Mac OS X Server
Web Technologies
Administration
For Version 10.5 Leopard
K
Apple Inc.
© 2007 Apple Inc. All rights reserved.
The owner or authorized user of a valid copy of
Mac OS X Server software might reproduce this
publication for the purpose of learning to use such
software. No part of this publication might be
reproduced or transmitted for commercial purposes,
such as selling copies of this publication or for providing
paid-for support services.
Every effort has been made to guarantee that the
information in this manual is correct. Apple Inc., is not
responsible for printing or clerical errors.
Apple
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014-2084
408-996-1010
www.apple.com
The Apple logo is a trademark of Apple Inc., registered
in the U.S. and other countries. Use of the “keyboard”
Apple logo (Option-Shift-K) for commercial purposes
without the prior written consent of Apple might
constitute trademark infringement and unfair
competition in violation of federal and state laws.
Apple, the Apple logo, ColorSync, Final Cut Pro, Mac,
Macintosh, Mac OS, QuickTime, Xgrid, and Xserve are
trademarks of Apple, Inc., registered in the U.S. and
other countries. Finder and Safari are trademarks of
Apple, Inc.
Adobe and PostScript are trademarks of Adobe Systems
Incorporated.
UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group.
Other company and product names mentioned herein
are trademarks of their respective companies. Mention
of third-party products is for informational purposes
only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a
recommendation. Apple assumes no responsibility with
regard to the performance or use of these products.
019-0945/2007-09-01
Contents
1
Preface 9 About This Guide
9
What’s New in Version 10.5
9
What’s in This Guide
10
Using This Guide
10
Using Onscreen Help
11
Mac OS X Server Administration Guides
12
Viewing PDF Guides Onscreen
12
Printing PDF Guides
13
Getting Documentation Updates
13
Getting Additional Information
Chapter 1 15 Web Technologies Overview
15
Web Technologies Overview
15
Key Web Features
16
16
16
17
17
17
17
17
17
18
18
18
19
19
19
20
20
20
21
Apache Web Server
WebDAV
CGI Support
SSL Support
Dynamic Content with Server Side Includes (SSI)
Blogs and RSS Support
Before You Begin
Selecting a Version of Apache
Configuring Your Web Server
Providing Secure Transactions
Setting Up Websites
Hosting More Than One Website
Understanding WebDAV
Setting WebDAV Privileges
Understanding WebDAV Security
Defining Realms
Understanding Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME)
MIME Suffixes
Web Server Responses (Content Handlers)
3
Chapter 2 23 Working with Web Service
23
Setup Overview
24
Turning Web Service On
24
Setting Up Web Service
24
25
27
28
29
29
30
30
31
31
31
32
32
33
33
Configuring General Settings
Configuring MIME Types Settings
Configuring Proxy Settings
Configuring Modules Settings
Configuring Web Services Settings
Starting Web Service
Managing Web Service
Checking Web Service Status
Viewing Web Service Logs
Viewing Web Graphs
Stopping Web Service
Performance Tuning
Setting Simultaneous Connections for the Web Server
Setting Persistent Connections for the Web Server
Setting a Connection Timeout Interval
Chapter 3 35 Creating and Managing Websites
35
Website Setup Overview
37
Setting Up Your Website
37
38
39
39
40
42
43
45
47
48
49
49
49
50
50
51
52
52
53
53
Setting Up the Web Folder
Creating a Website
Setting the Default Webpage
Configuring Website Apache Options
Using Realms to Control Access
Enabling Access and Error Logs for a Website
Enabling Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
Managing Access to Sites Using Aliases
Setting Up a Reverse Proxy
Enabling Optional Web Services
Connecting to Your Website
Website Management
Viewing Website Settings
Changing the Web Folder for a Site
Changing the Access Port for a Website
Enabling a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) Script
Enabling Server Side Includes (SSI)
Creating Indexes for Searching Website Content
Monitoring Website Activity
Using a Passphrase with SSL Certificates
4
Contents
54
Using WebDAV to Manage Website Content
54
55
55
56
56
57
57
57
58
58
59
Enabling WebDAV on Websites
Using WebDAV to Share Files
Configuring Web Content File and Folder Permissions
Managing Multiple Sites on One Server
Using Aliases to Have a Site Respond to Multiple Names
Websites and Multiple Network Interfaces
User Content on Websites
Web Service Configuration
Default Content
Accessing Web Content
Securing Web Content on Case Insensitive File Systems
Chapter 4 61 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
61
Wiki Overview
62
62
62
63
64
64
65
65
66
66
66
66
67
67
68
68
68
69
69
69
70
70
70
71
71
72
72
72
About Wiki Pages
About Wiki Security
About Wiki File and Folder Hierarchy
Wiki Setup Overview
Setting Up a Wiki
Enabling Wiki Web Services for a Website
Connecting to a Wiki
Changing Wiki Settings
Managing Wiki Pages
Adding Document Pages
Editing Document Pages
Deleting Document Pages
Adding a Link to a Wiki Page
Inserting a Table on a Wiki Page
Adding Tags to Wiki Pages
Removing Tags from Wiki Pages
Attaching a File to Wiki Pages
Finding Tagged Wiki Pages
Searching Wiki Pages
Viewing or Replacing Older or Deleted Wiki Pages
Restoring Deleted Wiki Pages
Customizing Wiki
Choosing Font Styles and Formatting
Customizing Wiki Themes and Layouts
Getting Help Using the Wiki
Setting Up a Web Calendar
Enabling Web Calendar Service for a Website
Navigating the Web Calendar
Contents
5
73
73
74
74
Creating Timed Calendar Events
Editing Calendar Events
Deleting Web Calendar Events
Using the Web Calendar with iCal
75 Setting Up User and Group Blogs
75 Enabling Blog Service for a Website
75 Adding a Blog Page
76 Setting Blog SACL Permissions for Users
Chapter 5 77 Configuring and Managing Webmail
77 Webmail Overview
77 Webmail User Services
78 Webmail and Your Mail Server
78 Webmail Protocols
78 Enabling Webmail
79 Configuring Webmail
80 Setting Up Mailing List Web Archives
Chapter 6 83 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
83 Working with WebObjects Service
84 WebObjects Overview
84 Turning WebObjects Service On
84 Setting Up WebObjects Service
85 Starting WebObjects Service
85 Checking the Status of WebObjects Service
86 Stopping WebObjects Service
86 Opening the Monitor
86 Working with Apache
87 Editing Apache Configuration Files
88 Restoring the Default Configuration
88 Using the apachectl Script
89 About Apache Multicast DNS Registration
90 Using Apache Axis
90 Working with Tomcat
91 Setting Tomcat as the Application Container
92 Working with MySQL
92 Turning MySQL Service On
92 Setting Up MySQL Service
92 Starting MySQL Service
93 Checking the Status of MySQL Service
93 Viewing MySQL Service and Admin Logs
93 Stopping MySQL Service
94 Upgrading MySQL
6
Contents
94 Working with Ruby on Rails
95 Managing the Deployment of Ruby on Rails Applications
Chapter 7 99 Managing Web Modules
99 Apache Web Module Overview
99 Working with Web Modules
10 0 Viewing Web Modules
10 0 Adding Web Modules
101 Enabling Web Modules
101 Changing Web Modules
10 2 Deleting Web Modules
10 2 Macintosh-Specific Modules
10 2 mod_macbinary_apple
10 2 mod_spotlight_apple
10 2 mod_auth_apple
10 3 mod_hfs_apple
10 3 mod_digest_apple
10 3 mod_auth_digest_apple
10 3 mod_spnego
10 3 mod_encoding
10 3 mod_bonjour
10 3 Open Source Modules
10 3 Tomcat
10 4 PHP
10 4 mod_perl
10 4 mod_encoding
Chapter 8 107 Solving Web Service Problems
10 7 If Users Can’t Connect to a Website on Your Server
10 7 If a Web Module Is Not Working as Expected
10 8 If a CGI Script Does Not Run
Index 11 3
Contents 7
8 Contents
About This Guide
This guide tells you how to set up and manage a web server,
websites, and use open source web technologies.
