What is an Isolated Environment?
An isolated environment in ServerAvatar is a security feature that keeps applications separated by running each under its own system (application) user account.
As one application user cannot access the files of another application user, you get an environment where security issues on one site cannot affect the other sites hosted on your server. Imagine someone hacked into your application files and tried to access application files using absolute paths. It won't work when it comes to ServerAvatar.
Similarly, a PHP script with the same intention will not work, and a WordPress plugin with malicious code cannot affect other websites on the same server.
Best Practice: Assign one application user per application to ensure maximum isolation. This way, a compromise in one app cannot affect any others on the same server. Or, if you have a group of developers, freelancers, or clients who need access to the server files, you can create multiple applications under a single user account.
Applications under the same user account share the same environment. To achieve isolation, use separate user accounts for each application.
Here is the visual representation of isolated environments. It will make it easier for you to understand.
Isolation works the same way on both self-managed and managed servers, giving you consistent security no matter how your server is provisioned.
This way, you can manage as many users and as many applications as you want on your servers. There is no limit on how many sites you can create per application user or how many application users you can create on a single server.
Now that you understand isolated environments and the fundamentals of ServerAvatar, you’re ready to move on to the installation process.