It is a common myth that mod_php is slower – it is faster in real world applications, but *only just* compared to fcgid. fgcid + eAccelerator is demonstrably fractionally slower than mod_php + eAccelerator. So why not just use mod_php? The answer is two fold.

1. There are more security options using fcgid. This is only relevant when you have untrusted user scripts such as found in hosting environments.
2. You can use worker-mpm on Apache. Let’s face it, Apache is still in the Stone-Age when it comes to threading. Worker-mpm improves resource utilization on high traffic sites significantly, but mod_php in such a configuration is not guaranteed. The reason is not mod_php (which is thread-safe) but all the various extensions you may use with it (which are often not thread-safe). By using mod_fcgid you can use threaded apache and not worry about php extension thread-safety.

In the real-world I use both mod_php and fcgid depending on my requirements. mod_php for my mercurial server that is heavily fortified and has a limited user base, and mod_fcgid for load balanced high-performance sites, 80,000 or more hits per minute, where the pre-fork model is just not tenable.
YMMV

Real Story: A existing website with a following of more than 130,000 registered users and an awful lot of lurkers was re-engineered to not only look more modern but also link into a vast number of business processes. The site went live, and every one of the user base hit it in the first five minutes after launch. Despite the number of servers and virtual servers in the cluster the pre-fork model simply could not cope. Switching to worker-mpm handled the load easily, but some of the apache instances crashed randomly. Changing to use fcgid rather than mod_php sorted the crashing issue. I never did get an an answer as to which php optional extension (we used a lot of them) caused the issue. Now there’s a task for someone with time on their hands! :-)

DirectoryIndex index.html index.shtml index.cgi index.php

thanks before

thank you for this article. I have followed every step.

no errors at apache22 startup, but can’t get working .html files, only php is working via fcig.

when I enter http://url/index.php is ok, when I enter http://url/index.html got 500 error. File permisions is ok 644 and owner is ok ( same as index.php )

where I’m wrong?

Thank you

Yes, I’m running in FreeBSD jail without any problem. Are you talking about chroot(2) based jail or FreeBSD jail(8) or mod_chroot?

Have you ever got this setup running in a jail? I’m getting a “not implemented” error preventing apache from starting, but only in jailed environments.

This right?
LoadModule fcgid_module libexec/apache22/mod_fcgid.so

and This wrong?
LoadModule fastcgi_module libexec/apache22/mod_fastcgi.so

………………………..
LoadModule rewrite_module libexec/apache22/mod_rewrite.so
LoadModule fastcgi_module libexec/apache22/mod_fastcgi.so
#LoadModule php5_module libexec/apache22/libphp5.so

………………………….

LoadModule fcgid_module libexec/apache22/mod_fcgid.so

srv# apachectl start
Syntax error on line 187 of /usr/local/etc/apache22/httpd.conf:
Invalid command ‘FCGIWrapper’, perhaps misspelled or defined by a module not included in the server configuration

I running in FreeBSD 7.2 and Apache 2.2.11. How to fix it?

Thanks
Anderson

I now longer can access my regular webpages under the DocumentRoot as I am receiving the following error :

Forbidden
You don’t have permission to access / on this server.

Please note that the command: apachectl status also gives me the same error.

I found that when I comment out the following three lines nested within the Directory directive, my apache doesn’t error out:

…
SetHandler fcgid-script
FCGIWrapper /usr/local/bin/php-cgi .php
Options ExecCGI
…

The /var/log/httpd-error.log reads:

[warn] Init: Session Cache is not configured [hint: SSLSessionCache]
[notice] Digest: generating secret for digest authentication …
[notice] Digest: done
[notice] Apache/2.2.6 (FreeBSD) mod_ssl/2.2.6 OpenSSL/0.9.8e DAV/2 configured — resuming normal operations

I’m running Apache 2.2.6 against FreeBSD 7.0

Could it be file or directory permissions ? If you have any suggestion, I’d be happy to hear them.

Thanks,

Binit

No I did not missed /usr/ports/www/mod_fcgid. Please read it carefully. Do you get any sort of error?

So, simplified:
. AddHandler binds a handler to a file extension
. SetHandler binds the context location to a handler.

Telltale:
[notice] mod_fcgid: process /usr/local/www/phpPgAdmin/images/themes/default/title.png(2905) exit(communication error), terminated by calling exit(), return code: 255

Thanks for pointing out /usr/ports/www/mod_fcgid. Yes -c is the best option for virtual hosting. You can always write your own FCGIWrapper if you want.

Great article though, thanks for writing it up :)

# portsanp fetch update

has to be:

# portsnap fetch update