Mac OS X Server version 10.5 includes Web service that is comprised of multiple web
technologies. Web service comes preinstalled on Apple server hardware and offers an
integrated, flexible environment for establishing and managing web technologies.
What’s New in Version 10.5
Mac OS X Server v10.5 offers the following enhancements to Web service:
 New and improved Apache 2.2
 Group wikis and blogs
 Easy certificate management in Server Admin
 Control of conventional (forward) and back-end (reverse) proxies
 Back-end proxy balancer, which allows simple deployment of Ruby on Rails or
WebObject applications
Preface
What’s in This Guide
This guide includes the following chapters:
 Chapter 1, “Web Technologies Overview,” highlights key concepts and provides basic
information about configuring a server, setting up websites, and understanding
specialized web components.
 Chapter 2, “Working with Web Service,” describes how to set up your web server for
the first time and how to manage web settings and components.
 Chapter 3, “Creating and Managing Websites,” provides instructions for setting up
and managing websites.
 Chapter 4, “Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs,” describes how to use Server
Admin to set up and manage wikis and blogs.
 Chapter 5, “Configuring and Managing Webmail,” tells you how to enable and use
Webmail on your web server.
9
 Chapter 6, “Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications,” provides
information and instructions related to WebObjects and open source components
Apache, Tomcat, and MySQL.
 Chapter 7, “Managing Web Modules,” describes the modules included in Mac OS X
Server and explains how to install, enable, and view modules.
 Chapter 8, “Solving Web Service Problems,” helps you address issues with web
technologies and websites.
In addition, the Glossary defines terms you’ll encounter as you read this guide.
Note: Because Apple frequently releases new versions and updates to its software,
images shown in this book may be different from what you see on your screen.
Using This Guide
The following list contains suggestions for using this guide:
 Read the guide in its entirety. Subsequent sections might build on information and
recommendations discussed in prior sections.
 The instructions in this guide should always be tested in a nonoperational
environment before deployment. This nonoperational environment should simulate,
as much as possible, the environment where the computer will be deployed.
Using Onscreen Help
You can get task instructions onscreen in Help Viewer while you’re managing Mac OS X
Server. You can view help on a server or an administrator computer. (An administrator
computer is a Mac OS X computer with Mac OS X Server administration software
installed on it.)
To get help for an advanced configuration of Leopard Server:
m Open Server Admin or Workgroup Manager and then:
 Use the Help menu to search for a task you want to perform.
 Choose Help > Server Admin Help or Help > Workgroup Manager to browse and
search the help topics.
The onscreen help contains instructions taken from Server Administration and other
advanced administration guides described in “Mac OS X Server Administration Guides,”
next.
To see the most recent server help topics:
m Make sure the server or administrator computer is connected to the Internet while
you’re getting help.
10 Preface About This Guide
Help Viewer automatically retrieves and caches the most recent server help topics from
the Internet. When not connected to the Internet, Help Viewer displays cached help
topics.
Mac OS X Server Administration Guides
Getting Started covers installation and setup for standard and workgroup configurations
of Mac OS X Server. For advanced configurations, Server Administration covers planning,
installation, setup, and general server administration. A suite of additional guides, listed
below, covers advanced planning, setup, and management of individual services. You
can get these guides in PDF format from the Mac OS X Server documentation website:
www.apple.com/server/documentation
This guide... tells you how to:
Getting Started and
Mac OS X Server Worksheet
Command-Line Administration Install, set up, and manage Mac OS X Server using UNIX command-
File Services Administration Share selected server volumes or folders among server clients
iCal Service Administration Set up and manage iCal shared calendar service.
iChat Service Administration Set up and manage iChat instant messaging service.
Mac OS X Security Configuration Make Mac OS X computers (clients) more secure, as required by
Mac OS X Server Security
Configuration
Mail Service Administration Set up and manage IMAP, POP, and SMTP mail services on the
Network Services Administration Set up, configure, and administer DHCP, DNS, VPN, NTP, IP firewall,
Open Directory Administration Set up and manage directory and authentication services, and
Podcast Producer Administration Set up and manage Podcast Producer service to record, process,
Print Service Administration Host shared printers and manage their associated queues and print
QuickTime Streaming and
Broadcasting Administration
Server Administration Perform advanced installation and setup of server software, and
Install Mac OS X Server and set it up for the first time.
line tools and configuration files.
using the AFP, NFS, FTP, and SMB protocols.
enterprise and government customers.
Make Mac OS X Server and the computer it’s installed on more
secure, as required by enterprise and government customers.
server.
NAT, and RADIUS services on the server.
configure clients to access directory services.
and distribute podcasts.
jobs.
Capture and encode QuickTime content. Set up and manage
QuickTime streaming service to deliver media streams live or on
demand.
manage options that apply to multiple services or to the server as a
whole.
Preface About This Guide 11
This guide... tells you how to:
System Imaging and Software
Update Administration
Upgrading and Migrating Use data and service settings from an earlier version of Mac OS X
User Management Create and manage user accounts, groups, and computers. Set up
Web Technologies Administration Set up and manage web technologies, including web, blog,
Xgrid Administration and High
Performance Computing Guide
Mac OS X Server Glossary Learn about terms used for server and storage products.
Use NetBoot, NetInstall, and Software Update to automate the
management of operating system and other software used by
client computers.
Server or Windows NT.
managed preferences for Mac OS X clients.
webmail, wiki, MySQL, PHP, Ruby on Rails, and WebDAV.
Set up and manage computational clusters of Xserve systems and
Mac computers.
Viewing PDF Guides Onscreen
While reading the PDF version of a guide onscreen:
 Show bookmarks to see the guide’s outline, and click a bookmark to jump to the
corresponding section.
 Search for a word or phrase to see a list of places where it appears in the document.
Click a listed place to see the page where it occurs.
 Click a cross-reference to jump to the referenced section. Click a web link to visit the
website in your browser.
Printing PDF Guides
If you want to print a guide, you can take these steps to save paper and ink:
 Save ink or toner by not printing the cover page.
 Save color ink on a color printer by looking in the panes of the Print dialog for an
option to print in grays or black and white.
 Reduce the bulk of the printed document and save paper by printing more than one
page per sheet of paper. In the Print dialog, change Scale to 115% (155% for Getting
Started). Then choose Layout from the untitled pop-up menu. If your printer supports
two-sided (duplex) printing, select one of the Two-Sided options. Otherwise, choose
2 from the Pages per Sheet pop-up menu, and optionally choose Single Hairline from
the Border menu. (If you’re using Mac OS X v10.4 or earlier, the Scale setting is in the
Page Setup dialog and the Layout settings are in the Print dialog.)
You may want to enlarge the printed pages even if you don’t print double sided,
because the PDF page size is smaller than standard printer paper. In the Print dialog or
Page Setup dialog, try changing Scale to 115% (155% for Getting Started, which has CDsize pages).
12 Preface About This Guide
Getting Documentation Updates
Periodically, Apple posts revised help pages and new editions of guides. Some revised
help pages update the latest editions of the guides.
