Introduction and review of the popular softwares & Apps to support hosting service. This includes hosting control panel solutions, plugin & modules for different technical requirements

Best Smartermail Hosting Reviews

best smartermail hosting

Smartermail Review

Smartermail is one of the best mail software developed by SmarterTools Inc. SmarterMail is powered by asp.net and marketed as "The Cost-effective Microsoft Exchange Alternative", Since from 2003, smartermail has been offering outstanding windows mail service to thousands of personel and enterprises over 100 countries.

SmarterMail is a scalable and stable solution with fully integrated anti-spam and anti-virus protection with enterprise class functionality. With over 15 million end users and a strong global network of channel partnerships, Smartermail is the best choice for enterprise grade businesses.

Best Smartermail Hosting Provider

Smartermail is windows mail program and mainly used for corporation email solutions. It's not popularly offered in web hosting industry. The best smartermail hosting goes to HostGator.com based editorial experience and side by side reviews. HG smartermail service is configured on windows 2008 R2 with as cheap as $4.76/mon. Smartermail is a simple support by default in Plesk control panel. Smartermail hosting plan features include the following:

hostgator smartermail hosting

Hostgator is on top recommendation not only because of its seamless support to smatermail software but mainly because of their super stable hosting server and network. By powering over 10 million global sites, their people are very serious about server performance and security. Web server, database server and email server are seperated for professioal management and guaranteed performance.

Visit www.HostGator.com for smartermail hosting details!


More about Smartermail

SmarterMail aims at delivering an industry leading and a user friendly user interface for accessing the emails, contacts, calendars and tasks as also provides a complete server management system. The AJAX Web interface is designed by drag and drop operations and tab controls. Smartermail hosting comes with following advantages

  • Exchange Alternative – While smartermail has pretty low server requirements. it is pretty cheaper than Microsoft exchange and definitely the best-in-class Microsoft Exchange alternative for businesses and hosting companies.
  • Professional looking – Using a standard Web browser we can access email, calendars, contacts, tasks, chats and notes in the office, on the road, or at home.
  • Easy Migration – No matter if you're using free mail service such as hotmail, gmail or a hosted mail service. Smartermail provide a very friendly GUI to migrate over everything from other place to your hosting mail server.
  • Powerful APIs – Administration tasks can be done via web based interface and coding level through a web service API.
  • Control panel support – Smartermail comes with default support with several most popular hosting control panel such as Plesk and dotnetpanel.
  • Free option – Best of the best, Smartermail offers free version which is fully functional like the paid version besides it only works on one domain, it's good enough for people to learn about everything of smartermail.

As for smartermail itself, there're lots of leading features comparing to all other email platforms. Those spotlights includes

  • Email Forwarding
  • Greylisting
  • Whitelisting
  • Microsoft Outlook Sync
  • AJAX Spellcheck
  • Multilanguage support
  • Inbox message preview window
  • Create custom spam weights
  • RSS feed news integration
  • Calendaring
  • Contact management
  • Rich text editing
  • HTML email compatible
  • And more….

If you have feeled the power of microsoft exchange but not ready to deal with the complex setup and expensive license yet, smartermail will be your best choice. A single executive installer will get everything prepared very quickly. Just go ahead and try out it's free edition and test out.

Smartermail official site: http://www.smartertools.com/

Best Simplescripts Hosting

best simplescripts hosting

Simplescripts Introduction

SimpleScripts provides FREE and easy one-click management of over 100 top web applications, including WordPress, Joomla, phpBB, Roundcube, Gallery, and more. With Simplescripts, you can have applications running on your website by just a few clicks away. No HTML or programming knowledge required. SimpleScripts is a "hosted service", so you can add applications to your existing web hosting account,

Best Simple scripts Hosting Providers

Simplescripts is becoming more and more popular nowadays for it's powerful scripts library and free feature. It can be added via any hosting control panel via APIs. If you're looking for the best web hosting support. We highly suggest you check out the following:

Best Simplescripts Hosting – Bluehost

Bluehost who's actually the first one uses simplescripts in cpanel control panel. Bluehost was fantastico based before and transfered to Simplescripts. Bluehost simplescripts hosting comes with a bounch of great features that's required by successful website including

  • Free domain name
  • Unlimited websites hosting
  • Unlimited mysql database
  • SSH secure tunnel supported
  • Fully optimized hosting server
  • Super affordable hosting service!

It's sister brand hostmonster is also simple scripts based while it's implemented by bluehost service. Same price and features, you can't find better place for cpanel simplescripts support

Go to www.Bluehost.com for simplescripts hosting details!

