be a very interesting feature, but there are still many questions which need to be answered and many technical challenges which will need to be tackled. I’m not even sure this feature would ever see the light of day, let alone when it would and what exact shape it will take.
Basically, yes. I’m primarily limited by the possible interactions with the hosting platform, both programmatically and manually. But that doesn’t mean I can’t make any features myself. The Let’s Encrypt integration in the client area is a good example of something that’s possible: it makes creative use of existing features (custom SSL certificates and CNAME records) to work.
Vendor lock-in and cost are two important issues.
The other issue is that it’s simply very complicated. iFastNet has a team of developers and two decades of experience building a free hosting platform. While there are many design decisions I don’t agree with, it’s hard to argue that many of the core features of the platform are stable and battle tested.
I would say I have enough industry experience and technical knowledge to be able to design a good free hosting platform, but the amount of labor it would take to make it a reality is just too much. And even then it’s debatable whether the end result is actually an improvement.
So for the foreseeable future, InfinityFree will stick with iFastNet.
I’m sorry, but you’ve lost me here. How exactly do you figure SSH access could give you the option to host other programming languages? Even if you could get access to a Python interpreter, how would you make this application accessible from the internet?
