In this lab you will set up Apache2 and configure a virtual server. You will practice incorporating modules, and test your web service.
Install the Apache2 package using apt-get install apache2.
Add a UFW rule to allow web browsing service through your firewall ( ufw allow 80/tcp ). Test that you can access your web service with a browser on your host laptop, accessing it using the IP address in the URL (http://pcNNNNNNNNN). Verify you see the Apache2 default page describing the available documentation and configuration basics.
Try reloading your apache configuration files using apachectl graceful. Note the suggestion to set a default server name.
Create a file named defaulthostname.conf in /etc/apache2/conf-available and put your server’s name in it using the ServerName directive(i.e. ServerName pcNNNNNNNNN). Enable the new conf file using a2enconf defaulthostname. Restart your Apache service and verify you get no more errors or suggestions. Test retrieving the default web page using wget -O - http://pcNNNNNNNNN and telnet pcNNNNNNNNN 80. Verify you can still access the default site home page using your web browser to access http://pcNNNNNNNNN. Try to access your personal public_html document directory using http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~your-username. That should result in an error saying document not found.
Enable the userdir module using a2enmod userdir. Reload your apache configuration. Try to access your personal public_html document directory using http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~your-username. You should now see a directory listing showing an empty directory.
We don’t want directory listings to be available by default, so modify the mods-available/userdir.conf file to not include Indexes in the Directory permissions Options line. Use the AllowOverride directive to permit the users to override the missing Indexes directive using .htaccess files at their discretion (i.e. add Options=Indexes to an AllowOverride line in the Directory stanza of mods-available/userdir.conf). After the edit, your file might look like this:
<IfModule mod_userdir.c>
UserDir public_html
UserDir disabled root
<Directory /home/*/public_html>
AllowOverride FileInfo AuthConfig Limit Indexes Options=Indexes
Options MultiViews SymLinksIfOwnerMatch IncludesNoExec
<Limit GET POST OPTIONS>
Require all granted
</Limit>
<LimitExcept GET POST OPTIONS>
Require all denied
</LimitExcept>
</Directory>
</IfModule>
Reload your configuration for apache using apachectl graceful and verify your browser can no longer get directory listings for your personal public_html pages.
The commands in this paragraph should be run as your ordinary user, not root. In your public_html directory, create a file named index.html. Put some text in your index.html file to identify it as your personal web page (e.g. This is my personal page). Verify that the page shows up correctly when accessing your server with a browser (e.g. http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~firstname).
As the normal user, not sudo:
mkdir ~/public_html
echo "<h1>Some text to identify your site</h1>" > ~/public_html/index.html
wget -O - http://pcNNNNNNNNNN/~username
curl http://pcNNNNNNNNNN/~username
Also test accessing your server using using wget -O - http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~yourfirstname. and curl http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~your-username. Create a subdirectory named pics in your public_html. Use curl http://zonzorp.net/pics.tgz|tar xzf - to install some sample picture files into that pics directory. Try to access that using your browser with http://pcNNNNNNNNN/~firstname/pics as the URL. It should fail because there is no index file. Add a .htaccess file to the pics directory with Options +Indexes in it as an override for the directory, and try reloading the pics directory with your browser. It should show a list of picture files. Clicking on a file will try to open that file.
mkdir ~/public_html/pics
cd ~/public_html
curl http://zonzorp.net/pics.tgz|tar xzf -
chmod 755 pics
chmod 644 pics/*
wget -O - http://pcNNNNNNNNNN/~username/pics
echo "Options +Indexes" > ~/public_html/pics/.htaccess
wget -O - http://pcNNNNNNNNNN/~username/pics
Create a new site for www.yourdomain in /etc/apache2/sites-available by copying the default site file already there to a file named www.yourdomain.conf. Configure your VirtualHost, ServerAdmin, ServerName, DocumentRoot and Directory directive for your DocumentRoot in the site file for www.yourdomain as folllows:
cp /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf /etc/apache2/sites-available/www.yourdomain.conf
nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/www.yourdomain.conf
VirtualHost www.yourdomainname:80
ServerName www.yourdomainname
ServerAdmin webmaster@yourdomainname
DocumentRoot /sites/www.yourdomainname
Directory stanza to include Require all granted
An example file modifed as required might look like this:
<VirtualHost www.sim.mytld:80>
ServerAdmin webmaster@www.sim.mytld
ServerName www.sim.mytld
DocumentRoot /sites/www.sim.mytld
<Directory /sites/www.sim.mytld/>
Require all granted
</Directory>
ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>
Create a directory named /sites to hold document stores for virtual servers and a directory named www.yourdomain in /sites to hold the specific document store for the www site you are creating. Add an index.html to the /sites/www.domain directory with content to identify that page as the home page for your site (e.g. This is the home page for www.yourdomain). Enable your site using a2ensite www.yourdomain and restart your apache service using apachectl graceful. Verify you can access the site using a browser, wget, curl, or telnet for the url http://www.yourdomain. Verify you can access your personal home page on your new site (i.e. http://www.yourdomain/~yourfirstname ).
mkdir -p /sites/www.yourdomain
echo "<h1>This is the www.yourdomain website</h1>" > /sites/www.yourdomain/index.html
a2ensite www.yourdomain
apachectl graceful
curl http://www.yourdomain
Examine the content of access.log and error.log in /var/log/apache2 to see what is being logged for your activity on your web server.
tail /var/log/apache2/access.log /var/log/apche2/error.log
Run sudo /root/server-check.sh -l 4 firstname lastname studentnumber. Review any problems detected and correct as necessary. Do not move on to Lab 5 SSL until you have Lab 4 at 100%. If you are having trouble getting Lab 4 to 100%, try running sudo /root/server-check.sh -l 123 firstname lastname studentnumber to make sure you haven’t accidentally broken what was completed in previous labs.
Using a browser, go to the Apache2 documentation site and review the list of modules and directives to see what sort of things can be done with an Apache2 server.