Best Simplescripts Hosting – iPage

iPage implemented simplescripts not long ago, it's actually using InstallCentral before to install scripts. Now, ipage control panel is fully integrated with simplescripts installer, it's sister brands like Fatcow etc all introduced this App in their Vdeck control panel. The best advantage with ipage hosting is we only pay $1.99/mo currently for unlimited websites, free domain and unlimited database!

Steps to use simplescripts with ipage hosting

  • In vDeck control panel, click on the "Scripting and Add-ons" icon.
  • You will see a list of available scripts for installation. Click on the script icon you wish to install then fill out the necessary information to complete installation.

Simplescripts Features

  • Plenty of scripts – Simplescripts comes with a full list with the most popular web applications such as wordpress, joomla, phpbb etc. You can always find a solution from simplescripts.
  • Security patch – SimpleScripts makes script security and feature updates available within minutes of public release, and will notify you of new software releases via email and control panel notification (where available).
  • Auto Upgrade – If you deployed several websites via simplescripts and need a update version later, simplescripts can upgrade all your sites at once with just one click!
  • Backup and restore – If there's any problem via your upgrade, it will auto create a backup, just one click for restore.
  • Free – You don't have to pay in order to use simplescripts and even no need a webhost since it's already a "hosted service", you just register on their site directly and start the install journey.

What's the disadvantage with simplescripts?

I think the most disadvantage with simplescripts is the platform support. It can't be working under windows system but just linux with apache server. This greatly reduced the number of users. I hope there will be a windows compatible plan from their team.

Another is about the reliability. It's announced to be hosted scripts and people be able to install scripts on their site directly. However, we tried to install wordpress and joomla from their site directly but alwys complaining ftp not correct but the ftp is actually working fine.

Simplescripts vs Softaculous vs Fantastico

All the three apps are popular auto installer in cpanel control panel, but which is the best? Nowadays, the fantastico is used less and less by hosting groups for the lack of support/updates over scripts. For leading cpanel hosting providers they mostly integrate Softaculous as cpanel add-on. Simplescripts came out as new competitor in the market and not being installed popularly in cPanel. Regardless of the newness for simplescripts, as it's already integrated by endurance group, with huge business, Simplescripts will be recoginized by more and more people. It's really working as nice as softaculous but with a lower price.

Best Installatron Hosting

best installatron hosting

Installatron Overview

Installatron is the premiere auto-installer and auto-upgrade plugin for the cpanel/WHM, cPanel Enkompass, DirectAdmin, InterWorx, Plesk Linux/UNIX, Plesk Windows, and Kloxo/LxAdmin web-hosting control panels. Installatron is a multi-platform application installer that provides a graphical interface and automation tools designed to simplify the process of hosting web applications.

Installatron's powerful, easy to use user-interface gives you and your users the ability to install and upgrade a growing collection of web applications at the click of a button.

What's good of Installatron installer?

Fast updates – Installatron updates your application list with latest stable versions scripts as fast as their release, Installatron just make sure you get the latest version scripts without any delay.

Cross platform support – Installatron can be easily added to several popular control panels such as cpanel, plesk and directadmin. The software is also available in multiple ways like plugin, hosted application and hosting server installation.You can choose the most suitable option to use the service.

Zero downtime – Application installers and upgraders are automatically downloaded to your server each night by a crontab process, reducing server maintenance to zero.

Scalability – If you like to develop your own installer, Installatron is absolute the best platform to work with. Installatron provides a modification system for developers to program their own installer.

Free option – Installatron free edition comes with all features of the licensed products, you are free to use for as long as you like. The only limitation is that it will only work on a single domain.

Another outstanding feature from installatron is we can view the application side by side before installation. This includes website front layout, admin panel and even showcase sites available.

Installatron installer features

Best Installatron Hosting?

Installatron is still on the way of gaining more popularity and not yet used by those major web hosts. However you can refer to their official site http://installatron.com/partners to check a list of hosting providers with installatron support. The point is you don't need a specific hosting provider in order to use this service, you can add it directly in hosting control panel. If you have a VPS or dedicated server, you can get it installed by yourself at no cost.

Installatron vs Softaculous

I bet many people always compare this two installers for their fantastic features. Ok, let's take a look and see which is better choice:

Softaculous is featured for their scripts amount and update frequency, it has by far the biggest scripts library and actually used by most hosting companies. Installatron is more like an open source project since you can develop your own installer via their sample scripts. Another is about their "free" option, while softaculous offers a limited features version, installatron gives us anyrything by paying. For this concern, I have no reason to choose softaculous but drop installatron. Especially the friendly design for each software page, it's not available from any other installer.

