FedoraCore 5 Newbie: Apache setup?

ATS16805

hello. i'm a happy newlywed w/ Fedora Core 5, and i've only now lost my Linux virginity. I'm really pleased-- impressed even (the pleasure is more than i was expecting)!! please bear with me here as i'll need your patience-- i realize i'm narratively verbose, but i hope you'll deal w/ it this time as i greatly struggle for concise text... thanks.

okay-- the whole point of this Linux box started out as i wanted to have a better Web Development environment (plus hopefully better for learning to program some other stuff, like Ruby, Rails, etc). i'm afraid my unfamiliarity w/ everything Linux has presented obstacles-- mostly the Extraordinary ease-of-use has me bewildered-- so, i'm questinging "is this right?" a lot.

fortunately, almost everything seems to be working out right (according to how-to's) so far, and i'm enjoying the learning process-- i think i'm doing okay as most has followed precisely as the howto's and walkthroughs, etc i've been doing. but, of all things i didn't expect, i'm stuck on setting up a "local development server" in the same manner as i'm familiar with using on a Windows system. In other words-- i want to be able to store and edit files under the Linux equivalent of apache/htdocs/mywebs/, and test pages on ://localhost/myfile.php , but i've apparently done something wrong when editing httpd.conf

i've been using this guide: http://stanton-finley.net/fedora_core_5_installation_notes.html#Web
whereby i've used Yum to update (i think successfully avoiding repository conflicts), and eventually i followed his tips for Apache, only modifying where i thought appropriate as i DONT want to setup a public server-- this is to be for me only... additionally, i want to firewall it too... and i'm not sure if i've got that setup correctly, but i think i do!
(Note: all of this i did while logged in as NOT ROOT, but as UserName and used in Terminal

su -

then typed in my ROOT password-- so, i'm assuming that these changes would 'stick', so to speak? (it's all so intuitively easy-- i can't help but think i might have done it wrong)

so, after completing [what i felt was a local install version of] this little server guide, i started apache [successfully i believe], and go to firefox, type localhost in the address bar and i get the dialog

"You have chosen to open [blank space here] which is a: application/x-httpd-php What should Firefox do w/ this file?..."

having never seen this on my WinXP Localhost before, i decided to try putting a simple index.html into both /var/www/html and /home/my_user_name/public_html and then tried pulling up the absolute URL in Firefox. Oddly, this gives me a 404, yet the server info is shown

Apache/2.2.0 (Fedora) Server at localhost Port 80

where did i go wrong? what do i need to change to get this working properly? maybe i need to see a proper httpd.conf file? maybe you recommend a different guide?

thank you!

thorpe

Sorry, but I dont see anywhere in that guide where you actually install php. Dont get me wrong, it could be anywhere in that opening click this and that spill. I must say, clicking this and that is NOT very Linux.

Anyway....

To get to files in /home/my_user_name/public_html, you'll need to use http://localhost/~username in the browsers address bar. Where username is your username. As for /var/www/html this doesn't seem right, but may just be some wierd Fedora thing. In your httpd.conf file, look for the line...

DocumentRoot blahblahblah

What does blahblahblah say?

ATS16805

from the httpd.conf, after i customize for my system. i don't recall modifying these sections manually or otherwise-- i think it carried over from the default. i should remark that i don't, not even now, yet have an understanding of the filesystem such that i would have known how to properly customize this section to my own specs anyway-- so everything is either default, or straight from a walkthrough guide. virtualhost is left commented out:

#
DocumentRoot "/var/www/html"

...

# This should be changed to whatever you set DocumentRoot to.
#
<Directory "/var/www/html">

since i posted this, my server status has changed. localhost in the browser address bar took me to a 'default page', but not the apache html welcome/ success page-- instead it's i believe a 'fedora default server page' which seemed neither html or php as i was instructed to modify Welcome.conf to withdraw the default page and associate localhost w/ any html content in the directories i stated above. after i modified Welcome.conf, and go back and refresh the browser, now i see browsing the directory, my html file from the other day. if i click to open that file in the browser, it seems to go there, but i see no text displayed-- nothing at all-- a white screen. i'm also instructed to the URL ://localhost/manual/index.html for the apache manual. again, the same white screen. so, although the behavior is different, and seemingly more 'correct', something must remain very wrong.

any other Fedora Users out there? (did i pick a lousy distro for localhost development? i thought fedora was a time-tested, therefore likely better choice. i haven't lost confidence, but i am curious)

thorpe wrote:
...it could be anywhere in that opening click this and that spill. I must say, clicking this and that is NOT very Linux...