 To view new onscreen help topics for a server application, make sure your server or
administrator computer is connected to the Internet and click “Latest help topics” or
“Staying current” in the main help page for the application.
 To download the latest guides in PDF format, go to the Mac OS X Server
documentation website:
www.apple.com/server/documentation
Getting Additional Information
For more information, consult these resources:
 Read Me documents—important updates and special information. Look for them on
the server discs.
 Mac OS X Server website (www.apple.com/server/macosx)—gateway to extensive
product and technology information.
 Mac OS X Server Support website (www.apple.com/support/macosxserver)—access to
hundreds of articles from Apple’s support organization.
 Apple Discussions website (discussions.apple.com)—a way to share questions,
knowledge, and advice with other administrators.
 Apple Mailing Lists website (www.lists.apple.com)—subscribe to mailing lists so you
can communicate with other administrators using email.
Preface About This Guide 13
14 Preface About This Guide
1 Web Technologies Overview
1
This chapter helps you to become familiar with web
technologies and to understand the major components
before setting up your services and sites.
The Web service is a complex suite of tools for the configuration and management of
the Apache web server, development of websites, and the integration of an application
server with a number of open-source components. It is best to familiarize yourself with
the complexities of your system before proceeding.
Web Technologies Overview
Web technologies offer an integrated Internet server solution. Web technologies—also
known as Web service in this guide—are easy to set up and manage, so you don’t need
to be an experienced web administrator to set up multiple websites and configure and
monitor your web server.
Web service is based on Apache, an open source HTTP web server. A web server
responds to requests for HTML webpages stored on your site. Open source software
gives you the capability to view and change the source code to make changes and
improvements. This has led to Apache’s widespread use, making it one of the most
popular web servers on the Internet today.
Web administrators can use Server Admin to administer Web service without knowing
about advanced settings or configuration files. Web administrators proficient with
Apache can also administer web technologies using Apache’s advanced features.
Because Web service in Mac OS X Server is based on Apache, you add advanced
features with plug-in modules. Apache modules let you add support for Simple Object
Access Protocol (SOAP), Java, and CGI languages such as Python.
Key Web Features
Web service consists of the following key components (web technologies), which
provide a flexible and scalable server environment.
15
 Apache Web Server
 WebDAV
 CGI Support
 SSL Support
 Dynamic Content with Server Side Includes (SSI)
 Blogs and RSS Support
Apache Web Server
Apache is an open source HTTP web server that administrators configure using Server
Admin.
Apache has a modular design, and the set of modules enabled by default is adequate
for most uses. Server Admin controls a few optional modules. Experienced Apache
users can add or remove modules and change the server code. For information about
modules, see “Apache Web Module Overview” on page 99.
Apache v1.3 is installed in earlier versions of Mac OS X Server. If you are doing a clean
installation, use Apache 2. Automatic migration from Apache1 to Apache 2 is a
supported feature of the Mac OS X Server v10.5.
WARNING: There are possible side-effects of the Apache 1 to Apache 2 conversion
script, particularly for security-related settings, which can impact the security of your
upgrade.
WebDAV
Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) is particularly useful for
updating content on a website. Users who have WebDAV access to the server can open
files, make changes or additions, and save those revisions. On Mac OS X, users can
mount WebDAV volumes and access them seamlessly from the Finder.
For more about using WebDAV for file sharing, see “Using WebDAV to Share Files” on
page 55.
CGI Support
Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripting provides a means of interaction between
the server and clients. For example, CGI scripts let you place an order for a product
offered on a website or submit responses to information requests.
It is possible to write CGI scripts in several scripting languages, including Perl and
Python. The folder /Library/WebServer/CGI-Executable is the default location for CGI
scripts.
16 Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview
SSL Support
Web service includes support for Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), a protocol that encrypts
information being transferred between client and server. SSL works with a digital
certificate that provides a certified identity for the server by establishing a secure,
encrypted exchange of information.
Dynamic Content with Server Side Includes (SSI)
Server Side Includes (SSI) provide a method for using the same content on multiple
pages in a site. They also can tell the server to run a script or insert specific data into a
page. This feature makes updating content much easier, because you revise
information in only one place and the SSI command displays that revised information
about many pages.
For more information about SSI, see “Enabling Server Side Includes (SSI)” on page 52.
Blogs and RSS Support
The web server provides blogs as an option for each website. The blogs comply with
RSS and Atom XML standards and permit Open Directory authentication. Blog users
can choose from several techniques for working with templates and style sheets.
Important: To make service access control list (SACL) changes to blog service, it is
necessary to use the server interface and not the web interface.
For information about setting access control for blogs using SACLs, see “Setting Blog
SACL Permissions for Users” on page 76.
Before You Begin
This section provides information you need before you set up your web server for the
first time. Read this section even if you are an experienced web administrator. Some
features and behaviors might be different from what you expect.
Selecting a Version of Apache
With a clean installation, Apache v2.2.4 will be installed. With an upgrade installation,
you start with v1.3 but can move to v2.2.4 when you are ready to do so.
Configuring Your Web Server
You use Server Admin to set up and configure most features of your web server. If you
are an experienced Apache administrator and need to work with features of the
Apache web server that aren’t included in Server Admin, change the relevant
configuration files.
However, Apple does not provide technical support for modifying Apache
configuration files. If you alter a file, be sure to make a backup copy first. Then revert to
the copy if you have problems.
Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview 17
Providing Secure Transactions
If you want to provide secure transactions on your server, you must set up SSL
protection. SSL lets you send encrypted, authenticated information across the Internet.
For example, if you want to authorize credit card transactions through your website,
you can use SSL to protect the information that’s passed to and from your site.
Important: You can’t use the performance cache for a website if SSL is enabled for that
site.
For instructions on how to set up secure transactions, see “Enabling Secure Sockets
Layer (SSL)” on page 43.
Setting Up Websites
Before hosting a website, you must:
 Register your domain name with a domain name authority
 Create a folder for your website on the server
 Create a default page in the folder for users to see when they connect
 Verify that DNS is properly configured if you want clients to access your website by
name
When you are ready to publish, or enable, your site, use Server Admin. The Sites pane,
located within Web service, lets you add a new site and select a variety of settings for
each site you host.
For more information about using WebDAV for file sharing, see “Website Management”
on page 49.
Hosting More Than One Website
You can host more than one website simultaneously on your web server. Depending
on how you configure your sites, they might share the same domain name, IP address,
or port. The unique combination of domain name, IP address, and port identifies each
separate site.
Your domain names must be registered with a domain name authority such as
InterNIC. Otherwise, the website associated with the domain won’t be visible on the
Internet. (There is a fee for each extra name you register.)
For more information about multiple sites, see “Managing Multiple Sites on One Server”
on page 56.
For more information about WebDAV, see “Understanding WebDAV” on page 19.
For more information about MIME formats, see “Understanding Multipurpose Internet
Mail Extension (MIME)” on page 20.
18 Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview
Understanding WebDAV
If you use WebDAV to provide live authoring on your website, you must create realms
and set access privileges for users. Each site you host can be divided into a number of
realms, each with its own set of users and groups that have browsing or authoring
privileges.
Setting WebDAV Privileges
The Apache process running on the server must have access to the website’s files and
folders. To provide this access, Mac OS X Server installs a user named www and a group
named www in the server’s Users & Groups List. The Apache processes that serve
webpages run as the www user and as members of the www group.
You must give the www group Read access to files in websites so the server can
transfer the files to browsers when users connect to the sites. The Apache process runs
with an effective user id and group id of www and needs access to the files and
directories in the WebDAV realm and in the /var/run/davlocks/ folder.
