Getting started and settings: installing and configuring CoreInto
The administrator guide opens with the chapter every new installation needs. Getting started lists the requirements, PHP 8.1 to 8.5 with PDO MySQL and a MySQL or MariaDB database, and then walks through uploading the files, the web installer, the configuration file, the storage folder and the single cron job. It explains the two address styles, short addresses with .htaccess on Apache or LiteSpeed and the index.php?r= style that works on any server, how to rename the admin folder, the first sign-in and how to require two-step sign-in for staff. A section on the encryption key says plainly what to back up, because the key in the configuration file protects every secret in the database.
The settings chapter follows. Nearly everything about how CoreInto behaves is a setting changed from the admin area, and the chapter documents the three pages drawn from the settings list: General Settings with its twelve tabs, Automation Settings with ten, and Tax Configuration. Storage settings, fraud protection and notifications each get a section of their own.
Read these two chapters before anything else; the rest of the administrator guide assumes the installation is running and the cron job is reporting on the Automation Status page.
Staff, security and email: roles, logs and templates
Staff sign in to the admin area with their own accounts, and what each may do comes from its role. The staff and security chapter covers administrators and administrator roles, two-step sign-in with TOTP, API credentials with their scopes and allowed addresses, banned IPs and banned email domains, security questions, sessions, sign-in lock-outs and the limiter, and the My Account page. A section titled What is encrypted lists the secrets that are stored encrypted, and another explains how admin forms behave behind web firewalls.
The logs get their own section because they are where staff go when something is unclear: the activity log, the email log, the module log with secrets hidden, the gateway log, the API log and the admin log each record a different kind of event.
The email chapter explains how an email is sent, through PHP mail or SMTP with a queue, the Mail tab in General Settings, and every template CoreInto comes with, each editable with merge fields and in per-language versions. It also covers the email message log, a client's email history, emails written by staff to one client, and mass messages to a selected group of clients. Together these chapters tell a new administrator who can do what, what is recorded, and what clients receive.
Clients and the catalogue: accounts, products, prices and promotions
A client is an account that is billed; a user is a person who signs in. The clients chapter is built on that distinction and documents the client list and search, the client page with its tabs, adding a client, managing users and invitations so one account can have several logins with different permissions, signing in as a client, password reset and email verification, client groups, custom client fields, marketing opt-in, the search box and client IP bans.
The catalogue chapter is everything you sell and the prices you sell it at. It begins with how prices work, then goes page by page through currencies with exchange rates and per-country currency, products and services of each type, shared, reseller, VPS or server, software licence and other, with per-term prices from monthly to triennial, one-time and free, setup fees, stock, featured products and upgrade paths. Configurable options, product add-ons, bundles, promotions and domain pricing per TLD each have a section.
These chapters answer the questions a store owner asks first: how to let a client's accountant sign in without sharing a password, how to offer a free domain with a hosting plan, and how to sell the same product in several currencies. The features page summarises the same ground for someone still deciding.
Orders and billing: the store, invoices, credit and tax
The orders chapter follows an order from the store to the order page. It describes the store and the cart, what happens when an order is placed, the order list and the order page with its accept, cancel and mark-fraud actions, adding an order as staff, order statuses, fraud protection hooks, order emails and the ordering settings that decide whether accounts are created on order, on payment or on acceptance.
The billing chapter is the longest in the guide, because billing is where money is recorded. Invoices are covered in full: statuses, numbering schemes, splitting and merging, cancelling, the PDF with your logo, batch PDF export, reminders, late fees and the automatic cancelling of unpaid services. Transactions and reversals, payments, refunds, the credit balance and add funds, billable items, quotes, credit and debit notes, disputes and mass pay each have a section. Tax configuration explains rates by country and state, inclusive and exclusive pricing and the tax ID label, and a section on renewal dates and proration shows how due dates line up.
The chapter ends with what the client sees, so staff can picture the invoice page their clients will open. The billing automation page on this site draws on the same chapter.
