Q. How do I install and configure php under Lighttpd web server. I’m using

=> FreeBSD 6.2

=> Lighttpd 1.5

=> FastCGI PHP 5.2

How do I configure php under Lighttpd?

A. PHP generally runs on a web server like lighttpd taking PHP code as its input and creating Web pages as output. FastCGI is a protocol for interfacing interactive programs with a web server. Lighttpd has mod_fastcgi to run php application.

Assuming that you have php installed (see these instructions on installing Lighttpd+MySQL+php5 under FreeBSD), open lighttpd.conf file:
# vi /usr/local/etc/lighttpd.conf
Make sure FASTCGI module is enabled:
server.modules += ( "mod_fastcgi" )

Now append following code

fastcgi.server = ( ".php" =>
( "localhost" =>
                     (
                        "socket" => "/tmp/php-fastcgi.socket",
                        "bin-path" => "/usr/local/bin/php-cgi"
                      )
                   )
)

Save and close the file. Restart lighttpd:
# /usr/local/etc/rc.d/lighttpd restart