====== vocabulary ======

"httpd" is a synonym for "the Apache server in linux."  It stands for "http daemon," which is a piece of software that is always running in the background, watching and waiting for requests made through the <nowiki>http://</nowiki> protocol.  [[http://www.apache.org/|Apache]] is just one flavor of //httpd//, but it is extremely popular and successful.

====== Sundry commands ======

<code>
/etc/httpd/conf/conf.d/ 	# an important Apache startup directory
/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf 	#  Apache configuration file.

/var/www/html 			# root of documents served by Apache

apachectl
apachectl -M
apachectl configtest 	# test the syntax in the configuration file
apachectl graceful 	# restart Apache gracefully

httpd -t 		# same as apachectl configtest
httpd -v 		# short version
httpd -V 		# Verbose information about compilation
httpd -l 		# list compiled-in modules
httpd -M		# list loaded modules

service httpd start
service httpd restart
httpd
httpd -k stop
httpd

ps -ef |grep httpd # find out whether httpd is running

</code>

===== standard apache setup on linux =====
<code>

ServerRoot              ::      /etc/httpd
Primary Config Fle      ::      /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf
DocumentRoot            ::      /var/www/html
ErrorLog                ::      /var/log/httpd/error_log
AccessLog               ::      /var/log/httpd/access_log
cgi-bin                 ::      /var/www/cgi-bin (empty and disabled by default)
binary                  ::      /usr/sbin/httpd
start/stop              ::      /sbin/service httpd 

{start|stop|restart|condrestart|reload|status|fullstatus|graceful|help|configtest}

</code>

====== /var/www/html ======
This is the **document root**--where all browser-accessible files are kept.  When someone puts [[http://tighar.org]] into their browser, they arrive at /var/www/html/ on our system.  Their browser cannot access anything above that folder.
<code>
chown apache:apache html
chmod -R 775 html
</code>

====== .cgi support ======

In /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf:
#
# MXM: added for scripts
#

<Directory "/var/www/html/cgi-local">
    AllowOverride None
    Options +ExecCGI
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
</Directory> 

#
# MXM: uncommented following line, added .pl
#
AddHandler cgi-script .cgi .pl

====== .htaccess support ======

In /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf:
#
# MXM: Changed from None to AuthConfig to protect "protected" folder
#
    AllowOverride AuthConfig