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Troubleshoot - by Hostrare

Update On: 23 Jul 2021CloudFlare Plugin install on cpanel

CloudFlare is a performance and security service. With 14 points of presence around the world, a website on CloudFlare typically loads twice as fast, uses 65% less server resources, saves 60% of bandwidth and has an additional layer of security. Hosting Providers get reduced server load, bandwidth savings, mitigation of DDoS attacks and and IPv4/v6 gateway.

The CloudFlare cPanel plugin makes it easy to integrate into your hosting control panel. It takes less than 5 minutes to install on a test server and then the service is available to your end customers with two clicks.

Before proceed to install cloudflare plugin, you should get HOST KEY from cloudflare partners 

https://www.cloudflare.com/certified-partners

Installation

Install cloudflare cpanel plugin Using an SSH client such as Terminal or Putty:

Step 1. Access cPanel for the server using root user by:

ssh root@SERVER IP ADDRESS or SERVER NAME

Step 2.

cd /usr/local/cpanel

Step 3.

curl -k -L https://github.com/cloudflare/CloudFlare-CPanel/tarball/master > cloudflare.tar.gz

Step 4.

tar -zxvf cloudflare.tar.gz

This extracts a directory that includes a UNIQUE ID. For example, the directory will be in this format:
cloudflare-CloudFlare-CPanel-d03f3b8
The UNIQUE ID is only: d03f3b8
The UNIQUE ID is not cloudflare-CloudFlare-CPanel-d03f3b8

Step 5.

cd cloudflare-CloudFlare-CPanel-UNIQUE ID/cloudflare/

Step 6.

./install_cf API HOST KEY mod_cf “YOUR COMPANY NAME”

example for Awesome Hosting Company: ./install_cf 56yt8x9s987dfy4324bnv mod_cf “Awesome Hosting”

Best SysAdmin practices

Now that CloudFlare is installed, you can remove some of the unnecessary remnant files:

Step 9.

cd ../ ../

This takes you back two levels.

Step 10.

rm -rf cloudflare-CloudFlare-CPanel-UNIQUE ID*

To check if it is installed:

cat /etc/cloudflare.jsonorcat /usr/local/cpanel/etc/cloudflare.json

You should see an output with the following:

root@server1 [/usr/local/cpanel]# cat etc/cloudflare.json{ “host_key”:”32yt5a7b436tuy8974tre -”, (For security purposes, this will not be your host key.) “host_formal_name”:”Awesome Hosting”, “host_name”:”api.cloudflare.com”, “host_uri”:”/host-­gw.html”, “user_name”:”www.cloudflare.com”, “user_uri”:”/api_json.html”, “host_port”:”443”, “host_prefix”:”cloudflare-­resolve-­to”, “cp_version”:”1.3.0”}

Uninstall:

/usr/local/cpanel/bin/unregister_cpanelplugin /usr/local/cpanel/3rdparty/cloudflare.cpanelplugin

Test Websites

To ensure that CloudFlare was properly installed, enable CloudFlare for three test websites from your control panel.

To check if a website is on CloudFlare, use Terminal. Open Terminal, and enter the following dig command.

dig www.mydomain.com

Output without CloudFlare-enabled:

www.mydomain.com 10782 IN CNAME www.mydomain.com

Output with CloudFlare-enabled:

www.mydomain.com 10782 IN CNAME
www.mydomain.com.cdn.cloudflare.net.

If you see ‘.cdn.cloudflare.net’ at the end, then CloudFlare is enabled.