Apache Name Based VirtualHost Example

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Q. Can you give or specify an example for Apache name based VirtualHost feature under CentOS/ RHEL / Fedora Linux?

A. The term Virtual Host refers to the practice of maintaining more than one web site on one Apache machine or server.

The NameVirtualHost directive is a required directive if you want to configure name-based virtual hosts.

With the NameVirtualHost directive you specify the IP address on which the server will receive requests for the name-based virtual hosts. This will usually be the address to which your name-based virtual host names resolve.

Apache 2 Name based virtualhost Configuration

For example if your IP address is 203.54.2.5. Set it as follows in httpd.conf file:
# vi /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf
Set NameVirtualHost as follows:
NameVirtualHost 203.54.2.5:80
Let us see how your virtual host entry looks for two domains called theos.in and nixcraft.com . Code for theos.in domain:
<VirtualHost theos.in/>
ServerAdmin [email protected]
DocumentRoot /var/www/theos.in
ServerName theos.in
ServerAlias www.theos.in
ErrorLog /var/logs/httpd/theos.in/error_log
CustomLog /var/logs/httpd/theos.in/access_log common
</VirtualHost>

Code for nixcraft.com domain:
<VirtualHost nixcraft.com/>
ServerAdmin [email protected]
DocumentRoot /var/www/nixcraft.com
ServerName nixcraft.com
ServerAlias www.nixcraft.com
ErrorLog /var/logs/httpd/nixcraft.com/error_log
CustomLog /var/logs/httpd/nixcraft.com/access_log common
</VirtualHost>

Save and close the file. Restart Apache:
# /etc/init.d/httpd restart

Make sure both domains theos.in and nixcraft.com points to (A address) 203.54.2.5. Also make sure you create /var/logs/httpd/domain-name directories and point ftp user directory to appropriate /var/www/domain-name directory.

Virtual Hosts and IP addresses

IPv4 has limited set of IP address. If you want to maintain multiple domains/hostnames on your
# machine you can setup VirtualHost containers for them. Most configurations use only name-based virtual hosts so the server doesn’t need to worry about IP addresses using the asterisks in the config file as follows:

NameVirtualHost *:80
 
<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin [email protected]
    DocumentRoot "/usr/local/docs/dummy-host.example.com"
    ServerName dummy-host.example.com
    ServerAlias www.dummy-host.example.com
    ErrorLog "/var/log/dummy-host.example.com-error_log"
    CustomLog "/var/log/dummy-host.example.com-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>
 
<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin [email protected]
    DocumentRoot "/usr/local/docs/dummy-host2.example.com"
    ServerName dummy-host2.example.com
    ErrorLog "/var/log/dummy-host2.example.com-error_log"
    CustomLog "/var/log/dummy-host2.example.com-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>

Posted by: Vivek Gite

The author is the creator of nixCraft and a seasoned sysadmin and a trainer for the Linux operating system/Unix shell scripting. He has worked with global clients and in various industries, including IT, education, defense and space research, and the nonprofit sector. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, Google+.

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10 comment

  1. A very useful guide. Im in a differnt situation though where I want to use my self signed SSL certificate on 2 apaches. I’ve succefully installed it on one server and works as a charm. I want to use te same certificate on another apache server(fail over). Can this be really done? If so please help out. If someone can point me to a good tutorial It’ll be highly appreciated. I need to test this out at this stage is all. Many thanks in advance.

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  6. hi
    i have a query
    If and only if we have our own Domain (Registered) only we can able to configure Name Virtual Host
    ?? or we dont need of Registered domain name to host
    Thanks in advance

    Regards
    Bharath

    Reply Report comment

  7. Job for httpd.service failed. See ‘systemctl status httpd.service’ and ‘journalctl -n’ for details.
    [[email protected] atps]# systemctl status httpd.service
    httpd.service – The Apache HTTP Server
    Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service; disabled)
    Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Thu, 2013-02-07 16:21:22 IST; 11s ago
    Process: 9548 ExecStop=/usr/sbin/httpd $OPTIONS -k graceful-stop (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
    Process: 9546 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/httpd $OPTIONS -DFOREGROUND (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
    Status: “Total requests: 0; Current requests/sec: 0; Current traffic: 0 B/sec”
    CGroup: name=systemd:/system/httpd.service

    Feb 07 16:21:22 localhost.localdomain httpd[9546]: httpd: Syntax error on line 61 of /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf: Canno…ctory
    Feb 07 16:21:22 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: httpd.service: main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
    Feb 07 16:21:22 localhost.localdomain httpd[9548]: httpd: Syntax error on line 61 of /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf: Canno…ctory
    Feb 07 16:21:22 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Failed to start The Apache HTTP Server.
    Feb 07 16:21:22 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Unit httpd.service entered failed state

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  9. In several tutorials one scenario is not clearly explained.
    If we need to point virtual host to /home/user/public_html directory there are few more things:
    1. In httpd.conf put comment on
    # UserDir disabled

    # remove comment:
    UserDir public_html

    #point your virtual host:

    ServerName some-dummy.host.com
    DocumentRoot /home/user/public_html
    ErrorLog logs-some-dummy.host.com
    CustomLog logs-some-dummy.host.com

    2. From a shell:
    # chmod 711 /home/user/
    # chmod 755 /home/user/public_html/

    3. Restart apache:
    # service httpd restart

    It works for me.

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