Best Softaculous Hosting

best softaculous hosting

Softaculous Introduction

Softaculous is another top rated auto installer scripts library. Softaculous is being deployed more and more on hosting servers and their script lists refreshes every few weeks. What's more, it's compatible with various hosting control panels. Using Softaculous is absolutely a happy journey.

Softaculous targets open-source software and is available in a Pro and Free version. Softaculous applications typically create tables in a database, install software, adjust permissions, and modify web server configuration files.

Best Softaculous Hosting Providers

The good of softaculous is the cross platform feature. Since it is compatible with many popular control panels. softaculous can be deployed to both windows and linux platforms. it's popularly used by all leading hosting groups. The best softaculous hosting awards goes to Inmotion hosting and Arvixe Hosting.

Inmotion Hosting – An honest hosting provider comes with various hosting products at good price, it's the best choice for people who need enterprise grade hosting service. Inmotion is also ranked NO.1 for speed competition over 10 popular hosting providers. You get what you pay, inmotion will never be disappoint you for what you purchased. Inmotion Softaculous hosting comes with following advantages

  • Free domain registration
  • Max speed zone enabled
  • 90 days leading money back guarantee
  • 100% satisfication guarantee!

Go to www.InmotionHosting.com and view plan features!


Arvixe Hosting – Arvixe linux hosting plans are all configured with softaculous support. Similar to Inmotion hosting service, softaculous is offered free from cpanel center as standard service for each hosting account. What makes arvixe softaculous hosting outstanding is their super friendly and helpful tech support. Their people are everywhere from the country to support customer from each corner on the planet. Softaculous is just a simple support on their powerful hosting plans. Arvixe advantages include

  • Free domain for life
  • Unlimited database per account
  • SSD Disk storage
  • SSH secure tunnel support
  • Tomcat/Jsp optional support

Go to www.Arvixe.com for hosting plan details

More about Softaculous

There are many tools for one-click installation of free software. However, Softaculous is rated the best for the newest version scripts library and professional management. Meanwhile, it's backend with the most helpful support.

  1. Lots of Scripts – softaculous currently implemented over 170 scripts library and the support team is still making more. All scripts get updated once the official site released. People will get email notification for installed apps on website.
  2. Cross platform support – Softaculous can be added to the most popular Control panels such as Cpanel, Plesk, DirectAdmin and the support team is trying to make it compatible with more and more control panels. This should be the main benefit to hosting providers who offer different hosting solutions .
  3. Good price term – It's pretty cheap to get Softaculous. While fantastico charges $30/yr license fee, softaculous available for only $24/yr and a much cheaper lifetime license fee. Unlike other auto installers that requires to be paid first in order to try out. Softaculous offers free version and they are confident you will be impressed with the software make the purchase after evaluation.
  4. User friendly – Softaculous provide a demo first before you make the installation. It simply tells you if it will be the right choice with your project. It also introduced the update notice as long as the new version scripts available.

How to Use Softaculous in Control panel?

The use of softaculous is pretty straight. Take cpanel for instance, just follow the steps below to have the desired script installed in few minutes

  • Login to cpanel and click the "Softaculous" icon located in your cPanel.
  • From the navigation menu, select your desired software.
  • Click the "Installation" link on the right.
  • Fill out the required information and complete the installation

If you have installed a program using softaculous but want to remove it. Just navigate to softaculous center and view the existing installations, click "remove" under the specific site. All website files and backend database will be auto removed.

Best Fantastico Hosting

best fantastico web hosting

Fantastico Introduction

Fantastico is developed by Netenberg team which is previously well known for cpanel skin development. For very a long period, the fantastico script library is a standard cpanel add-on for most hosting service. The fantastico one click installer helps customer deploy the popular website scripts quickly in server space.

Fantastico installer includes 50+ popular php scripts such as wordpress, wordpress and joomla etc. Since from the very beginning, fantastico is only programmed for cpanel control panel and not available for windows server.

Best Fantastico Hosting Provider

The best fantastico hosting awards before goes to industry leader – Hostgator! For very a long time, hostgator is standard choice for fantastico web hosting requirement till 2013. Their platform transfered to softaculous for better support and management.

Being one of the earliest scripts installer, fantastico was the most popular and leading name for cPanel scripts installation. However, during the development competition, fantastico is fading away because of slow update and less support to new scripts. The most popular choice today turns to softaculous and simplescripts, they both update scripts libraries frequently with best user experience. Fantastico is being disucssed less and less. Even hostgator now offers softaculous option in control panel.

If you're still looking for fantastico installer, most probably you have to purchase the pack separately from its vendor, but if you want to manage your site via such installers, softaculous would be best choice because you will get up to date script library and you will be email notified once there's update available, just one click away to keep everything up to date!