Understanding WebDAV Security
In Mac OS X Server v10.5, WebDAV lets you use a web server as a file server. Clients use
their browsers from multiple locations, on many types of computers, to access and
share files on the server. For more information about using WebDAV for file sharing, see
“Using WebDAV to Share Files” on page 55.
WebDAV also lets users update files on a website while the site is running. When
WebDAV is enabled, the web server must have write access to the files and folders in
the site users are updating.
Both features of WebDAV—providing a file server with browser access, and website
updating—have significant security implications when other sites are running on the
server, because individuals responsible for one site might be able to change other sites.
You can avoid this problem by carefully setting access privileges for the site files using
the File Sharing pane of Server Admin. Mac OS X Server uses a predefined group www,
which contains the Apache processes. You must give the www group Read & Write
access to files on the website. You also need to assign these files Read & Write access by
the website administrator (Owner) and No Access to Everyone. For more information,
see File Services Administration.
Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview 19
Defining Realms
When you define a realm, which is typically a folder (or file system), the access
privileges you set for the realm apply to all contents of that folder. If a new realm is
defined for a folder in the existing realm, only the new realm privileges apply to that
folder and its contents. For information about creating realms and setting access
privileges, see “Using Realms to Control Access” on page 40.
Note: When an assigned user or group possesses fewer permissions than the
permissions that have been assigned to user Everyone, that user or group is deleted
upon a refresh. This happens because the access assigned to Everyone preempts the
access assigned to specific users or groups with fewer permissions than those
possessed by Everyone.
The greater permissions always take precedence. Consequently, the list of assigned
users and groups with fewer permissions are not saved in the Realms pane upon
refresh if their permissions are determined to be preempted by the permissions
assigned to Everyone. After the refresh the names are no longer listed in the list on the
right in the Realms pane. Also, for a brief period of time, user Everyone will switch its
displayed name to "no-user.”
Understanding Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME)
Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME) is an Internet standard for specifying what
happens when a web browser requests a file with certain characteristics. You can
choose the response you want the web server to make based on the file’s suffix. Your
choices depend partly on what modules you have installed on your web server. Each
combination of a file suffix and its associated response is known as a MIME type
mapping.
MIME Suffixes
A suffix describes the type of data in a file. Here are some examples:
 txt for text files
 cgi for Common Gateway Interface files
 gif for GIF (graphics) files
 php for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (embedded HTML scripts) used for Webmail,
and so on
 tiff for TIFF (graphics) files
Mac OS X Server includes a default set of MIME type suffixes. This set includes all the
suffixes in the mime.types file distributed with Apache, with a few additions. If a suffix
you need is not listed or does not have the behavior you want, use Server Admin to
add the suffix to the set or to change its behavior.
20 Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview
Note: Do not add or change MIME suffixes by editing configuration files.
Web Server Responses (Content Handlers)
When a file is requested, the web server handles the file using the response specified
for the file’s suffix. Responses, also known as content handlers, can be either an action
or a MIME type. Likely responses include:
 Return file as MIME type (you enter the mapping you want to return)
 Send-as-is (send the file exactly as it exists)
 Cgi-script (run a CGI script you designate)
 Imap-file (generate an IMAP mail message)
 Mac-binary (download a compressed file in MacBinary format)
MIME type mappings are divided into two subfields separated by a forward slash, such
as text/plain.
Mac OS X Server includes a list of default MIME type mappings. You can edit these and
add others using Server Admin.
When you specify a MIME type as a response, the server identifies the type of data
requested and sends the response you specify. For example, if the browser requests a
file with the suffix “jpg,” and its associated MIME type mapping is image/jpeg, the
server knows it needs to send an image file and that its format is JPEG. The server
doesn’t need to do anything except serve the data requested.
Actions are handled differently. If you’ve mapped an action to a suffix, your server runs
a program or script, and the result is served to the requesting browser. For example, if a
browser requests a file with the suffix “cgi,” and its associated response is the action
cgi-script, your server runs the script and returns the resulting data to the requesting
browser.
Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview 21
22 Chapter 1 Web Technologies Overview
2 Working with Web Service
2
This chapter shows you how to use Server Admin to set up
Web service and to manage web settings and components.
Mac OS X Server combines the latest open source and standards-based Internet
services in a complete, easy-to-use web hosting solution. Use Server Admin to
configure Web service and set up web components depending on your organization’s
needs.
Setup Overview
Here is an overview of the basic steps for setting up Web service.
Step 1: Read “Before You Begin”
For issues you should consider before setting up Web service on your network, read
“Before You Begin” on page 17.
Step 2: Turn Web service on
Before configuring, Web service must be turned on. See “Turning Web Service On” on
page 24.
Step 3: Configure web general settings
Configure General settings to set connection settings and enable Tomcat. See
“Configuring General Settings” on page 24.
Step 4: Configure web MIME types
Using MIME types you can set up how your web server responds when your browser
requests certain file types. See “Configuring MIME Types Settings” on page 25.
Step 5: Configure web proxy settings
Use proxy settings to enable a proxy that sends requests to and from the web server.
See “Configuring Proxy Settings” on page 27.
Step 6: Configure web modules
Use modules settings to select or deselect which web modules are available for the
web server. See “Configuring Modules Settings” on page 28.
23
Step 7: Configure web services
Use web service settings to set up common settings shared between wikis, blogs, web
calendars, and web based mailing list archives for groups. See “Configuring Web
Services Settings” on page 29.
Step 8: Start Web service
After you configure Web service, start the service to make it available. See “Starting
Web Service” on page 29.
Turning Web Service On
Before you can configure Web settings, you must turn on web service in Server Admin.
To turn Web service on:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click Settings, then click Services.
3 Select the Web checkbox.
4 Click Save.
Setting Up Web Service
Use Server Admin to change Web service settings. The following sections describe the
tasks for configuring and starting Web service.
There are five groups of settings on the Settings pane for Web service in Server Admin:
 General. Set Web service connection and spare server settings.
 MIME Types. Set up multipurpose internet mail extension (MIME) types and content
handlers.
 Proxy. Configure proxy settings for the web server.
 Modules. Select which web modules are available for Web service.
 Web Services. Configure settings common Web services that are hosted on any site.
The following sections describe how to configure these settings, and a final section
tells you how to start Web service when you finish.
Configuring General Settings
You use the General settings pane in web service to configure Web server connection
settings, spare server settings, and to enable or disable Tomcat.
For more information on web server connection settings, see “Performance Tuning” on
page 32.
To configure Web service General settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
24 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click General.
5 Enter the maximum simultaneous connections.
The default setting is 1024 connections.
This is the number of concurrent connections that are allowed to access your web
server.
6 Enter the time in seconds for the connection timeout.
The default setting is 300 seconds.
This is the length of time before a connection to your web server times out. This
happens when a user is viewing web pages but not interacting with the site.
7 Enter the number of minimum and maximum spare servers.
Spare server settings regulate the creation of idle spare server processes.
For maximum spare servers, if more than the maximum number of spare servers are
idle, the server stops adding spare servers beyond the maximum limit.
For minimum spare servers, if there are fewer than the minimum spare servers
required, the server adds spare servers at a rate of one per second.
8 Enter the number of servers to start.
This is the number of spare servers that get created at startup.
9 For your site to permit persistent connections, select the Allow Persistent Connections
checkbox and configure the persistent connection settings:
Set the Maximum persistent connections. The default is 500 connections.
Set the Persistent connection timeout length in seconds. The default is 15 seconds.
