Shafail Shafa
Available for new work · I reply within a business day · UTC+6

I upgrade and customise phpBB forums

I set up and maintain Linux servers

I fix broken or hacked WordPress sites

I transfer websites and emails between hosts

Thirteen years of keeping small-business web infrastructure working: forums, sites, servers, mailboxes and the moves between them. Beyond WordPress that includes Joomla, Drupal, Laravel and plain PHP applications, plus self-hosted automation and private AI. You deal with me directly, not with an agency.

5.0 ★ · 2,200+ reviews · 100% job success · 13 years
5.0 ★
rating
2,200+
reviews
3,200+
orders
100%
job success
13
years

Some of the work

All case studies →
AUTOMATION & AI

Production self-hosted n8n with tested disaster recovery

An n8n instance running in production on my own hardened VPS, with a restore I've tested end to end on a clean server.

n8n · Docker · nginx · PostgreSQL 16 · Prometheus · Grafana · Uptime Kuma · Tailscale
AUTOMATION & AI

Private self-hosted AI stack

A private AI setup on self-managed infrastructure. Local models by default, with a cloud API used only where local hardware isn't enough.

Ollama · OpenWebUI · SearXNG · Claude API · Linux · nginx
PHPBB

Five years of phpBB work for one publisher

Six separate phpBB contracts with the same client between 2016 and 2021. It started with a single extension install and ended with a version upgrade that had to carry a whole set of modified extensions along with it.

phpBB · PHP · MySQL · HTML/CSS · Cloudflare · WordPress
PHPBB

A sixteen-year-old phpBB 2 board brought up to the current version

A bulletin board that had been running phpBB 2.0.11 since around 2005, moved onto the current phpBB 3 release with its posts and user base intact.

phpBB 2 · phpBB 3 · PHP · MySQL
PHPBB

A community forum kept current across seven updates

The same client hired me seven times between 2019 and 2024 to update one phpBB board and adjust it as their branding changed.

phpBB · PHP · MySQL · CSS · cPanel · Google AdSense
PHPBB

A forum where no email worked and nobody could reach the admin panel

Signup confirmations and alerts had stopped sending, so new members couldn't register, and then the admin account locked itself out because password resets went through the same broken email.

phpBB · PHP · MySQL · SMTP
WORDPRESS

Old phpBB forum moved into bbPress on WordPress

An old phpBB board moved into bbPress on WordPress. I carried across the whole category structure, the posts, attachments, users and groups, so none of the forum's history got left behind.

phpBB · bbPress · WordPress · PHP · MySQL
WORDPRESS

A WordPress site that turned into a monthly retainer

This one started as a site build with a learning app attached and turned into a standing monthly arrangement to keep everything maintained. By value it's the largest single contract in my Upwork history.

WordPress · PHP · MySQL · HTML/CSS
SERVER CARE

Maintaining a long-standing client's Linux servers

A client I'd been doing phpBB work for since 2016 brought me onto their Linux servers: configuration, maintenance, security policy, backups, and a disaster recovery plan behind them.

Linux · Debian · MySQL · PostgreSQL · Bash · TCP/IP
MIGRATION

Four years of hosting work for a web agency

Forty-eight orders between 2021 and 2025 for one agency: certificate installs, moves between hosting accounts, server setup, and whatever else broke on the sites they host for their own customers.

cPanel · Linux · Let's Encrypt · DNS · WordPress · VPS
SERVER CARE

A site that broke every morning

A small business site went down most mornings, and the owner had been bringing it back by re-uploading one file. The real cause was the hosting company overwriting that file every night.

Apache · .htaccess · PHP · cPanel
MIGRATION

A forum and its image gallery after a server move

A community forum with a separate image gallery had been moved to a new server by someone else. Image links across the board were dead, and a large part of the gallery had never arrived.

phpBB · Piwigo · Plesk · rsync · FTP
PHPBB

A scheduled forum upgrade, and a thumbnail that came out sideways

A version upgrade booked for a fixed hour, so the members could be told when the board would be down, followed by two image problems that both turned out to be somewhere other than phpBB.

phpBB · PHP · GD · EXIF · Cloudflare

What clients say

All 2,200+ reviews →

A few out of 2,200+, across 13 years. 58 percent of them are from clients who came back.

★★★★★ Fiverr

“Delivered as expected! Pleasure to work with! Got my server fixed and ready to go quicker than I thought.”

j*** · United States · Server care · Jul 2024
★★★★★ Upwork

“If you need phpBB work done on your site, Shafail is your man. We have worked with him over the past couple years now and will continue to work with him because he produces excellent results and often suggests improvements that we end up implementing, which has really been a huge help. He has done various projects with us, and has proven himself to be dependable and trustworthy, which is very important when finding freelancers. He has my highest recommendation and you will enjoy working with him, as his communication skills are top notch too.”

D*** M*** · United States · phpBB · Aug 2017
★★★★★ Fiverr

“Amazing experience. Would definitely use again. Really happy with the work produced and has saved me so much time trying to do something that I have absolutely no clue about. Shafa transferred all of my old emails to my new account as well as transferring an old website domain and 14 email address to a new domain name. It wasn't always easy to find a time to connect so that I could give him access codes, because of the time difference, but he remained consistent and competed the project exactly as I needed. Thank you very much”

b*** · United Kingdom · Migration · Nov 2025
★★★★★ Fiverr

“This is the second time I used this seller to transfer my website, and once again he did a fantastic job. Anyone looking to have their website transferred without any headache and very fast, then hire this guy. Excellent communication skills and very smart. I highly recommend this seller and will only use him for any website transfer.”

s*** · Bahamas · Migration · Jul 2022
★★★★★ Fiverr

“Excellent work! He was fast, and (due to my ignorance) had to do extra work, but still completed the job quickly and with no extra charge. Will definitely use again, and highly recommend!”

t*** · United States · Migration · Jul 2015
★★★★★ Fiverr

“Very good communication, there were some problem which could not be resolved, but dtyacf did his best to fix the problem, which were a result of my server. He offered me a refund but I declined to ask for a refund. He was dedicated and did the work I asked for. I recommend dtyacf. Michael”

m*** · United States · Migration · Jul 2016

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