How to use Fantastico Installer in cpanel?

It's pretty straight to use fantastico installer with cpanel service. just follow the below steps to have your prefered scripts installed!

  1. Login to cpanel and click the "Fantastico De Luxe" icon located in your cPanel.
  2. In the left menu of Fantastico, select your desired software.
  3. Click the "New Installation" link on the right.
  4. Fill out the required information such as installation directory as well as the username and password that you want to use to login. When you've completed filling out the required information page, click the install button at the bottom of the page.

More about Fantastico

Being the very first autoinstaller, fantastico has been installed over 1 million times by service provider. Although it's some kind outdated nowadays, it's still used by lots of people for basic software installation. Fantastic is announced to be friendly by following features

Plenty of scripts – Being the number one auto installer scripts, fantastico introduced more than 50 free most popular cms scripts. Generally speaking, more than 90% people actually choose from the script list even from local development.

Security – Cpanel is the most secure and standard manage panel for linux hosting. Fantastico is dedicated for Cpanel and their development team always update and optimize it.

User friendly – Fantastico has pretty clear design and layout and also simplified the process to get a script installed. Even a start user will be able to handle it perfectly.

Widely deployment – From their official news, Fantastico has  over 10,000 installations on hosting servers. The benefit is you get different license fee if you're running a dedicated or vps server and they even offer 15 days no question asked money back guarantee

Best Postgresql Hosting

postgresql hosting

Postgresql Introduction

PostgreSQL is a powerful, open source object-relational database system developed by Burkley team. Postgresql can be running on all major operating systems including Windows, Linux and Unix like OS. The data structure is fully compatible with SQL server and all other programming languages such as C++, Java etc. The best Postgresql web management program is available as phpPgadmin

Core features of Postgresql

  • Open source – Postgresql is absolutely the best open source and powerful database system. Their advanced theories introduced to many other commercial databases.
  • Performance – Postgresql is the best choice for running a busy database drive website. A single postgresql table can be as large as 32TB and no max size limit for the entire database.
  • Cross platform – If you're familiar with other database systems such as mysql or mssql, you don't have to start a new lesson in order to use postgresql, it's fully compatible with other database structures.
  • Powerful support – Postgresql is widely supported by lots of communities. The point is Postgresql development even includes the hacker's effort.

Best Postgresql Hosting Provider

After reviewed and tested over 12+ postgresql hosting providers, we strongly recommend Siteground and Arvixe for high quality postgresql services. Not only for postgresql software, the two companies offer side by side support to general hosting service.

Arvixe Postgresql hosting plan comes support for both postgresql and mysql, you have the option to choose which one to use from cpanel control panel. The default management tool phppgadmin is offered as initial configuration. Only $4/mo plus 20% discount with yearly registration!

Arvixe PostgreSql hosting

Why Arvixe is your best choice for postgresql database hosting? Simply because of their knowlegeable tech support group and super friendly customer caring policies. Whenever you run into problems with their service you will get the instant support and fast problem fixing!

Siteground is another leading hosting solution which is fully postgresql compatible. They announced to have fully optimized the hosting server for best postgresql database. With siteground hosting you have choice over multiple PHP versions and mysql editions with unlimited website support. For only $3.95/mo you can choose datacenter location on multiple continents on the earth!


How to choose the best Postgresql hosting?

To search the best postgresql hosting provider, mostly you should look at the following items:

DB management tool – The hosting should provide an easy to use management tool for database creation, backup and restore. The best tool on internet is phpPgadmin.

Server uptime and reliability – The postgresql already optimized itself. By deploying postgresql to hosting server, it should meet 99% uptime guarantee at least.

Tech support – 24 x 7 live tech support must be a standard feature for a good hosting provider.

Reputation – We don't recommend put your business with a new company where we can't find too much user reviews and feedbacks on internet. A decent postgresql hosting service should have been tested by lots of existing clients with real experience sharing.

More about Postgresql database

PostgreSQL has more than 15 years of active development and a proven architecture that has earned it a strong reputation for reliability, data integrity, and correctness. An enterprise class database, PostgreSQL boasts sophisticated features such as Multi-Version Concurrency Control (MVCC), point in time recovery, tablespaces, asynchronous replication, nested transactions (savepoints), online/hot backups, a sophisticated query planner/optimizer, and write ahead logging for fault tolerance.

PostgreSQL supports international character sets, multibyte character encodings, Unicode, and it is locale-aware for sorting, case-sensitivity, and formatting. PostgreSQL prides itself in standards compliance. Its SQL implementation strongly conforms to the ANSI-SQL 92/99 standards.