3. Introduction to Apache
• Apache is a web server package that
works under Linux as well as under
other operating systems
• The name Apache comes from the
concept of extensive patching of
existing code
• The primary advantage of Apache is
that it is generally free or available at
modest costs
5. Installing Apache From a CD-ROM
• If your CD-ROM has Apache and you
want to use RPM to install the package,
issue this command
– rpm –i apache_1_3_4.rpm
(substitute the full name of the Apache package)
6. Installing Apache From a Download
• Place the downloaded files in a location
that will be dedicated to the Apache
files, such as /usr/apache
• Uncompress the files using either gzip
or tar and compress
• You must edit the configuration file
– You can find more information about this in
the Readme file
7. Installing Apache… (con’t)
• Uncomment all the Modules in the
configuration file except
– cern_meta_module
– msql_auth_module
– dld_module
• Choose either db_auth_module or
dbm_auth_module; they should not be
used together
8. Installing Apache… (con’t)
• Create the configuration file for Linux by
issuing the command
– Configure
• Compile Apache by issuing the make
command
– The most common error message
encountered concerns the socket.h library,
most likely because TCP/IP is not installed
9. Installing Apache… (con’t)
• The result of the compilation will be a
binary file called httpd
• Copy this file into /bin or /usr/bin,
where it will reside in the path
11. Setting Up the Website
• Create the home directory for the
website, we will use
/usr/www/ganesan
• Create 3 subdirectories under the site
directory
– conf
– htdocs
– logs
12. Setting Up the Website (con’t)
• You will find a subdirectory called conf
under the directory where you installed
Apache
– Copy 3 files (srm.conf-didst,
access.conf-dist, http.conf-
dist) from this directory into
/usr/www/ganesan/conf
– If you cannot find the 3 files, use the find
command to find them
13. Setting Up the Website (con’t)
• Rename the 3 files you just copied to
drop the “-dist” portion of the name
• Edit the httpd.conf file to specify
– the port number on which your web server
responds
– the user running the httpd daemon, etc…
• Specify the server name
– ServerName ganesan.com
14. Setting Up the Website (con’t)
• Add a line that specifies the root
directory for your website
– DocumentRoot
/usr/www/ganesan/htdocs
• Edit the srm.conf file to set up the
web home directory and any special
internal command usage
• Edit the access.conf file to set a
basic set of access permissions
15. Setting Up the Website (con’t)
• In the htdocs directory create an
HTML file for the server to read when it
starts
– This can be any HTML file
– The filename should be default.html
• Start the httpd daemon
– httpd –f /usr/www/ganesan/conf
16. Setting Up the Website (con’t)
• Test the web server by starting a
browser and specify the URL
http://127.0.0.1/
• If the system is working properly, you
will see a screen with a list of files in the
htdocs directory
18. Server Configuration
• Make sure the ServerType directive is
set to “standalone”
• Check the Port device to make sure it is
set to the TCP/IP port to which your
Apache server listens
• Set the User directive to either the user
ID (UID) or the user name used for all
web visitors
19. Server Configuration (con’t)
• Set the Group directive to either the group ID
(GID) or the group name assigned to all web
users
• Modify the ServerAdmin directive to include
the e-mail address of the administrator
• Set the ServerRoot directive to the absolute
path to the directory where all Apache
resource and configuration files are stored
– /usr/apache/conf or /etc/httpd
22. Starting and Stopping Apache
• If you are running Apache as a
standalone server, you need to start
and stop Apache manually
– Start with httpd –d rootdir –f
configs
– To stop Apache use ps to detect the httpd
daemon’s PID and use the kill command
to terminate the process
23. A Note on Starting and Stopping
Apache
• Later versions of Apache include a
script that does the start and stop tasks
for you
25. Virtual Hosts
• A virtual host is a web server that
resides on one domain but acts as if it
was on another. For example, suppose
you control ganesan.com and
cis454.com. Instead of setting up 2
servers, you can set up a single
machine that serves both domains.
• Virtual hosting saves on machinery and
allows for a lot of flexibility in setting up
web servers
26. Setting Up Virtual Hosting
• If your network uses a name server for
DNS, modify it so that the domain name
points to your web server for each
domain you’ll host
• Use the ifconfig command to set up
the IP address for each domain on your
server
– ifconfig eth0:1 xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
27. Setting Up Virtual Hosting (con’t)
• Add the route to the network configuration
using the route command
– route add –host xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx dev eth0:1
• Edit the Apache httpd.conf file to set up virtual
hosting
– <VirtualHost www.cis454.com>
DocumentRoot /usr/www/cis454/htdocs
TransferLog
/usr/www/cis454/logs/access
ErrorLog /usr/www/cis454/logs/errors
</VirtualHost>
28. Setting Up Virtual Hosting (con’t)
• The previous step defines the virtual
host for cis454.com and specifies its
DocumentRoot, since each virtual host
will have different web directories
• If more than one virtual host is defined,
the entries are to be repeated for each
29. A Final Note
• There are many more configuration
options possible with Apache, but they
are usually used for commercial sites
that require authentication or special
handling characteristics
31. Apache Resources
• For more information on Apache go to
– www.apache.org
– www.apacheweek.com
– dev.apache.org
32. Thank You and Good Luck!
If you have any questions regarding
Apache and/or any part of this
presentation, please feel free to email:
Lonnye Bower at Lonnye@aol.com
Chris Orona at corona@calstatela.edu
Fardin Khan at Fardin24@aol.com
Editor's Notes
As we all know, in the UNIX environment there are various flavors of this
operating system. To name a few:
IBM: AIX
SUN: SOLARIS
HP: HP-UX
SILICON GRAPHICS: IRIX
And there’s…………………...
