Have you ever wished you could upgrade your Joomla installation with the click of a button? What about being able to quickly fix all of your Joomla file and directory permissions without manually checking each one? Have you been locked out of your website and wanted an easy way to reset your Joomla super administrator password?

Now you can do all of this and more directly through your Rochen account’s cPanel interface. Recently you may have noticed a new addition to your cPanel options called “Joomla Utilities”.

This cPanel plug-in is an additional Joomla Hosting feature exclusive  to Rochen that will allow you to easily install, upgrade, maintain and enhance the security of your Joomla websites. Currently you will see the “Joomla Utilities” option in your cPanel but we must advise that at this time it is still in BETA. However, we’re excited about these new features and we couldn’t wait any longer to give you a preview.

Some of the Joomla Utilities features include: -

• Simple Joomla installation tool that unlike other “auto installers” always installs the latest stable version of Joomla
• Ability to install multiple Joomla installations to your secondary domains,  sub domains and sub directories
• Automatic security hardening for new Joomla installs
• Reset the password for any Super Administrator account under a Joomla site
• Update the Joomla Core in a single easy step
• Security tweaks that prevent arbitrary scripts from running
• File and Directory Permission optimization / repair tool – useful if moving a Joomla site to Rochen from another host
• Easily password protect your Joomla Administrator panel
• Joomla sites that were not initially installed using the “Joomla Utilities” feature can still be managed and updated
• The “Joomla Utilities” are built directly into your Rochen account’s cPanel so there is no third-party extension to install or maintain under Joomla meaning zero hassle
• White labeled so that resellers can offer Joomla Utilities to their own clients without Rochen being visible

We’ve prepared a short five minute demonstration video that we encourage you to watch: -

As soon as the Joomla Utilities are ready for use on live and production websites we will let you know. In the meantime, as always, keep those sites secure and up to date! A great way to stay informed and prevent possible compromises to your sites is  to follow the Joomla Security Mailing List, and the Vulnerable Extensions List.

Rochen are working to add an additional range of features to the Joomla Utilities over the coming months. We welcome any comments or feedback you may have regarding the current feature set.

Update: Please see our recent blog post with the new Joomla Utilities features: The choice to install Joomla 1.5 or Joomla 1.6 as well as the ability to migrate a Joomla website (1.5 or 1.6) from another host to your Rochen hosting account!

- Wendy

P.S. The “Joomla Utilities” option is available on all Rochen’s shared servers so is ready for immediate use by Business Hosting and Reseller Hosting customers. Managed Virtual Server (MVS) and full Managed Server customers can request this be installed on your server at no extra charge by opening a technical support ticket via the My Rochen customer portal.

The #1 Question at the Sales Desk is “How can I upgrade my Rochen Hosting Plan?”

As I tell people all the time, “It’s Easy.”

How Easy it?

If you are currently on a Rochen shared hosting plan that no longer meets your needs, you can upgrade anytime to a larger plan simply by opening a support ticket in our My Rochen customer portal a member of our technical support staff will be able to assist you to make the necessary changes to your account. As our support staff operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, you can upgrade whenever it is most convenient for you.

Do you know what the best part is? There’s no downtime in it for you. Other then your extra storage space and bandwidth, you won’t feel a thing!

Question #2: “Can I use your services before I redirect my DNS?”

Yes, absolutely.

When you sign up for an account with Rochen we give you a temporary url to use. With access to a temporary url you are able to upload your website to our servers before you switch your DNS and transfer the site permanently. This gives you the opportunity to view and test the functionality of your website, and clear up any issues. When you’re ready, just point your DNS to our nameservers (which you receive from us via your Welcome email). All done accordingly, you should experience no downtime as the DNS propagates.

Switching your DNS may vary depending on your domain registrar but is usually a simple process. Never cancel your domain registration on the assumption that you can re-register it with Rochen. We do not handle domain registration.

The third most common Inquiry is actually a tie between: “How many email addresses can I have with my plan?”, ” How many databases do you limit per account?” and, “How many subdomains can I have?”

The answer to all of the above is that we don’t actually limit those features in number.

With your Rochen hosting plan you can have as many email addresses, databases and subdomains as your plan’s available space allows.  It’s simple too and doesn’t cost you anything extra. All of these can be managed, by you, via your cPanel account in just a few steps. Email addresses are even easier to set up now with our Google Apps utility which is an available alternative to Rochen’s own email service included in our plans.

I hope to do more posts like this as new questions come in.  That’s all for now though! Thanks for reading.

If you have any questions about our services, you can reach us at sales@rochen.com, browse our Knowledge Base or ask a question in our customer forums.

-Wendy

Wendy Robinson joined the Rochen team in June 2010 as a sales support staff member. She is also currently involved with the Joomla! project as a member of the Community Leadership Team.

You can check out the new Rochen Customer Knowledge Base here. Now, when you visit our helpdesk, perhaps your question will be answered before you even have to ask us for help.

Let’s just review a few of the new articles and sections:

The Billing and Support Tickets sections contains articles such as:

• Adding alternate email addresses to My.Rochen.com profile
• What level of support can I expect from Rochen?

Under Common Issues some articles are:

• Can I access my account before changing my name servers / propagates to your servers?
• My site has been compromised, help!

We even have a Third Party Scripts section, with such articles as:

• Maintaining your website software/scripts
• Transfer a Joomla site to Rochen

… to point out just a few.

We encourage you to take the time to review the new Rochen Knowledge Base next time you are looking for help. You will find the ‘live search’ feature to be very handy, as it searches as you type to pull up articles that you might be interested in. Also, a ‘Related Articles’ section on each Knowledge Base article allows us to group together other articles on the same subject to help you even more. There are also plenty of animated tutorials to help explain things clearly for you.

