Apache http server on ec2

Now I get a little bit involved with server side. Have to setup a server for our projects. While the machine is not ready, I decide to first try setting up the server at aws ec2 platform to just have a taste.

I choose Apache because I know nothing about running a server and also this is the word I heard most of the time when people talk about server stuff. It is totally not hard to install it but there are some wrong turns that I took, turns that some guides would be appreciated.

Therefore, following is the walk to setup httpd on ec2.

First package to download is of course the apache httpd itself, 2.4.3 to-date. Extract it into a folder say ~/httpd. Note there is a subfolder named ~/httpd/srclib, which will be used later.

Second we got APR and APR-Util. They are required for httpd installation, which ec2 doesnt have (at least ubuntu server doesnt). Extract them and put them into subfolders ~/httpd/srclib/apr and ~/httpd/srclib/apr-util respectively. This tells httpd to install them along the way if the system does not have them already.

One side note, during the install process the system would probably ask you for root password, which you dont have if you are using a ec2 instance. Dont worry, just set it: use command sudo passwd root. Set your password you are good to go.

Before going into installation, install PCRE (Perl-Compatible Regular Expression Lib). If you are using the same server as me, just type sudo apt-get install libpcre3-dev.

Now do the old trick: ./configure, make, sudo make install. Note add --with-included-apr in ./configure so that it will look at srclib we prepare for it for apr and apr-util.

The make and install commands will take some time, so relax and waste your time on some stupid videos, like this one, which I quite like.

After installation, use apachectl -k start and apachectl -k stop to test the server. If you install correctly, when you start the server, issue curl http://localhost.com will get you the 'it works' html page, which tells you everything is good. Use locate if you cannot find apachectl.

Thanks for watching. I am talking about the video...