10 Select the Enable Tomcat checkbox to turn Tomcat on.
11 Click Save.
Configuring MIME Types Settings
MIME is an Internet standard for specifying what happens when a web browser
requests a file with specific characteristics. The MIME Types pane in Server Admin lets
you set up how your web server responds when a browser requests certain file types.
Content handlers are similar and also use suffixes to determine how a file is handled.
The file suffix describes the type of data in the file. Each suffix and its associated
response (such as text/plain and text/richtext) are known as a MIME type mapping or a
content handler mapping.
Chapter 2 Working with Web Service 25
The server includes the MIME type in its response to a browser to describe the
information being sent. The browser can then use its list of MIME preferences to
determine how to handle the information.
The server’s default MIME type is text/html, which specifies that a file contains HTML
text.
The web server is set up to handle the most common MIME types and content
handlers. You can add, edit, or delete MIME type and content handler mappings. In
Server Admin, these files are displayed in two lists: MIME Types and Content Handlers.
You can edit items in each list and add or delete items in either list.
To configure MIME Types settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click MIME Types.
5 Add, delete, or edit MIME Type mappings.
Click the Add (+) button to add a mapping to the MIME Types list. Enter each part of
the name (separated by a slash), then double-click “new” in the Suffixes list and enter a
suffix name. Use the Add (+) or Delete (–) button (next to the Suffixes list) to add or
delete suffixes in the Suffixes list. Then click OK.
To delete a MIME Type mapping, select it from the MIME Types list and click the Delete
(–) button.
To edit a MIME Type mapping, select the mapping from the MIME Types list and click
the Edit (/) button. Make your changes to the mapping, then click OK.
6 Add, delete, or edit Content Handlers mappings.
Click the Add (+) button to add a mapping to the Content Handlers list. Enter the
name, then double-click “new” in the Suffixes list and enter a suffix name. Use the Add
(+) or Delete (–) button (next to the Suffixes list) to add or delete suffixes in the Suffixes
list. Then click OK.
To delete a Content Handlers mapping, select it from the Content Handlers list and click
the Delete (–) button.
To edit a Content Handlers mapping, select the mapping from the Content Handlers list
and click the Edit (/) button. Make your changes to the mapping, then click OK.
Note: If you add or edit a handler that has a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) script,
make sure you have enabled CGI execution for your site in the Options pane of the
Sites pane.
26 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
7 Click Save.
Configuring Proxy Settings
You use the Proxy settings pane in Web service to configure a forward proxy. A forward
proxy is located between the web server and client browsers and passes requests for
information between clients and server. The client must be configured to use the
forward proxy to access other sites.
A forward proxy is commonly used to provide Internet access to internal client
computers that are restricted by a firewall. A forward proxy lets users verify a local
server for frequently used files. A forward proxy can be used to block access to specific
sites for internal clients and can improve performance.
You can also use a forward proxy to speed response times and reduce network traffic.
The proxy stores recently accessed files in a cache on your web server. Browsers on
your network verify the cache before retrieving files from more distant servers.
For additional security you should restrict access to your server by setting up this
forward proxy. This is particularly true if your server hosts internal and external
websites. If your web server is set up to act as a proxy, you can prevent the server from
caching objectionable websites.
Important: To take advantage of this feature, client computers must specify your web
server as their proxy server in their browser preferences.
When setting up a forward proxy, make sure you create and enable a website for the
proxy. You might want to disable logging on the proxy site or configure the site to
record its access log in a separate file from your other sites’ access logs. The site does
not need to be on port 80 but setting up web clients is easier if it is because browsers
use port 80 by default.
Mac OS X Server v10.5 provides forward and reverse proxy. The reverse proxy is
configured in the Web service Sites pane. For information about setting up a reverse
proxy, see “Setting Up a Reverse Proxy” on page 47.
To configure Web service forward proxy settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click Proxy.
5 Select the Enable Forward Proxy checkbox.
If a forward proxy server is enabled, each site on the server can be used as the proxy.
Chapter 2 Working with Web Service 27
6 Select the Control Access To Proxy checkbox to limit access and then enter the domain
name that is permitted access in the “Allowed Domain” field.
Generally, when limiting who can use your web server as a proxy, limit access to a
specific domain. Users in that domain obtain access.
7 In the Cache Folder field, enter the pathname for the cache folder.
You can also click the Browse button and browse for the folder you want to use.
If you are administering a remote server, File service must be running on the remote
server to use the Browse button.
If you change the folder location from the default, you must select the new folder in
Finder. Choose File > Get Info, and change the owner and group to www.
8 Set the disk cache target size and set an interval for emptying the cache.
When the cache reaches this size, the oldest files are deleted from the cache folder.
9 To add a host to block, click the Add (+) button and enter its URL.
Add the names of all hosts you want to block.
You can import a list of websites by dragging the list to the list of blocked hosts. The
list must be a text file with the host names separated by commas or tabs (also known
as csv and tsv strings). Make sure the last entry in the file is terminated with a carriage
return/line feed; otherwise, it is overlooked.
10 Click Save.
Configuring Modules Settings
You use the Modules settings pane in Web service to configure the web modules your
server will use.
The Web service in Mac OS X Server is modular. This means that administrators have
more flexibility in the web technologies that are added to the service. For more
information on web modules, see “Working with Web Modules” on page 99.
To configure Web service modules settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click Modules.
5 Select the Enable checkbox next to each module that you want the server to use.
For information on how to add, change, or delete modules, see “Working with Web
Modules” on page 99.
6 Click Save.
28 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
Configuring Web Services Settings
You use the Web Services settings pane in Web service to configure common web
server settings that are hosted on any site.
Web services include wikis, blogs, web calendars, and web-based mailing list archives
for groups. These services are independently enabled for each website you host.
To configure Web service settings for your server:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click Web Services.
5 In the Data Store field, enter the folder where Web service will store information.
The default folder is /Library/Collaboration/. Click Choose to browse for a different
folder.
6 In the Maximum attachment size field, enter the maximum attachment size for files
that can be attached to the web services.
The default file size is 50 MB.
7 From the Default Wiki and Blog Theme pop-up menu, choose the theme for your wiki.
A theme controls the appearance of a wiki and blog. Themes determine the color, size,
location, and other attributes of wiki and blog elements. Each theme is implemented
using a style sheet. The default theme is used when a wiki or blog is initially created,
but blog owners can change the theme. For more information, see “Customizing Wiki
Themes and Layouts” on page 71.
8 Click Save.
Starting Web Service
You start Web service from Server Admin. When you make configuration changes to
Web service and you save your changes, the web server is restarted, causing those
changes to be recognized by the httpd process.
To start Web service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Start Web (below the Servers list).
Chapter 2 Working with Web Service 29
The service runs until you stop it and restarts if your server is restarted.
From the Command Line
You can also start Web service using the serveradmin command in Terminal. For more
information, see the Web service chapter of Command-Line Administration.
Managing Web Service
This section describes typical day-to-day tasks you might perform after you set up Web
service on your server. Initial setup information appears in “Setting Up Web Service” on
page 24.
For more information about Website management, see “Website Management” on
page 49.
Checking Web Service Status
Use Server Admin to check the status of Web service.
To view Web service status:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 To see information such as whether the service is running, when it started, Apache
Server version, the number of requests per second, and server throughput, click
Overview.
5 To review access and error logs, click Logs.
To choose which log to view, select the logs in the list. The corresponding log appears
below.
6 To see graphs of connected users or throughput, click Graphs.
Use the pop-up menus to choose which graph to view and the duration of time to
graph data for.
7 To see a list of websites, click Sites.
The list includes the domain name, address, port, and whether the site is enabled.
