This document describes a basic Apache installation and configuration. Apache is a free open source software which runs web servers.

Installation

Check if Apche is already installed	rpm -qa | grep httpd
Install Apache Webserver	yum groupinstall “Web Server” yum install httpd
Install PHP Support	yum groupinstall “PHP Support” yum install php php-mysql
List of useful PHP-libraries and -modules	yum search php-
To see more details about what each module does	yum info name of the module
Start Webserver	service httpd start apachectl start
set the Apache to run automatically when the server boots	chkconfig httpd on
Install LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP)	yum groupinstall “Web Server” “PHP Support” “MySQL Database server” “MySQL Database client” yum install php-mysql
See PHP on the server by creating testpage	vi /var/www/html/info.php <?php phpinfo(); ?>
Visit your site	http://server/info.php
Restart Apache	service httpd restart
Scrtipt to control the functioning of the Apache httpd daemon	apachectl start|stop|restart|fullstatus|status|configtest
Restart / Stop without aborting currently open connections	apachectl graceful |graceful-stop

Configuration

The default configuration (/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf) is already preconfigured to get Apache Server running. All you need is to write your index.html and your web pages and place them in the default DocumentRoot ( /var/www/html).

Best Practices

There are numerous ways to organize your Apache configuration files. In some cases this will be dictated by your Linux distribution.

• Minimize changes to /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf. It’s easier to upgrade or migrate if this file has few or no changes.
• Place virtual host definitions in /etc/httpd/conf/vhosts.conf.
• Put the document root for each website at /var/www/vhosts/[domain name]/httpdocs. Do not include “www” on the domain name. For example with “exampledomain.com” the document root would be /var/www/vhosts/ exampledomain.com /httpdocs.

Here’s a template for the virtual host definition:

NameVirtualHost *:80

 

<VirtualHost *:80>

ServerAdmin webmaster@ exampledomain.com

ServerName exampledomain.com

ServerAlias www. exampledomain.com

DocumentRoot /var/www/vhosts/ exampledomain.com /httpdocs

ErrorLog logs/ exampledomain.com -error_log

CustomLog logs/ exampledomain.com -access_log combined

<Directory /var/www/vhosts/ exampledomain.com /httpdocs>

AllowOverride All

</Directory>

</VirtualHost>

 

Firewall

Make sure the firewall does not block access to port 80 by running:

system-config-securitylevel

Allow WWW(HTTP) as “Trusted Services”

Configuring user based security

To allow only authorized users who have passwords, add the following lines to /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf.

Just before the commented option for the UserDir directive:

AuthType Basic
AuthName “Test Passwords”
AuthUserFile /etc/httpd/passdb
Require user user1

Configuring Passwords

To create the passwords database passdb in /etc/httpd and add user1 to it run the following command:

htpasswd -c /etc/httpd/passdb user1

To add another user, run the following command without the -c switch (which creates the database):

htpasswd /etc/httpd/passdb user2

Configuring host based security

Add the following to the Directory if you want to allow access only to your network. If your network for example is 192.168.1.0:

# vi /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Order allow,deny
Allow from  192.168.1.0/255.255.255.0

 

Setting permissions for PHP sites

Secure your site by setting the correct permissions on your DocumentRoot:

Set Apache user as the owner for your DocumentRoot	chown -R apache:apache /var/www/html/yoursite
Modify permissions	chmod -R 400 /var/www/html/yoursitechmod -R a+X /var/www/html/yoursite

In some cases your PHP site requires write access in some folders. For example WordPress sites requires write access into the /wp-content folder to could install plugings, themes or updates.

Provide write permissions to WordPress

chmod -R 775 /var/www/html/yoursite/wp-content

Troubleshooting

Make sure Apache is running	service httpd status
Start Apache	apachectl start service httpd start
Make sure Apache is starting during the boot process	chkconfig httpd on
Test the syntax of the configuration	httpd -t httpd –S
view error log file	tail /var/log/httpd/error_log
view Access log file	tail /var/log/httpd/access_log
restart Apache without disconnecting the user	service httpd reload apachectl graceful