APACHE WEB SERVER

Presented by
Lonnye Bower
Fardin Khan
Chris Orona

Introduction and
Installation of Apache
Server

Note: Images courtesy of apache.org

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

Installing Apache

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)

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

Installing Apache (cont)

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

Installing Apache (cont)

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

Installing Apache (cont)

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

Setting Up the Website

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

Setting Up the Website

(cont)
You will find a subdirectory called
conf under the directory where
you installed Apache
Copy 3 files (srm.conf-didst,
access.conf-dist, http.confdist) from this directory into
/usr/www/ganesan/conf
If you cannot find the 3 files, use the
find command to find them

Setting Up the Website

(cont)
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

Setting Up the Website

(cont)
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

Setting Up the Website

(cont)
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

Setting Up the Website

(cont)
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

Server Configuration

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

Server Configuration
(cont)
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

Server Configuration
(cont)
Set the ServerName directive to
the fully qualified domain name of
your server

Starting and Stopping

Apache

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 daemons PID and use the kill
command to terminate the process

A Note on Starting and

Stopping Apache

Later versions of Apache include a

script that does the start and stop
tasks for you

Virtual Hosting

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

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 youll host
Use the ifconfig command to set
up the IP address for each domain
on your server
ifconfig eth0:1 xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

Setting Up Virtual Hosting

(cont)
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>

Setting Up Virtual Hosting

(cont)
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

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

Key Terms
Apache
conf
Server Name
Virtual Hosting
ifconfig

Apache Resources
For more information on Apache go
to
www.apache.org
www.apacheweek.com
dev.apache.org

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