Section 11.6. Summary

Web servers are an essential part of any organization's network, and the Apache web server is an excellent choice. It runs as the HTTP daemon (httpd), which is configured in the httpd.conf file.

The Apache software on Linux and Solaris systems comes preconfigured and ready to run. Review the configuration and adjust parameters such as ServerAdmin, ServerName, and DocumentRoot to make sure they are exactly what you want for your server.

Use the monitoring tools and log files to closely observe the usage and performance of your system. Keep tight control on Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripts and Server Side Includes (SSI) to keep your server secure. Use SSL to secure the confidential data coming from your clients.

This chapter concludes our study of TCP/IP server configuration, our last configuration task. In the next chapter, we begin to look at the ongoing tasks that are part of running a network once it has been installed and configured. We begin that discussion with security.