4.1 Prerequisites for Using Apache on OES Servers

The following setup is required to use Apache HTTP Server on your OES servers:

  • When you install OES services on the server, Novell-ready versions of Apache 2 (Prefork, 64-bit) and Tomcat 6 are automatically installed and configured. You manually manage Apache services with the Apache configuration files. Use a text editor to create or modify the configuration files, then gracefully restart the Apache HTTP Server daemon (rcapache2 graceful) to apply the changes.

    WARNING:Do not install the default Linux Web and LAMP pattern independently of the OES patterns being added to the server. Do not use the HTTP Server option in YaST to configure Apache or virtual host settings on an OES server. It overwrites essential OES settings for Apache and breaks the existing setup. For recovery information, see Section 4.5.1, Apache Server Errors after Using the HTTP Server Option in YaST.

    OES selects the Linux Web and LAMP pattern and configures the HTTP server settings for OES when you install any of the OES services from the OES Add-On DVD. If you plan to install OES services after the SLES installation, do not install the Linux Web and LAMP pattern as part of the SLES setup, doing so will configure the HTTP server with the SLES defaults. Then, when you add OES services to the server, the HTTP server setup might be broken for OES. For possible workarounds to fix the HTTP server configuration to work for OES, see the default OES setup described in Section 4.3, Understanding the Default OES Setup of Apache HTTP Server and Section 4.5, Troubleshooting the Apache HTTP Server.

  • You can use the Novell Storage Services (NSS) file system or Linux file systems to host your web content:

  • You can host multiple websites on the same server. You must configure an Apache virtual host for each website.

  • The following permissions are required:

    • The user wwwrun must be the file owner of the website directories and files. The group can be the system root or the Apache group www.

    • If web content resides on an NSS volume or on an NCP-enabled Linux volume, the following additional permissions are required:

      • Enable the eDirectory user wwwrun and group www with Linux User Management (LUM). OES automatically creates and LUM-enables the user and group when you install the first OES server in a NetIQ eDirectory tree.

      • Assign the eDirectory user wwwrun as a file system trustee with Read and File Scan rights for the directory you specify in the DocumentRoot directive in the virtual host configuration file.

For information about the default OES setup for Apache and setting up virtual hosts, see Section 4.4, Using Apache HTTP Server on OES Servers (Single Server or Cluster Nodes).