In this week’s release: new LDAP Provisioning module and domain redemption period & redemption fees feature!

LDAP, the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, is a mature, flexible, and well supported standards-based mechanism for interacting with directory servers. It’s often used for authentication and storing information about users, groups, and applications, but an LDAP directory server is a fairly general-purpose data store and can be used in a wide variety of applications.

At HostBill we’ve already developed a plugin that enables staff member authentication with Active Directory / Lightweight Directory Access Protocol.

Our newly developed module allows to sell any AD/LDAP-Authenticated service and charge for number of active users in AD/LDAP Group. When creating AD / LDAP product in HostBill, admin can set limit of users that customer can create under the account.  Using the “Allow to select by client during order” function will create a form element which can apply additional pricing for user-entered value. An AD/LDAP Group can be later used by a client for various purposes, for example to authenticate Remote Desktop service. The client can manage users within the group from admin area: list, add new, modify existing users details and remove users from AD / LDAP group. Groups are created in AD/LDAP automatically by HostBill. HostBill also automates removing users from the group and upgrades/downgrades. The admin can view and manage billing details and control account lifecycle.

Domain redemption fees

In HostBill, the whole domain lifecycle can be automated: from registration, through transfer, expiration reminders to automatic renewals. Normally, domains can be renewed up to expiration date. One the expiration date passes, the admin can still set the domain “grace period”, which gives the client additional number of days to renew the domain for a regular price set for the domain renewal.

The new feature give the admin the opportunity to set the “redemption period” – additional number of days after the domain grace period when the client can still renew the domain. This time however the client must pay the additional ‘redemption fee’ on top of the domain renewal fee. The redemption period and fees can be set for each tld individually, respectively in the automation settings and general settings.