???
who, or what are you addressing here. sorry, but i found that confusing. is it commentary, or are you suggesting that i did something wrong?

thorpe

Sorry. I was merely stating that somewhere in amongst all that clicking you may have enabled php. Other than that, I see no reference to enabling php in that guide.

did i pick a lousy distro for localhost development?

No. There really isn't (or shouldn't be) such a thing. Apache is Apache and php is php on any distro. If you know the configuration files it shouldn't be too difficult to setup.

Have you tried placing a file (html or php) within your users public_html directory then accessing this via http://localhost/~username in your browser?

Also, check your httpd.conf file for the DirectoryIndex setting. This sets which documents are viewed by default.

ATS16805

hey there thorpe. thanks for your continued help.

i'm dealing w/ a couple issues here which prevent a smooth, confident process. i need to gain a better understanding of the filesystem. i'm just kinda lost on finding stuff-- certain things seeming redundant to me, yet they aren't when i view the files... i've got a good reference for that now though from a fedora forum.

i know the httpd.conf file pretty well. 😉 and i do appreciate your leading me, steadfast, in the right direction there. but-- it's not that i'm lost on the issues you've cited-- i'm familiar w/ all that-- it's my lack of knowledge of the way things 'work' here.
e.g. on windows, i know i've got c:\apache\htdocs\this is my document root -- while on Linux, i have no idea where that is... i can't 'see it' as i could on win. so, i feel like i'm flying blind cause i can't really look at anything... or if i do, i'm unsure if i'm looking at the /right/ thing. so, that's really my problem here. i just can't understand why i've got this blank screen... it just 'seems' to work in all aspects except for the stuff actually showing in the browser-- meaning-- i've got the directory browsing (what i wouldn't have if i did Options -Indexes in .htaccess ), and i see my test.html file there. but, clicking on it, the browser shows the blank screen.

i'll post a screenshot soon as i figure out how to do that w/ the gimp. 😉

thorpe

Im not sure why you would be getting a blank page. Sorry, but Ive just never come accross that issue before.

As for not knowing where / what everything on Linux is. Your not allone. I was in that situation some 2 and a half year ago. Since then Ive completely switched all my systems to Linux and would never use windows again.

This document may help you some. Like most things Linux, the filesystem structure is based on a standard. Of course this may vary to some extent depending on how closely each distro wants to resemble the standard.

If you get stuch with anything too, you might also want to bookmark the Linux Documentation Project, its an invaluable resource.

ATS16805

thanks, Thorpe. i do appreciate it. the blank screen was a permissions problem.. .no, actually an SELinux security problem. if you wish to learn about it, read here-- http://www.linuxhomenetworking.com/wiki/index.php/Quick_HOWTO:Ch20:The_Apache_Web_Server#Table_20-1_SELinux_Security_Context_File_Labels

i had to do the chcon command -- the 3rd code piece beneath the illustration (if the URL anchor works for you)

EDIT:
and i just realized it was staring me in the face in the 'Official Documentation' the whole time! live and learn, i suppose. 😉

thorpe

Well, Id'e have never guessed that. You failed to mention you where using SELinux.

ATS16805

i think it's a Fedora Core 5 standard default-- not positive on that though... but ya gotta remember-- i know nothing of that o/s... would be like sayin' to my grandma, hey 'you didn't mention you had 'simple file sharing turned off!' on XP... know what i mean?

edit: oh, and by the way-- i didn't mean 'if you wish to learn...' as if you didn't know the in's and out's-- i meant-- to learn specifically where i was / what i did. 😉

but... anyway-- it's all good. and now we know possible fix for similar issue.. funny thing is, at least which stuck out at me-- if all Fedora Core 5's have SELinux by default (because i didn't specifically enable it, or Yum it to my recollection), then why is this not a problem for nearly everyone who followed the steps that i did? weird. i probably did something to httpd.conf along the lines which caused me to get off track-- unless you mean that SELinux will never let Apache run properly.

even as i typed this, i'm still unsure of the exact purpose or use or reason to enable or disable SELinux... i was having more fun being distracted by other stuff. actually kinda bummed right now cause i had to put it away for a while (the Fedora box)... yeah, i'm on this crappy XP for some darn vocational nonsense box -- oops that was a typo, but i like it: XP - "the (universal) Nonsense Box" .. hee hee