Help

If you are new to HOASTI, we would recommend you read the help documentation in conjunction with the HOASTI demo – a fully functioning test version of the HOASTI web app, that allows you to “test drive” the fantastic features of HOASTI to see how it might benefit you. To read more and try the demo please click here.

Once you have seen what HOASTI can do, you will no doubt wish to sign up and get your FREE account! Please click here to register.

Once you’ve entered your registration details and confirmed that you have read our terms and conditions, you will be sent an email with a link to verify your email account (please check your Spam folder if you cannot locate the email).

Once verified, you will be prompted to set at least one security question (you must do this to be able to use any of the features of the site).

Once you have registered your account and set your security question(s), it’s time to add some data!  There are two methods in which to do this:

• importing the data from a csv file (see the “Importing CSV Data” section, right, for information) or,
• inputting your data manually, which is explained below.

When inputting data manually, it is important to note the order in which to enter the initial data, these steps are detailed below.

Technical data can be stored for the servers and websites that you add to HOASTI.  This includes:

• Control Panel information
• DNS information
• FTP Account details
• Database Account details
• CMS Account details (websites only)
• General Information

There are two types of notes in the technical details area:

1. Simple note field (used for Control Panel info., DNS info., and General notes).
2. Multiple account listings (used for FTP info., Database info., and CMS info. areas)

The former doesn’t really require any explanation – just enter the data and save!  For account listings, you are able to add multiple FTP/Database or CMS accounts to a server or website.  To add an account, click on the relevant tab (the FTP tab was selected in this example, but the process is the same for any of the tabs you select):

The FTP Info panel will show in red and the panel on the right will be cleared, allowing you to enter a new FTP account:

Once you have entered your data, click the “Save FTP Details” button and your new account will be added to the list:

you can add as many FTP accounts to your website or server as you wish.

To edit an account, simply click on it and the details will appear in the right pane with the option to save:

As you can see, whilst in edit mode, you also have the option to delete an account, or you can add another new account by clicking on the plus button at the top of the listing:

Costs or charges (for example hosting fees you charge to your clients) can be stored for the servers and websites that you add to HOASTI.  These charges will be used to calculate the figures that appear on the Billing page.

As an example, let’s say you have a server that you purchased from a provider that you host your clients’ websites on.  The provider charges you an annual amount for that server, so you want to add that to your server details.  Firstly, under the main server details panel, there is an option to add a billing start date (which will be the date the provider started billing you for the loan of the server).  There is also an option to add the date that the next bill is due (HOASTI will remind you 7 days prior):

Then, to add costs, scroll down to the “Server Costs” area, expand that section if it’s not already expanded, and enter the amount that you are charged by the provider and the billing cycle (annually, monthly, etc.) and save it:

The cost will appear in the listing with the date that it applies (if you entered an incorrect amount, simply edit it at any time by clicking on the entry in the list).  If the cost changes, but you still want HOASTI to hold the data for the previous period, simply add the new cost using the plus button at the top of the listing.

Adding Website Charges

Adding charges for websites is almost identical to the process for adding costs to servers, above.  The reminder for bill due dates is 30 days prior to the due date however, to give you time to invoice your client.

If your HOASTI data is not solely going to be viewed or administered by yourself, you can add other users to your account with the relevant access levels. To do this:

• Click on the “Account” option on the small menu at the top right of your screen, which will expand to give you a “Users” sub-menu.  Choose the “Add” option.

• On the resulting page, complete the relevant details and set the permissions.  You have 3 options:
  • Admin (access to view everything).
  • Billing (access to view only billing information)
  • Technical (access to view everything except billing information)
• Finally, you have the option to decide whether the user has read-only access or can add/update the data on HOASTI.  Ensure that the “writable” option is checked or unchecked, depending on the access required and click on the Save button.

You can edit the user data (or delete users) at any time by clicking again on the “Account” menu (top right) and selecting the “Manage” option under the “Users” sub-menu.

To view billing information, click on the “Billing” option on the top menu bar.  You will see that you have options to select a date period and then click on a “Get Report” button to view all the costs incurred and revenue received for that period.

By default, all information for all servers will be shown, but you can individually show or hide the information for a particular server by clicking (or tapping) on the server you wish to show or hide.  Any server(s) selected will be highlighted in black with an active eye icon, whereas unselected server(s) will show in grey with an eye icon with a line through it.

In order for data to appear on the Billing page, you will need to have added charges to the websites (Website Hosting Fees area) and costs for the servers (Server Costs area) that you manage.  See the “Adding Costs/Charges” help section, right, for how to do this.

HOASTI comes with an import tool to allow you to add data that you already have stored on a spreadsheet (or other source where you can export to csv) to your HOASTI account.

To use the tool, click on the tools menu option (indicated by a gears icon) on the top menu bar and a sub-menu will appear.  Click on the “Spreadsheet Import” option underneath the “Import Tools” section.

You will be provided with lots of information on how to upload your data from a csv file (including some example files for reference purposes).  It is worth taking some time to familiarise yourself with the process and we would recommend you perform this step before entering any data manually onto the system, because if you go wrong and you need to reset your data (by choosing the “Delete All Data” option from the tools menu option), as well as any data you’ve imported, any data you’ve entered manually will also be lost.

It is important to note that you do not have to customise your csv file to match HOASTI, as in the next step you will be dragging and dropping ONLY the fields you wish to import (and there are only 3 required fields: client name, server name, website name).  If you want a quicker performance however, you may want to consider removing any columns in your spreadsheet that you do not wish to import.

Once you have read and understood the information describing the upload process, the next step is to select the csv file you wish to import using the “Choose Import File” button.  If you have selected a valid csv file, the details (file name and size) will appear in the area underneath that button, along with a “Start Import” button.  Click on that button to begin the drag and drop process (again, some information is provided at the top of the page).  Familiarise yourself with this and then select whichever fields you wish to add to HOASTI from from the “Spreadsheet Columns” area (if this is blank or looks strange, it will probably be because either: you haven’t added your field/column titles on the first row; or used commas as separators and returns as line breaks).

Assuming everything looks fine however, you can start mapping your data to the fields on HOASTI.  To do this, just expand the relevant sections on the “HOASTI fields” area, depending on whether your data relates to a client, server or website (due to the vast amount of information HOASTI can store, we decided to split this area into sections to make the data mapping more manageable) and simply drag the relevant spreadsheet column to the corresponding field on HOASTI where you would like that information stored (note that required HOASTI fields are marked with an asterisk).

Once you let go of the mouse, the field will map to the HOASTI field that you dragged it to (use the black X to remove it or drag another field over the top if you make any mistakes).  Once you are happy with the mapping, click on the “Import Data” button to add your data to HOASTI (you will need to be patient when waiting for the process to complete, as there is a lot of processing happening behind the scenes).  If everything worked, you’ll get a success message and will be able to view your imported data on HOASTI.

If at any point you wish to clean out your HOASTI data, there is a “Delete All Data” option available from the tools menu (indicated by a gears icon):

If you select that option, you will be prompted to confirm you wish to go ahead, as once removed, the data cannot be restored.