Chapter 21: Setting Up a Web Server

Overview

The World Wide Web is the fastest growing segment of the Internet. According to Netcraft (www.netcraft.com), there were more than 54 million Web sites on the Internet in September, 2004. Electronic commerce has provided a new virtual storefront for businesses trying to stay on the cutting edge of technology.

The Web has also been a boon to organizations seeking an inexpensive means to publish and distribute information. And with increasing computing power, decreasing prices, free operating systems such as Linux, and free Web servers such as Apache and TUX, it’s getting even easier for anyone to establish a presence on the Web.

This chapter shows you how to install and configure the Apache Web server. Each of the server’s configuration files is described and explained in detail. You learn about various options for starting and stopping the server, as well as how to monitor the activity of a Web server. Related security concerns and practices are addressed throughout the chapter in the descriptions and examples.

Note 

The current version of Fedora Linux comes with Apache version 2.0. Apache 2.0 includes support for a new Apache application programming interface, UNIX threading (for multi-processing), Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), and multiple protocols. A handful of new modules have also been added. With version 2.0, the package names apache and apache-manual changed to httpd and httpd-manual.