Configuring Apache Web Server On Linux

‫‪Republic of Iraq‬‬ ‫جمهورية العراق‬
‫‪Ministry of Higher Education‬‬ ‫وزارة التعليم العالي والبحث‬

‫‪and Scientific Research‬‬ ‫العلمي‬
‫‪University of Babylon‬‬ ‫جامع ــةباب ــل‬
‫‪College of Information‬‬ ‫كلي ـ ــةتكنولوجياالمعلومات‬
‫‪Technology‬‬ ‫قسم شبكات املعلومات‬
‫‪Department of Information‬‬ ‫التقرير النهائي‬
‫‪Network‬‬
‫التقرير النهائي‬
‫للعام الدراسي ‪ 2020-2019‬الفصل الدراسي (االول)‬
‫‪Configuring Apache Web server on Linux‬‬
‫اعداد الطالب‬
‫زينب كامل شيال‬
‫ملادة ( ‪ ) Introduction to Linux‬املرحلة ( الرابعة ) الدراسة( املسائي )‬
‫باشراف االستاذ‬
‫جورج عجام أسكندر‬
‫‪Page 1 of 8‬‬
Republic of Iraq ‫جمهورية العراق‬
Ministry of Higher Education ‫وزارة التعليم العالي والبحث‬
and Scientific Research ‫العلمي‬
University of Babylon ‫جامع ــةباب ــل‬
College of Information ‫كلي ـ ــةتكنولوجياالمعلومات‬
Technology ‫قسم شبكات املعلومات‬
Department of Information ‫التقرير النهائي‬
Network
Configuring Apache Web server on Linux
”Installing Apache Web server on Linux” told you where to download Apache
and explained how to install it on your Linux machine. Now I’ll follow up with
the basics of configuring the Apache Web server. I’ll also show you how to
make sure Apache starts automatically at boot time.
Working with the configuration files

As with many Linux-based programs, configuration for Apache is done through
the placement of directives in plain text files. In this case, the files are known as
httpd.conf, srm.conf, and access.conf. Their location and importance may differ
based on the particular installation, but the format remains the same. Through
these files, you may choose where to serve your Web documents from, what
modules are dynamically loaded at start-up, and even which port Apache will
listen on.
First, let’s look at the reasoning behind the three separate configuration files.
This has an almost Holy Trinity-like mystique in the Apache community. They
are basically a legacy of the NCSA 1.3 Web server and can be handled in many
different ways.
One option is to use httpd.conf as the server-wide configuration, srm.conf as

controlling naming and resources, and access.conf as setting access control for
the server. Another approach is to use only httpd.conf, which will support any
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directive that can be placed in either of the other two files. By placing the
options AccessConfig /dev/null and ResourceConfig /dev/null in httpd.conf, you
can tell Apache to look only to it for its configuration.
Another interesting method is to name directories httpd.conf, srm.conf, and

access.conf, respectively. The server will automatically parse any files and
subdirectories located there into the aforementioned configuration files. This
will let you break down items such as VirtualHosts to a very specific degree.
Location, location, location

Now that we’ve looked at why the configuration files exist in their current state,
let’s see where they’re located. Although the Apache root directory will vary
depending on installation options, these files will usually reside in the /conf
subdirectory. For example, if you installed Apache with all defaults, the
configuration files would be located in /usr/local/apache/conf.
This does not mean that you must use those particular files every time. The –f
command-line option allows for Apache to load its configuration from a user-
defined file at run time. Also, preconfigured packages from distributions such as
Red Hat and Debian may install to different directories. Under the current
version of Debian, the configuration files can be found in /etc/apache. If you’re
using Red Hat, you may want to check under /etc/httpd/conf.
If you’ve run more than one version of Linux before, you know that the
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directory structure and file locations can vary. When in doubt, running locate
httpd or locate apache with an updated database of files can be helpful in
pinpointing the exact location.
Configuring the server

Directives are entered into the configuration files one per line and are case-
sensitive. Placing a backslash at the end of the command can extend longer
entries into multiple lines. If you are not quite sure you entered the directives
correctly, Apache provides for some basic error checking of your syntax by
running apachectlconfigtest. If Apache sees a problem with a particular
command, it will give you the line number. Remember that you must still run
apachectl start to initialize the server. Let’s take a look at some standard
Apache directives taken from httpd.conf (which you can open with the text
editor of your choice, such as vi or pico):

# ServerType is either inetd or standalone.
ServerType standalone

# Port: The port the standalone listens to. For ports < 1023, you will
# need httpd to be run as root initially.
Port 80

# Document Root: The directory out of which you will serve your
# documents. By default, all requests are taken from this directory, but
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# symbolic links and aliases may be used to point to other locations.

