Hello,

I'm very intrigued by the efficiency opportunities presented by JMS.

I operate about 15 Joomla sites on a LINUX Virtual Private Server. Recently, I've installed APC to cache my PHP code and so in addition to the obvious benefits of JMS, I'm also excited about the possibility of having a greater percentage of my core Joomla PHP cached, squeezing all the performance possible out of my VPS before the next inevitable hardware upgrade.

Although I think I conceptually understand how JMS will work, I'm also self taught, so I've got some gaps in my technical knowledge and am trying to determine the best way to implement JMS on my VPS. Each of my domains is setup under a separate CPANEL account. The majority of these accounts / domains / Joomla sites are used by internal customers, although a couple are used by external customers. As such, and for simplicity, I'd like to keep this account structure the same, if at all possible.

I think the way I'd like to proceed is to create a new CPANEL account, install a fresh version of Joomla into /home/master/public_html folder, install the JMS component (and my other "production" extensions), thus establishing my JMS MASTER. I don't even think I'll need a new domain name, as this will be for my use only and I can just redirect to it using my from Windows desktop using the hosts.txt file.

So obviously now, when someone visits one of my www.legacy.com sites, we need to "redirect" that visitor to the new JMS MASTER account and /home/master/public_html. I believe one option is to change the httpd.conf <virtualhosts> servername documentroot from /home/legacy/public_html to /home/master/public_html for each of my legacy domains. And, if I do so, will a properly configured JMS, be able to determine the correct Joomla configuration (containing database, etc) based on "incoming" domain name alone?

If so, then are we talking about manually creating a folder structure under /home/master/public_html for all legacy sites (or does JMS do this?), and perhaps with symbolic links back to /home/legacy/public_html/images, /templates so that images, templates can all remain in the same locations? I'm thinking it's at this point where I'm unclear on what / where the legacy folder structures would be, exactly how to determine the best method, structure for my situation.

And, without a doubt, I'd have to migrate my legacy standalone Joomla sites, one at a time, to the JMS Master / Slave structure. I can appreciate that the JMS may be difficult so I'd want to have a good plan in place prior to beginning any installation.

Looking forward to your response!

Craig

Dear Craig,

First JMS Multisites can effectivelly share the same joomla installation for different website and select the appropriate configuration file.
This works perfectly on a same cPanel account.
If you try to share domain that are located on different cPanel account you will have a problem due to the security between cPanel account.
All the slave site should be created on the same cPanel account using subdomain or addon domain.

If you want to create manual symbolic link with another account, you might be faced to a security problem when the directory is owned by another user (cPanel account).

So create multiple slave site and share the same joomla installation is possible.
This can work on a same cPanel account.
If you try to create a bridge between different cPanel account you might have security problem as the different cPanel account have different owners.

Well, that's an excellent point you raise about security between accounts that I had completely overlooked.

As a result of your comment, I now realize that by having to reconstruct or combine existing domain names under a single CPANEL account using subdomains, my sites would not be able to retain their dedicated IP addresses... ugh!

I don't doubt the capabilities of JMS, just concerned about the "costs" and any other unknown "tradeoffs" of getting to a single code base.

But.... wouldn't changing the documentroot of each of my current CPANEL accounts to the documentroot of a new CPANEL account containing the JMS master Joomla instance negate having to define subdomains and preserve my dedicated ip addresses?

The key element that you have to take in account is the owner of the files.
If you are different cPanel account you will have different owner and therefore, try modifying document root or other stuff will not help you as long as you don't fix the problem related to the ownership of the files and folder that is attached to the cPanel account.

This is cPanel dependent.
Personnally we are using shared hosting that allow us to select amoung several IP address for our slave site. That mean that you can have a same JMS that replies for serveral IP addresses and also for a same slave site.

Yes, I agree that ownership is key.

My thoughts are as follows:

1. Setup a new CPANEL account (JMS) for the JMS Master and Slaves with documentroot of /home/jmsmaster/public_html
2. Install a new Joomla, JMS component, establish JMS Master and Slave in /home/jmsmaster/public_html
3. Keep ALL current CPANEL accounts thus preserving the capability to assign unique IP address to an account / domain name.
4. Change the documentroot of all current CPANEL accounts / domain names to /home/jmsmaster/public_html
5. Replace content of pristine Slave SQL Database with current Production Database.
6. Move ALL images, templates, etc to /home/jmsmaster/public_html structure. No dependency on legacy /home/currentsite/public_html structures.

So, in this scenario:

1. All files are located in the /home/jmsmaster/public_html folder structure, owned by the JMS CPANEL account
2. All incoming HTTP requests are responded to by /home/jmsmaster/public_html/.htaccess, /home/jmsmaster/public_html/index.php, proper configuration.php located within /home/jmsmaster/public_html structure is determined by JMS component.

Is this a valid approach used by other JMS users and an alternative to subdomains? Thanks for your patience in helping me better understand how I can make JMS work for my situation.

I had previously inquired about whether I could assign unique IP addresses to a CPANEL subdomain on my VPS and the response was no, I could not do that. Losing my Dedicated IPs or having to change IP addresses is something that I really do not want to consider when implementing JMS. So, this response from my VPS provider, may help you better understand my thought process.