From the Command Line
You can also view the status of Web service by using the
Terminal, or by looking at the log files in the /Library/Logs/wikid/ or /var/log/apache2/
folder using the
chapter of Command-Line Administration.
30 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
cat or tail command. For more information, see the File services
ps or top command in
Viewing Web Service Logs
Use Server Admin to view the error and access logs for Web service, if you have
enabled them. Web service in Mac OS X Server uses the standard Apache log format, so
you can also use a third-party log analysis tool to interpret the log data.
To view logs:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Logs, then choose between an access or error log by selecting the log from the
list of logs.
To search for specific entries, use the Filter field in the lower right.
From the Command Line
You can also view Web service logs in the /Library/Logs/wikid/ or /var/log/apache2/
folder by using the cat or tail command in Terminal. For more information, see the
Web service chapter of Command-Line Administration.
Viewing Web Graphs
Use Server Admin to view Web service graphs.
To view web graphs:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 To see graphs of connected users or throughput, click Graphs.
To choose which graph to view and the duration of time to graph data for, use the
pop-up menus.
5 To update the data in the graphs, click the Refresh button (below the Servers list).
Stopping Web Service
Use Server Admin to stop Web service. This disconnects all users, so connected users
may lose unsaved changes in open files.
To stop Web service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
Chapter 2 Working with Web Service 31
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Stop Web (below the Servers list).
From the Command Line
You can also stop Web service immediately using the serveradmin command in
Terminal. For more information, see the Web services chapter of Command-Line
Administration.
Performance Tuning
You can limit the period of time that users are connected to the server. You can also
specify the number of connections to websites on the server at one time.
Setting Simultaneous Connections for the Web Server
You can specify the number of simultaneous connections to your web server. When the
maximum number of connections is reached, new requests receive a message that the
server is busy.
Simultaneous connections are concurrent HTTP client connections. Browsers often
request several parts of a webpage at the same time, and each request creates a
connection. As a result, a high number of simultaneous connections can be reached if
the site has pages with multiple elements and many users are trying to reach the
server at one time.
To set the maximum number of connections to your web server:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click General.
5 Enter a number in the “Maximum simultaneous connections” field.
The range for maximum simultaneous connections is 1 to 1024. The default is 500, but
you can set the number higher or lower, taking into consideration the desired
performance of your server.
6 Enter the time in seconds for the Connection timeout.
The default is 300 seconds.
This is the length of time before a connection to your web server times out. This
happens when a user is viewing web pages but not interacting with the site.
7 Enter the number of minimum and maximum spare servers.
The spare server settings regulate the creation of idle spare server processes.
32 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
For maximum spare servers, if more than the maximum number of spare servers are
idle, the server stops adding spare servers beyond the maximum limit.
For minimum spare servers, if there are fewer than the minimum spare servers
required, the server adds spare servers at a rate of one per second.
8 Enter the number of servers to start.
This is the number of spare servers that get created at startup.
9 Click Save.
Setting Persistent Connections for the Web Server
You can set up your web server to respond to multiple requests from a client computer
without closing the connection each time. Repeatedly opening and closing
connections isn’t efficient and decreases performance.
Most browsers request a persistent connection from the server, and the server keeps
the connection open until the browser closes the connection. This means the browser
is using a connection even when no information is being transferred. The Apache
documentation refers to persistent connects as Keep-Alive connections.
You can authorize more persistent connections—and avoid sending a Server Busy
message to other users—by increasing the number of authorized persistent
connections.
Important: Persistent connections are not compatible with the performance cache.
To set the number of persistent connections:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click General.
5 Select Allow Persistent Connections if it is not selected.
6 Enter a number in the “Maximum persistent connections” field.
The range for maximum persistent connections is 1 to 2048.
7 Click Save.
Web service restarts when you save the changes.
Setting a Connection Timeout Interval
You can specify a time period after which the server can drop a connection that is
inactive.
Chapter 2 Working with Web Service 33
To set the connection timeout interval:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click General.
5 In the “Persistent connection timeout” field, enter a number to specify the amount of
time that can pass between requests before the session is disconnected by the web
server.
The range for connection timeout is 0 to 9999 seconds.
6 Click Save.
34 Chapter 2 Working with Web Service
3 Creating and Managing Websites
3
This chapter helps you create and manage websites that are
hosted on your web server.
With Web service configured and your web server running, you can create websites.
You create and modify websites on your server with Server Admin. Creating a website
establishes the framework that you use to provide web hosted content in various
formats.
Website Setup Overview
Here is an overview of the basic steps for setting up a website.
Step 1: Configure your web server
The default configuration works for most web servers that host a single website, but
you can configure all basic features of Web service and websites using Server Admin.
For more information, see Chapter 2, “Working with Web Service.”
For more advanced configuration options, see Chapter 6, “Working with WebObjects
and Open Source Applications.”
To host user websites, you must configure at least one website.
Step 2: Set up the web folder
When your server software is installed, a folder located at /Library/WebServer/
Documents/ is set up in the file system. Put items you want to make available through
a website in the web folder. You can create subfolders in the web folder to organize the
information, and it is generally recommended that you do so if you create additional
virtual hosts.
In addition, each registered user has a Sites folder in the user’s home folder. Graphics or
HTML pages stored in the user’s Sites folder are served from http://server.example.com/
~username/.
For more information, see “Setting Up the Web Folder” on page 37.
35
Step 3: Assign privileges for your website
The Apache processes that serve webpages must have Read access to the files and
Read/Execute access to the folders. (In the case of folders, Execute access means the
ability to read the names of files and folders contained in that folder.)
Those Apache processes run as user www—a special user created for Apache when
Mac OS X Server is installed. User www is a member of group www, so for the Apache
process to access the content of the website, the files and folders must be readable by
user www.
You must give group www at least Read-Only access to files in your website so it can
transfer those files to browsers when users connect to the site. This applies to all parent
folders as well. In other words, the folder containing your web content and the folder
containing that folder, and so on, must be readable and searchable by user or group
www.
You can do this by:
 Making the files and folders readable and searchable by everyone regardless of their
user or group ownership.
 Making group www the owner of files and folders and making sure that the files and
folders are readable and searchable by the owner.
 Making group www the owner of files and folders and making sure the files and
folders are readable and searchable by the group.
 Making sure the files and folders are readable and searchable by everyone (world),
regardless of their ownership and group settings. This is the default case.
For information about assigning privileges, see File Services Administration.
Step 4: Create the website
Use Server Admin to create a website. After the site is created, configure the settings
for your network environment and web requirements. For details, see “Creating a
Website” on page 38.
Step 5: Set the default page
When users connect to your website, they see the default page. When you first install
the software, the file index.html in the Documents folder is the default page. Replace
this file with the first page of your website and name it index.html.
To name the file something else, add that name to the list of default index files and
move its name to the top of the list in the General pane of the site settings window of
Server Admin. For instructions about specifying default index file names, see “Setting
the Default Webpage” on page 39.
Step 6: (Optional) Configure website Apache options
Use the Sites Options pane to configure Apache web options. For details, see
“Configuring Website Apache Options” on page 39.
36 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
Step 7: (Optional) Creating realms to control website access
You can create a realm to control access to locations or folders in a website. Use the
Sites Realms pane to configure your website realms. For details, see “Using Realms to
Control Access” on page 40.
Step 8: Enable website access and error logs
Use the Logging pane in the Sites pane to enable access and error logs for your
website. For details, see “Enabling Access and Error Logs for a Website” on page 42.