DocumentRoot /var/www/

# Dynamic Shared Object (DSO) Support
# To be able to use the functionality of a module which was built as a DSO you
# have to place corresponding ‘LoadModule' lines at this location.
LoadModule php4_module /usr/lib/apache/1.3/libphp4.so

# AddType allows you to tweak mime.types without actually editing it, or to
# make certain files to be certain types.
AddType application/x-httpd-php .php .php3 .php4
Notice that these directives have comments located before them that help to
explain the syntax and functionality. Almost every configuration option is
explained to some degree in the files themselves—a nice feature if you’re like
me and tend to read the documentation only when you can’t figure something
out otherwise. An important one to notice is the LoadModule command. Upon
installing programs related to Apache, you may need to edit the configuration
file(s) to load the modules at start-up. If you installed PHP after Apache, you
will need the above command in combination with an AddType directive to
make sure Apache will process PHP files.
The above examples are fairly standard and may not need editing. Some
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directives, however, will change from server to server. Some examples of these
are:
 ServerName
 ServerAdmin
 BindAddress
The ServerName directive sets the host name of the server and is usually a fully
qualified domain name. This saves the server from trying to do a lookup of the
host name by IP address, which may not return the result you want. An example
of how to use this would be:

ServerNamewww.techrepublic.com
The ServerAdmin option is also straightforward. It is merely the e-mail address

of the person to whom administrative and error e-mails are sent. If multiple
Web servers are being run, a centralized address used here can be helpful.
BindAddress tells Apache to listen to either all IP addresses on the machine or

just one. This can be important if you are multihoming and don’t want certain
IP addresses to respond to HTTP requests. The default for this command is
BindAddress *, which tells the server to listen for connections on every IP
address.
Starting Apache
Apache can either be started manually or automatically at boot time. For manual
operation, you use the command apachectl. As mentioned previously, multiple
arguments can be passed to this command. To start Apache, you execute
apachectl start. To restart the server after making changes to the configuration,
you use apachectl restart or apachectl graceful. The graceful switch sends a
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SIGUSR1, as opposed to the SIGHUP used with restart.
To load the server during boot time, you can either place a script in init.d orrc.N
or place a call to apachectl from rc.local or rc.boot. (These files and locations
will vary depending on your distribution.) For example, here is my script in
/etc/init.d/ on a Debian/GNU system.
Apache startup script
#! /bin/bash
#
# apache Start the apache HTTP server.
#
NAME=apache
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin
DAEMON=/usr/sbin/apache
SUEXEC=/usr/lib/apache/suexec
PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
CONF=/etc/apache/httpd.conf
APACHECTL=/usr/sbin/apachectl

trap "" 1
export LANG=C

test -f $DAEMON || exit 0
test -f $APACHECTL || exit 0

if egrep -q -i "^[[:space:]]*ServerType[[:space:]]+inet" $CONF
then
exit 0
fi

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Network
case "$1" in
start)
echo -ne "Starting web server: $NAME.\n"
$APACHECTL start
;;

stop)
echo -ne "Stopping web server: $NAME.\n"
$APACHECTL stop
;;

exit 0
There will be as many ways to load Apache at boot time as there are versions of
Linux. You may need to consult your specific documentation if the above
suggestions do not work on your Linux system.
Conclusion
The Apache Web server, as with any full-featured program, has a variety of
configuration options. Stored in plain text files, the main configuration files are
easily accessible through the text editor of your choice. In addition to the
comments in the config files, Apache provides excellent documentation on
directives and configuration options at http://httpd.apache.org/docs.
This article introduced the basics of setting up Apache on a Linux system.

Hopefully, I’ve provided you with enough fundamental knowledge to configure
and start your server. However, I would recommend taking a further look at the
documentation before beginning your configuration and making note of the
features you will need. That way, you can configure your Apache server to do
exactly what you need it to do.
Page 8 of 8

Configuring Apache Web Server On Linux

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‫‪Republic of Iraq‬‬ ‫جمهورية العراق‬

‫‪Ministry of Higher Education‬‬ ‫وزارة التعليم العالي والبحث‬

‫‪Configuring Apache Web server on Linux‬‬

Configuring Apache Web server on Linux

Working with the configuration files

One option is to use httpd.conf as the server-wide configuration, srm.conf as

Another interesting method is to name directories httpd.conf, srm.conf, and

Location, location, location

Configuring the server

# symbolic links and aliases may be used to point to other locations.

The ServerAdmin option is also straightforward. It is merely the e-mail address

BindAddress tells Apache to listen to either all IP addresses on the machine or

SIGUSR1, as opposed to the SIGHUP used with restart.

Apache startup script

This article introduced the basics of setting up Apache on a Linux system.

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