Directadmin - Falling behind?

compibot

compibot

Verified User
Joined
Aug 21, 2005
Messages
690
Location
Spain
Hi guys,

For over 4 years our company has been based on Directadmin entirely. We currently do not use any other hosting control panel. We run over 80 machines with DA, and 200 vms that use DA. Some with our own licences, other rented from DCs.

Lately I've been looking around at what's going on with other panels, and I am starting to feel that the other panels are much more beautifull and feature full. It kinda hurts, you know what I mean ? It hurts because I know that DA staff has always worried more about bug fixes and making the system more robust, rather than adding fancy stuff, which is really important. But I find myself looking out the window too often lately and feeling attracted by these other panels.

In Spain we are one of the few companies that use DA. We loose a lot of business in both shared and dedicated hosting, just becuase we don't use the other panels, and also becuase I think when people look at DA it looks old and simple.

The reason why I am expressing my feeling towards DA is becuase I believe in this project, I believe in DA staff, and I want you guys to know how I feel.

I think we need to do start looking like we need to look bigger, sharper and competitive against out competitors. This affect all of us, even our resellers.

I think we need to buy DA some new clothes. So we feel alive, young and powerfull up against the other panels.

I want to look out the window and feel good about using DA.

:o
 
I heard that DA will have a new beautiful skin soon (tableless with AJAX etc.) :) (unofficial news)
 
I know I have looked at Cpanel recently and was lost in all the clutter. Its not very well organized in my opinion. I could barely figure out how to use it.
 
I hear you cyberneticos.

Working with DirectAdmin is an absolute pleasure, but it does look very stale. It's getting harder to sell to our clients because it doesn't look good on the surface, and I have to admit that I've also been looking at the competitions products again. Once I look and test though I quickly remember why we use DA. It's not perfect, but it is damn good.

In a perfect world looks wouldn't matter, but hey, I'm as shallow as the next guy. ;)

What would I love to see DirectAdmin feature soon is;

  • A nice new modern skin (tableless with AJAX etc...)
  • A way to config/run custombuild from within DA (and watch the compile via AJAX - hey, one can always hope :P).
  • An official mail user access level.
Keeping a code base maintained is a tough job and I'll continue to show patience in regards to development speed as long as the product remains as rock stable as it is.
 
smtalk said:
I heard that DA will have a new beautiful skin soon (tableless with AJAX etc.) :) (unofficial news)
Click to expand...

That's great news. At least a step foward into getting a new look.

It doesn't matter what we , as admins, think of DA, or think of the other panels. What matters is what prospects think of DA when they see it for the first time.

It's hard to convince people of DA's greatness, when the worse aspect about DA is its look. :(
 
One thing I've heard mentioned is cPanel's ability to have multiple IP's / Certs per user - whereas DA can only have one.

We also are exclusively DA - and I'd really like to see this project go to the next level. Something "new" something "different".
 
cyberneticos, with 280 DirectAdmin licenses, I'd think you'd want to have your own identity and your own skin anyway.

We use the DirectAdmin enhanced skin because we specialize in DirectAdmin and therefore we like supporting it as a standard as much as we are able. We've NEVER had a client complain to us about the DirectAdmin skin, and some of our clients even use the original skin.

However, if I had my choice, what I'd like to see is a skin based on Smarty Templates.

There, that's my two cents worth :).

Jeff
 
Hi Jeff,

Creating and maintaning your own skin in a different language is equivalent to many man hours.

Some how the other panels have managed to have a nice looking one and in many other languages.

Again, just expressing how I feel about DA, not only the skin (seems like we are focusing on it). I'm already testing out other panels, I might even have my customers vote on it.

Again, this is not exclusively about how I feel about DA or DA's skin. It's about how prospects might feel about using DA and what they might think when looking at it for the first time.

We can all sit here and come up with some very good ideas so DA stays the same. We can come up with many excuses to just "be happy" with what we have.

As a DA fan, and one that respects the hard work that goes into DA, I still find myself looking at other panels, feeling like we are falling behind, and wanting to do something about it.

Thanks for the quick fix ideas in any case.

I'll stick with smtalk's post for now, and keep looking around.
 