Step 9: (Optional) Enable SSL
Use the Security pane in the Sites pane to enable SSL for your website. For details, see
“Enabling Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)” on page 43.
Step 10: (Optional) Creating website aliases and redirects
Use the Aliases pane in the Sites pane to configure website aliases and redirects. For
details, see “Managing Access to Sites Using Aliases” on page 45.
Step 11: (Optional) Set up a reverse proxy
Use the Proxy pane in the Sites pane to configure a reverse proxy for your website. For
details, see “Setting Up a Reverse Proxy” on page 47.
Step 12: (Optional) Enable optional website features
Use the Web Services pane in the Sites pane to enable optional web services. For
details, see “Enabling Optional Web Services” on page 48.
Step 13: Connect to your website
To make sure the website is working properly, open your browser and try to connect to
your website over the Internet. If your site isn’t working correctly, see Chapter 8,
“Solving Web Service Problems,” on page 107.
Setting Up Your Website
The following sections provide instructions for setting up your website.
Setting Up the Web Folder
To make files available through a website, put the files in the web folder for the site. To
organize the information, you can create subfolders inside the web folder. The folder is
located at /Library/WebServer/Documents/.
In addition, each registered user has a Sites folder in the user’s home folder. Graphics or
HTML pages stored here are served from http://server.example.com/~username/.
To set up the web folder for your website:
1 Open the web folder on your web server.
By default, the documents folder is located at /Library/WebServer/Documents/.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 37
2 Replace the index.html file with the main page for your website.
Make sure the name of your main page matches the default document name you set in
the Sites General pane. For details, see “Setting the Default Webpage” on page 39.
3 Copy files you want available on your website to the web folder.
Creating a Website
Use Server Admin to create a website framework. This allows content from the web
folder to be hosted by your web server. Before you can create a website, you must
produce the content for the site and set up your site folders.
To create a website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then click the Add (+) button to add a new site.
5 In the Sites General pane, enter the fully qualified DNS name of your website in the
Domain Name field.
Note: You can leave the domain name blank and the IP address set to “any” and the
site remains operational.
6 Enter the IP address and port number for the site.
The default port number is 80. If you are using SSL, the port is 443. Make sure the
number you choose is not in use by another service on the server.
To enable your website on the server, the website must have a unique name, IP
address, and port number combination. For more information see “Hosting More Than
One Website” on page 18.
WARNING: Do not try to access the server through the direct ports. Instead, allow
your access to be proxied through Apache as it is set up. For instance, Server Admin
provides no obvious way to configure wikis, and will return the xmlrpc error. In
addition, do not access the wiki server on port 8086 or 8087.
7 Enter the path to the folder you set up for this website.
You can also click the Choose button and browse for the folder you want to use.
8 In the Error Document field, enter the page you want to appear when a web page error
occurs.
9 (Optional) In the Administrator Email field, enter the administrator mail address.
The server sends website error messages to this mail address.
38 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
10 Click Save.
Setting the Default Webpage
The default page appears when a user connects to your website by specifying a folder
or host name instead of a file name.
You can have more than one default page (known as a default index file in Server
Admin) for a website. If multiple index files are listed for a website, the web server uses
the first one listed in the web folder for that website.
To set the default webpage:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click General below the websites list.
6 At the right of the Default Index Files list, click the Add (+) button and enter a name
(but do not use spaces in the name.)
A file with this name must be in the web folder.
7 To set the file as the default page the server displays, drag that file to the top of the list.
8 Click Save.
Note: If you plan to use only one index page for a site, you can leave index.html as the
default index file and change the content of the existing file with that name in /Library/
WebServer/Documents/.
Configuring Website Apache Options
The default page appears when a user connects to your website by specifying a folder
or host name instead of a file name.
To configure website Apache options:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Options below the websites list.
6 Select any of the following Apache options your website requires:
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 39
Folder Listing: Displays a list of folders when users specify the URL and no default
webpage (such as index.html) is present. Instead of viewing a default webpage, the
server shows a list of the web folder’s contents. Folder listings appear only if no default
document is found.
WebDAV: Turns Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) on, which
allows users to make changes to websites while the sites are running. If you enable
WebDAV you must also assign access privileges for the sites and for the web folders.
CGI Execution: Permits Common Gateway Interface (CGI) programs or scripts to run on
your web server. CGI programs or scripts define how a web server interacts with
external content-generating programs. For more information, see “Enabling a Common
Gateway Interface (CGI) Script” on page 51.
Server Side Includes (SSI): Permits SSI directives placed in web pages to be evaluated
on the server while the website is active. You can add dynamically generated content
to your web pages while the files are being viewed by users. For more information, see
“Enabling Server Side Includes (SSI)” on page 52.
Allow All Overrides: Instructs Web service to look for additional configuration files
inside the web folder for each request.
Spotlight Searching: Allows web browsers to search the content of your website. For
details on configuring website indexing, see “Creating Indexes for Searching Website
Content” on page 52.
7 Click Save.
Using Realms to Control Access
You can use realms to control access and provide security to locations or folders within
a website. Realms are locations at the URL or they are files in the folder that users can
view.
If WebDAV is enabled, users with authoring privileges can also change content in the
realm. You set up the realms and specify the users and groups that have access to
them.
When an assigned user or group possesses fewer permissions than the permissions
that have been assigned to user Everyone, that user or group is deleted upon a refresh.
This happens because the access assigned to Everyone preempts the access assigned
to specific users or groups with fewer permissions than those possessed by Everyone.
The greater permissions always take precedence.
Consequently, the list of assigned users and groups with fewer permissions are not
saved in the Realms pane upon refresh if their permissions are determined to be
preempted by the permissions assigned to Everyone. After the refresh the names are
no longer listed in the list on the right in the Realms pane. Also, for a brief period of
time, user Everyone will switch its displayed name to "no-user."
40 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
To use a realm to control website access:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Realms below the websites list.
6 Click the Add (+) button to create a realm.
The realm is the part of the website users can access.
7 In the Realm Name field, enter the realm name.
This is the name users see when they log in to the website.
8 From the Authentication pop-up menu, choose a method of authentication.
Basic authentication is on by default. Don’t use basic authentication for sensitive data
because it sends your password to the server unencrypted.
Digest authentication is more secure than basic authentication because it uses an
encrypted hash of your password.
Kerberos authentication is the most secure because it implements server certificates to
authenticate. If you want Kerberos authentication for the realm, you must join the
server to a Kerberos domain.
9 Enter the realm location or folder you are restricting access to:
Choose Location from the pop-up menu and enter a URL to the location in the website
that you want to restrict access to.
Choose Folder from the pop-up menu and enter the path to the folder that you want
to restrict access to.
You can also click the Browse button to locate the folder you want to use.
10 Click OK.
11 Select the new realm and click Add (+) to open the Users & Groups panel.
To switch between the Users list and the Groups list, click Users or Groups in the panel.
12 To add users or groups to a realm, drag users to the list on the right in the Realms
pane.
When users or members of a group you’ve added to the realm connect to the site, they
must supply their user name and password.
13 Limit realm access to specified users and groups by setting the following permissions
using the up and down arrows in the Persmissions column.
Browse Only: Permits users or groups to browse the website.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 41
Browse and Read WebDAV: Permits users or groups to browse the website and also
read the website files using WebDAV.
Browse and Read/Write WebDAV: Permits users or groups to browse the website and
also read and write to website files using WebDAV.
None: Prevents users or groups from using any permissions.
14 Click Save.
Use the Realms pane to delete a user or group by selecting the name and clicking the
Delete (–) button.