Finally, last but not least, Rochen is pleased to welcome Adam Boswell on board as a new staff member. Many of you have already been helped by Adam, but when you see him around, be sure to say “hi”.

- Brad

Brad Baker has been a member of the Rochen team since early 2003 and is a founding member of the Joomla! Open Source Project. He currently is part of the Joomla LeadershipTeam, and also blogs here.

1. Can I expect the same level of service with Rochen’s UK hosting?

Yes, our UK service is pretty much a direct copy of our US offering. We have applied everything we have learnt in the US and used all of our best practices. Services like Rochen Vault Managed Backups are included free with the UK plans. Whether you are on a US or UK plan you can seamless login to Rochen Vault via: https://vault.rochen.com, for example. Technical support is all in one place too at: https://my.rochen.com.

2. What services does Rochen offer in the UK?

All of our shared hosting plans including the Starter Plan, Multiple Domain Hosting and Reseller Hosting are available in the UK. Our Managed Virtual Server (MVS) service is available too. The plans are identical to the US offering except we charge in GBP instead of USD. Simply select the US or UK option prior to ordering on the plan page.

Latest enclosed isle technology. Click to enlarge.

3. In the UK does Rochen own and manage all of the hosting infrastructure?

We own and manage everything. Rochen could have probably saved quite a bit if we had started out the UK service with lower capital investments by leasing servers. However, we were not about to start compromising our service standards, so if we were to offer a UK service it had to stand up to its US sister. All the infrastructure in the UK from the enterprise Supermicro rackmount services, to the Cisco switches and backup appliances are all fully owned and managed by Rochen.

4. Is the US or UK service best for me?

It really depends where the bulk of your site traffic originates from. Configuring Google Analytics on your site should be able to tell you. If the bulk of your traffic comes from within Europe or Africa then the UK service is best. If most of your traffic is coming from North America, South America or areas like Australia then the US service is probably best. Some European companies also need to host their data inside of the EU for data protection reasons, so the UK service would meet that requirement. If you host sites with traffic from different regions then splitting your hosting between both Rochen locations might be a smart move. E.g. a Reseller Hosting Plan in the US and another in the UK.

First shared servers. Click to enlarge.

5. I wish to change from the US to UK service. Is this possible?

This is not currently possible. The reasons behind not allowing transfers are purely business ones right now. We could end up with lots of people moving over and filling up the UK infrastructure. This would mean Rochen has huge additional capital and recurring outlays without any additional revenue. We will however allow transfers in the future. If you are upgrading though we can however offer a transfer. E.g. Reseller Hosting in the US to Managed Virtual Server (MVS) in the UK.

6. I wish to open a UK account in addition to my US account. Is this possible?

Yes, this is certainly possible. You can simply order a UK plan via our website. When ordering though please be sure to provide a different email address to the one you currently have on file with Rochen. This is to ensure your UK order is placed under a separate My Rochen customer portal login to your existing US account. Currently our customer portal can not support US and UK accounts under the one login.

Neat Cabling. Click to enlarge.

7. I am not currently a customer. What’s the best way to signup for Rochen UK?

Simply visit our website at: http://www.rochen.co.uk, find the plan that best meets your needs and signup. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to email sales@rochen.com, post within our pre-sales questions forum or Twitter us @rochenhost.

8. Are there any discounts for non-customers?

Yes, you can signup using the promo code UK20 (expires Sunday, 21st June) to receive a 20% discount on your first invoice or UK15 (expires Tuesday, 30th June) to receive a 15% discount on your first invoice. These discounts apply to the UK service only as part of our launch celebrations. You can use the promo code DEAL for a 10% discount on your first invoice with the US service though. If you pay annually for a Starter Plan or Multiple Domain Hosting Plan then the savings can be significant.

Thanks for taking the time to read and do get in touch if you have any questions at all about either our new UK offering or any Rochen service!

- Chris

Chris Adams is the Founder and CEO of Rochen, a web hosting provider specializing in providing a performance tuned hosting platform for dynamic database driven scripts.

I recently switched to a Nokia E71 and have decided that this is the best phone I have used to date. I actually made a conscious decision and chose this phone after evaluating it and the iPhone. Probably one of my favorite features is the keypad, with a full, albeit small, qwerty keyboard. Also, running the Symbian Operating System, many 3rd party applications are available.

It will be interesting to see in a few years how the Google Android phone operating system stacks up, but for now, I’m sticking with this phone.

What difference does it make to you as a customer of Rochen?

Well, for one thing, I can be even more connected. I’m able to receive email the moment it arrives, continue to interact with our staff while out and about via our internal IM (instant messaging) network oh, and in emergencies it even accepts phone calls.

It has inbuilt GPS which I use in conjunction with Google Maps at times.

Did you know?

• If any services fail on any of our servers our remote monitoring system sends all staff an SMS.
• All our staff interact with our servers using a secure method. Sometimes this is via https other times using SSH keys.
• All staff can access their email while away from their desk in case of emergencies or just to monitor the helpdesk.
• It’s not uncommon on any given day for all our staff to have a few conversations together. So despite our geographical location, we’re working together as one team to support you.

I also carry with me an Asus Eee PC in case I need to handle anything more important that can’t be handled via my phone. It runs a Linux based operating system which is both familiar to me, but also efficient on a small machine like this. I have the small 7″ Eee PC.

Technology really has come a long way, and it enables us to continue to provide the high level of service our customers has all become accustomed to.

What kinds of technologies help you to be able to continue to support your own customers?

- Brad Baker

Brad Baker has been a member of the Rochen team since early 2003 and is a founding core-team member of the Joomla! Open Source Project. He also blogs here.