Installing and configuring Apache Web Server (HTTPD) in Centos 9 Linux and below
What is HTTPD?
HTTP server in Linux systems is known as Apache server. The package name is known as HTTPD. In short, installing HTTPD in Linux means installing the web server known as Apache.Depending on which version of the HTTP service you want to install, you will have to either, use the yum program (that would install the latest version available for CentOS) or install the software from sources downloaded from the Apache website.
For convenience sake and for compatibility guarantee however one would recommend the yum-based installation.
What Apache Web Server can allow:
Using Apache server one can:
- Enable HTTP service: This is the basic operation of the web server that works using port 80 sending data in clear text. We will set this up in this tutorial.
- Enable HTTPS service: This is a web server that uses SSL certificates certificates and creates secure connections that encrypt data sent between the web browser and server. This uses port 443 instead of port 80. Other tools such as openSSL and modSSL can be installed to make the web server more secure. A tutorial on this is in the works.
- Allow system users to create their own web sites: In some situations you might want different accounts on the system to create their own web applications in their own directories. A tutorial on this is also in the works.
- Virtual Hosts:Enables so called virtual hosts through which one physical HTTP server can handle many virtual HTTP servers (and thus many websites can reside on physical HTTP server).