Apache Installation on Ubuntu Server

Introduction

The Apache HTTP server is the most popular web server on the globe. It has a wide range of powerful features, such as dynamically loadable modules, robust media support, and extensive integration with other popular software.

Requirements

• A system running Ubuntu 

• An internet connection

• Access to a user account with sudo privileges

Installation Process of Apache Server

Here, in this document, I have included a step-by-step method to install Apache HTTP web server on an Ubuntu machine.

STEP-1: Apache Package Installation

 To begin, let us update the local package index to reflect the most recent upstream changes:

$ sudo apt update

Install the apache2 package next:

$ sudo apt install apache2

apt will install Apache and all required dependencies after you confirm the installation.

STEP-2: Firewall Configuration

Before running Apache, we must change the firewall settings to allow outside access to the default web ports.

List the ufw application profiles by typing:

$ sudo ufw app list

We will receive a list of the application profiles:

Output

Available applications:

  Apache

  Apache Full

  Apache Secure

  OpenSSH

Since we haven’t configured SSL for our server yet in this document, we will only need to allow traffic on port 80:

$ sudo ufw allow 'Apache'

You can verify the change by typing:

$ sudo ufw status

The output will provide a list of allowed HTTP traffic:

Output

Status: active

To                               Action                        From

--                                 ------                           ----

OpenSSH                  ALLOW                    Anywhere                  

Apache                     ALLOW                     Anywhere                

OpenSSH (v6)          ALLOW                    Anywhere (v6)             

Apache (v6)             ALLOW                    Anywhere (v6)

The profile has been activated to allow access to the Apache web server, as indicated by the output.

STEP-3: Checking the Web Server

Ubuntu starts Apache at the end of the installation process. The web server should already be operational.

Check the service's status with the systemd init system by typing:

$ sudo systemctl status apache2

Output

 apache2.service - The Apache HTTP Server

     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/apache2.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)

     Active: active (running) since Thu 2020-04-23 22:36:30 UTC; 20h ago

       Docs: https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/

   Main PID: 29435 (apache2)

      Tasks: 55 (limit: 1137)

     Memory: 8.0M

     CGroup: /system.slice/apache2.service

             ├─29435 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start

             ├─29437 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start

             └─29438 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start

The service has started successfully, as evidenced by this output. However, requesting a page from Apache is the best way to test this.

STEP-4: Managing the Apache Process

Now that our web server is up and running, let's go over some basic systemctl management commands.

To stop your web server, type:

$ sudo systemctl stop apache2

To start the web server when it is stopped, type:

$ sudo systemctl start apache2

To stop and then start the service again, type:

$ sudo systemctl restart apache2

STEP-5: Setting Up Our Virtual Hosts

When using the Apache web server, we can encapsulate configuration details and host multiple domains from a single server by using virtual hosts (similar to server blocks in Nginx). We will register the domain prosaugat.com.

Create the directory for prosaugat.com as follows:

$ sudo mkdir /var/www/prosaugat.com

Next, assign ownership of the directory with the $USER environment variable:

$ sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /var/www/prosaugat.com

To ensure that our permissions are correct and that the owner has permission to read, write, and execute files while granting only read and execute permissions to groups and others, we can run the following command:

$ sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/prosaugat.com

Next, create a sample index.html page using Nano or Vim editor:

$ sudo nano /var/www/prosaugat.com/index.html

Inside this directory, add the following sample HTML:

/var/www/prosaugat.com/index.html

<html>

    <head>

        <title>Welcome ProSaugat's Test Site!</title>

    </head>

    <body>

        <h1>Hey! Bro Configuration Successful.</h1>

    </body>

</html>

Save and close the file when you are finished.

To enable Apache to serve this content, a virtual host file containing the necessary directives must be created. Rather than directly modifying the default configuration file at /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf, let's create a new one at /etc/apache2/sites-available/prosaugat.com.conf 

$ sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/prosaugat.com.conf

Copy and paste the following configuration block, which is similar to the default but has been updated to reflect our new directory and domain name:

<VirtualHost *:80>

ServerAdmin admin@prosaugat.com

ServerName prosaugat.com

ServerAlias prosaugat.com

DocumentRoot /var/www/prosaugat.com/html

ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log

CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

</VirtualHost>

Save and close the file.

Let’s enable the file with the a2ensite tool:

$ sudo a2ensite prosaugat.com.conf

Disable the default site defined in 000-default.conf:

$ sudo a2dissite 000-default.conf

Next, let’s test for configuration errors:

$ sudo apache2ctl configtest

You should receive the following output:

Output

Syntax OK

Restart Apache to implement your changes:

$ sudo systemctl restart apache2

Apache should now be serving our domain name. We can test this by navigating to http://prosaugat.com.