Azhar Khan

Apache - Virtual Hosts

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Web Servers

What do we need? #

The two most common tools for this are the Apache and nginx servers.

Notes: #

You’ll need to edit a few system configuration files. If you’re uncomfortable with vim, replace vim with nano, or gedit in the following commands. For example, sudo vim will become sudo -H gedit or sudo nano.

Once you’re done setting it up, have a look at How to avoid using sudo when working in /var/www? A more detailed guide is available from the Ubuntu LTS Server Guide.

First, install Apache: # 

ak:~$ sudo apt-get install apache2

The Apache configuration files are located in /etc/apache2. You’ll typically be interested in:

  • /etc/apache2/sites-available - contains the Virtual Host definitions. Definitions are enabled and disabled using the a2ensite and a2dissitecommands. The enabled site definitions are linked to /etc/apache2/sites-enabled.

  • /etc/apache2/conf-available - contains custom configuration files. They are enabled and disabled using the a2enconf and a2disconf commands. The enabled site configuration files are linked to /etc/apache2/conf-enabled.

  • /var/www/html - the default directory that Apache serves.

  • For most instructions, I’ll assume we are in /etc/apache2.

VirtualHost setup #

Let us create a new site. There’s a default configuration available in sites-enabled/default.conf. We will make a copy of this, and work on it:

This is where should be

ak:/etc/apache2$ ls
apache2.conf  conf-available  conf-enabled  envvars  magic  mods-available  mods-enabled  ports.conf  sites-available  sites-enabled
ak:/etc/apache2$ 
ak:~$ sudo cp sites-available/000-default.conf sites-available/my-name.conf
ak:~$ sudo nano sites-available/my-name.conf

It should look something like this

<VirtualHost *:80>
	# The ServerName directive sets the request scheme, hostname and port that
	# the server uses to identify itself. This is used when creating
	# redirection URLs. In the context of virtual hosts, the ServerName
	# specifies what hostname must appear in the request's Host: header to
	# match this virtual host. For the default virtual host (this file) this
	# value is not decisive as it is used as a last resort host regardless.
	# However, you must set it for any further virtual host explicitly.
	ServerName myname.com

	ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost
	DocumentRoot /var/www/my-name

	# Available loglevels: trace8, ..., trace1, debug, info, notice, warn,
	# error, crit, alert, emerg.
	# It is also possible to configure the loglevel for particular
	# modules, e.g.
	#LogLevel info ssl:warn

	ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
	CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

	# For most configuration files from conf-available/, which are
	# enabled or disabled at a global level, it is possible to
	# include a line for only one particular virtual host. For example the
	# following line enables the CGI configuration for this host only
	# after it has been globally disabled with "a2disconf".
	#Include conf-available/serve-cgi-bin.conf
</VirtualHost>

# vim: syntax=apache ts=4 sw=4 sts=4 sr noet

Save the file, and enable it: # 

ak:~$ sudo a2ensite my-name

Now, we need to set up the directory for the site:

ak:~$ sudo mkdir /var/www/my-name

We’ll set permissions for convenience:

ak:~$ sudo chown $USER:www-data /var/www/my-name
ak:~$ sudo chmod g+s /var/www/my-name

Add a few HTML files here.

Since the virtual host is to run locally, we need to map myname.com to a local address. To do this, we need to edit /etc/hosts:

ak:~$ sudo nano /etc/hosts

It should look something like this

127.0.0.1       localhost
127.0.1.1       Acer
127.0.0.2       myname.com   myname


# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
::1     ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
fe00::0 ip6-localnet
ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters

Save, and then restart Apache: # 

ak:~$ sudo service apache2 restart

Now, you can browse to http://myname.com or http://myname, and the contents of /var/www/my-name will be displayed.