Payment gateways: PayPal, Stripe, JazzCash, Easypaisa and manual
A payment gateway is a way for a client to pay an invoice, and the gateways chapter documents each one CoreInto includes. Manual payment covers bank transfer, mobile wallet and cash with instructions shown to the client. PayPal, Stripe with cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay and saved cards, and the Pakistani providers JazzCash and Easypaisa each have a page describing the settings, the addresses the provider needs to be given for callbacks, and sandbox mode.
The chapter also explains the mechanics that are the same for every gateway: what the client sees when paying, how a provider's answer becomes a payment on the invoice, saved cards and automatic capture of renewals, card expiry notices, refunds made through the gateway, the gateway log, and staff-only gateways and payment methods restricted per client.
A closing section, Still to come and not yet tried, is honest about the edges. It notes that the built-in gateways were implemented against the providers' documentation and that sandboxes should be tried before taking real payments, and lists the gateways planned for a later update, Authorize.net, 2Checkout, Skrill, WorldPay, PayFast, Perfect Money and crypto providers, as planned rather than available. The payment gateways page gives the overview.
Services, servers and domains: modules, provisioning and registrars
A service is one product a client has bought, and the services and servers chapter explains how it comes to exist on a server. Settings › Servers lists servers and groups; the server modules section documents the intoPanel module and the cPanel & WHM module, with test, package reading, create, suspend with reason, unsuspend, terminate, change package, change password, usage reading and sign-in. Setting a product up to use a module, the life of a service from creation through fixed terms, upgrades, cancellation requests and termination, service add-ons, the pending module actions queue, the automation tasks that touch services and the client's service pages each have a section.
The domains chapter covers the other kind of product. It starts with how the work is divided between CoreInto and the registrar, then documents the registrar settings for ResellerClub, Namecheap, Spaceship, Porkbun and Dynadot, the domain list, when registration, transfer and renewal happen, syncing, renewal notices and expiry, WHOIS and availability, the client's domain pages, the domain settings and emails. A section called Not built yet lists what the chapter does not promise.
The separately sold PKNIC module for .pk domains is documented in the developer guide's add-on modules chapter, and the hosting automation and domain reseller billing pages summarise both chapters.
Support desk, affiliates, reports and utilities in the manual
The support chapter describes one place for staff to answer tickets that arrive from clients, from visitors who are not signed in, from staff and from email. It documents the settings that affect tickets, departments with their mailboxes, ticket statuses, escalation rules, spam control, the support overview and ticket list, opening a ticket as staff, tickets by email through piping or POP and IMAP mailboxes, guest tickets with their access-key link, Markdown in messages, predefined replies, the knowledgebase, announcements, downloads, network issues, closing idle tickets and removing old attachments.
The affiliates chapter explains how a client joins, gets a personal link and earns commissions on payments that are then released and paid out, with the settings, the affiliate list and the client side. The reports and utilities chapter lists the 23 reports and the batch invoice PDF under Reports, each a filtered table shown on the page and exported as CSV, and the Utilities menu with Automation Status, Email Marketer, link tracking, calendar, to-do list, logs, tools and Import Data.
Three further chapters round out the administrator guide: backups and updates, languages, and the CoreInto licence with its three states and what a restricted site can still do. The support desk page is the short version of the support chapter.
API, command line, add-on modules and licensing for developers
The developer guide is for people who write code against CoreInto. The API chapter documents Settings › API Credentials, calling the JSON API at /api/v1/ACTION, worked examples, and a reference of the actions for clients, orders, services, domains, invoices, payments, tickets and more, so a website, control panel or script can read and change records.
The command line chapter explains running php cli.php on a hosting account with shell access, lists the commands, including licence-set, licence-check, import-whmcs and cron, and documents tools/release.php for signing releases. The add-on modules chapter describes Settings › Add-on Modules, installing a module supplied separately, the included Gateway Fee and Renewal Pricing modules, the separately sold PKNIC module, and a section for developers on how a module is built.
The Licensing Manager chapter is shared with the administrator guide and extends it with the check addresses your software calls: what you need, the signing key pair, a product that sells licences, how a licence is issued and follows the service, binding, the check address, reissuing, the New licence key email, the admin pages, the client's service page, the API, version 2 with signed tokens, product codes and releases, and housekeeping. The developer guide holds all four chapters and the licensing manager page introduces the last.