Last edited:
I do understand your points... however

cyberneticos said:
We can all sit here and come up with some very good ideas so DA stays the same. We can come up with many excuses to just "be happy" with what we have.
Click to expand...
Or we (or DirectAdmin staff) could create what someone thinks is the perfect skin, and still you (or anyone or everyone) may not like it.

I'd much rather see constructive suggestions here and in other threads in this subforum.

But of course that's my opinion :).

Jeff


As a DA fan, and one that respects the hard work that goes into DA, I still find myself looking at other panels, feeling like we are falling behind, and wanting to do something about it.

Thanks for the quick fix ideas in any case.

I'll stick with smtalk's post for now, and keep looking around.[/QUOTE]
 
Hi Jeff,

Again, I am sharing my feelings about the reason why I'm looking at other panels. Going to a new panel becuase I think it's more fresh looking than DA is as constructive as it gets. I am saying clearly saying

"We need a change. DA looks old. Other panels look better and seem to have more features"

Let's not be afraid of change, or afraid someone might not like. Let not allow fear to keep us from getting a fresher look.

This is constructive criticism.

I think that you should realize that I don't waiste my time writing up these posts to just bitch. But to critisize constructivley, be taken seriously since I am a customer sharing his feeling about the product. Not to be taken like a winer.
 
I never accused you of being a whiner. But I don't see anything specific in your criticism, and that's my problem.

Personallly I like control panels to stay the same, and my clients aren't complaining. I'd certainlly wouldn't start developing a skin because you think it's not as fresh as others, without knowing exactly what you'd like to see.

Personally, I think that the skinability of DirectAdmin is one of it's best features, though I personally don't use it.

Of course DirectAdmin isn't my product; perhaps DirectAdmin staff will see your posts as very constructive.

Jeff
 
I'm hoping Directadmin (John/Mark) can comment on this topic ... there are several of us that feel like cyberneticos ..

People TYPICALLY don't spend a lot of time within the control panel itself (with DirectAdmin) - but a new set of skins would be nice. Also, there have been several threads (this one included) with ideas for new features that we (and our customers) would like to see within Directadmin.
 
Jeff,

Relax a little. You are starting to sway to the extremity and putting words into my mouth.

I never said, "Change the skin becuase I don't like the current skin" or "I don't like DA's current skins."

I can agree with you that I didn't give any concrete suggestions to make DA a better skin, and a more entising skin to new customers. But that doesn't make my points any less constructive.

Perhaps this thread really isn't for you. Why? Becuase something pushed you to use your own skin, right ? In other words, you have already come to the conclusion that DA's skin wasn't good for your company to use, and you took the iniciate to make your own.

I am not a web designer, and again, it is not easy to translate DA to another language when a good chunk of it is hardcoded (that's another constructive criticism) as it is to just change a few graphics around.

I think we need DA to make a nice, new and bad ass looking skin, with languages included like other skins have it, and add a few new features, or at least make it look like we are a living project with some kind of innovation. Again, I personally know DA is rock solid, is a bad ass panel, but we need to "look" like it too.

If you don't think this is constructive enough, perhaps DA staff will. As a matter of fact, if what smtalk says is true, then DA must have seen the need for this and that reinforces the fact that they might agree with how I feel and believe that how we look on the outside is pretty important and have acted upon it.
 
Last edited:
Hello smtalk :)

Nope, actually talking about like text chunks that are hard coded here and there. I tried translating the skin about 2 years ago, and it was not very translator friendly.

Not much has changed in 2 years in this aspect (part of my criticism to which John already address in a thread I created about a year ago)
 
Last edited:
As you know any form of art is very subjective. A skin is nothing but art. I personally think the DA enhanced skin is the best one out there. I have looked today at the most popular control panels out there. I do not like any of them. I see a few people have commented in this thread in favor of a new skin. Apparently the other members of the forum really don't care that much.
 
My point is that you might be able to accomplish more by setting up a poll to find out what others think.

And again, as has already been pointed out many times throughout the forum in many places, you can get somebody to create your own "bad ass looking skin."

If it really meant that much to me I would not waste my time posting here. I would get it done myself. I already got what I paid for from DA.

So why even bother replying ?
Click to expand...

You are correct.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top