Enabling Access and Error Logs for a Website
When enabled, Web service keeps access and error logs for your website. You can set
up error and access logs for individual websites that you host on your server. However,
enabling logs can slow server performance.
The access log contains an entry for each access to the website, indicating what page
was accessed, by whom, and whether the access was successful, along with other
details.
The error log contains information about failed accesses, or various conditions of
interest to the administrator. This log prioritizes messages using severity levels ranging
from debug to critical. Server Admin can limit the messages logged by the level of
severity. By default, messages are logged at a "warning" level threshold.
In addition to per-site logs, there is an access log and an error log for the wikid process,
which provides logging for wikis.
Finally, if you upgraded to Mac OS X Server v10.5 from Mac OS X Server v10.3 or
Mac OS X Server v10.4, and the Apache Mode was changed from Apache 1 to Apache
2, there will be a Web Service migration log, which details the actions taken by the
Apache 1.3 -> 2.2 translation script.
To enable access and error logs for a website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Logging below the websites list.
6 Select Enable Access Log to enable this log.
7 Set how often you want the Access log to be archived by selecting the “Archive every
__ days” checkbox and entering the number of days.
42 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
8 In the Location field, enter the path to the folder where you want to store access logs.
If you are working with multiple websites, you can name separate logs for each
website. You might want to include the site domain name in the log name for easy
recognition when reviewing logs. If you have only two websites, you might want to use
a single log (with the default name the server uses).
You can also click the Browse button to locate the folder you want to use.
If you are administering a remote server, File service must be running on the remote
server to use the Browse button.
9 From the Format pop-up menu, choose a log format.
10 If necessary, edit the format string.
Note: The Help button next to the format string opens the Apache documentation
web page (http://httpd.apache.org/docs/mod/mod_log_config.html), which explains
parameters for format strings.
11 Set how often you want the Error log to be archived by selecting the “Archive every __
days” checkbox for the Error log and entering the number of days.
12 In the Error log Location field, enter the path to the folder where you want to store
error logs.
You can also click the Browse button to locate the folder you want to use.
13 Choose the level of error in the Level pop-up menu to set which error message priority
gets logged.
14 Click Save.
Enabling Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) provides security for a site and its users by authenticating
the server, encrypting information, and maintaining message integrity.
SSL is a per-site setting that lets you send encrypted, authenticated information across
the Internet. For example, if you want to permit credit card transactions through a
website, you can protect the information that’s passed to and from that site.
The SSL layer is below application protocols (for example, HTTP) and above TCP/IP. This
means that when SSL is operating on the server and on the client computer, all
information is encrypted before being sent.
The Apache web server in Mac OS X Server uses a public key-private key combination
to protect information. A browser encrypts information using a public key provided by
the server. Only the server has a private key that can decrypt that information.
The web server supports SSLv2, SSLv3, and TLSv1. More information about these
protocol versions is available at www.modssl.org.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 43
When SSL is implemented on a server, a browser connects to it using the https prefix in
the URL, rather than http. The “s” indicates that the server is secure.
When a browser initiates a connection to an SSL-protected server, it connects to a
specific port (443) and sends a message that describes the encryption ciphers it
recognizes. The server responds with its strongest cipher, and the browser and server
then continue exchanging messages until the server determines the strongest cipher
that it and the browser can recognize.
The server then sends its certificate (an ISO X.509 certificate) to the browser. This
certificate identifies the server and uses it to create an encryption key for the browser
to use. At this point a secure connection has been established and the browser and
server can exchange encrypted information.
Before you can enable SSL protection for a website, you must obtain the proper
certificates. For detailed information about certificates and their management, see
Server Administration.
To set up SSL for a website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Security below the websites list.
6 In the Security pane, select Enable Secure Sockets Layer (SSL).
When you turn on SSL, a message appears, noting that the port is changed to 443.
7 In the Certificate pop-up menu, choose the certificate you want.
If the certificate is protected by a passphrase, the name of the certificate must match
the virtual host name. If the names don’t match, Web service won’t restart.
8 If you choose Custom Configuration or want to edit a certificate, you might have to do
the following:
a Click the Edit (/) button and supply the correct information in each field for the
certificate.
b If you received a ca.crt file from the certificate authority, click the Edit (/) button and
paste the text from the ca.crt file in the Certificate Authority File field.
Note: The ca.crt file might be required but might not be sent directly to you. This file
must be available on the website of the certificate authority.
c In the Private Key Passphrase field, enter a passphrase and click OK.
9 Click Save.
44 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
10 Confirm that you want to restart Web service.
Server Admin lets you enable SSL with or without saving the SSL passphrase. If you did
not save the passphrase with the SSL certificate data, the server prompts you for the
passphrase upon restart but won’t accept manually entered passphrases. Use the
Security pane for the site in Server Admin to save the passphrase with the SSL
certificate data. For more information, see “Using a Passphrase with SSL Certificates” on
page 53.
Managing Access to Sites Using Aliases
You can manage access to websites by using aliases and redirect commands. An alias is
an alternative name for a website, which can be useful in simplifying the name users
must enter to connect to the site. You can have multiple aliases for a single site.
For example, with a host named example.com you might want to provide a server alias
named www.example.com.
The Server Admin Sites Aliases panel mixes two types of aliases.
 The top half of the panel is for web server aliases that give an alternate name to the
website or virtual host.
 The bottom half of the panel is for URL aliases and redirects, which are more fine-
grained.
By default, the Sites Aliases panel lists a Web Server Alias * (wildcard) directive. To
perform name-based virtual hosting, remove the wildcard. If you do not remove the
wildcard, browsers trying to access your virtual hosts will access the default host
instead.
Note: Server aliases and virtual hosts must be DNS names and they must resolve to the
IP address of the website.
A redirect command specifies that when users ask for a specific folder or file on a site,
their browser is sent to a different location that you designate.
For example, you could set up a redirect so that if the user enters a URL such as
www.example.com/images/boats.jpg and the site has an images folder containing the
boats.jpg file, the browser gets redirected to www.apple.com.
By default, the Sites Aliases panel lists the following redirects:
 /collaboration - used to provide the CSS required by Apple’s wiki and blog pages and
default index.html and Spotlight displays
 /icons/ - used to direct browsers to the standard collection of icons shipped with
Apache
 /error/ - used to direct browsers to the standard collection of error pages shipped
with Apache
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 45
The examples below show aliases and redirects.
Type Pattern Path Description
Alias /images /Volumes/Data/imgs If you make a file system change but
don’t want to update all image URLs in
your HTML files, this instructs
www.example.com/images/boat.jpg to
take the file from /Volumes/Data/imgs/
boat.jpg.
Alias Match ^/(.*)\.gif /Library/WebServer/
Documents/
gifs$1.jpg
Redirect /webstore https://
secure.example.com/
webstore
Redirect Match (.*)\.jpg http://
imageserver.example.
com$1.jpg
If you store all gifs in a specific folder
but they must be referenced from the
web server root, this instructs the alias
www.example.com/logo.gif to serve the
file located at /Library/WebServer/
Documents/gifs/logo.gif.
This redirects all queries for webstore to
the secure server.
If you host static content such as
images on a new server, this redirects
all requests for files ending in .jpg to a
different server.
Further information and other examples of aliases and redirects are available at http://
httpd.apache.org/docs/mod/mod_alias.html.
To create or edit aliases the site responds to:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Aliases below the websites list.
6 To create aliases, click the Add (+) button under the Web Server Aliases list or select an
alias and click the Edit button.
7 In the Server Alias field, enter an alias and click OK.
8 To create a redirect, click the Add (+) button under URL Aliases and Redirects list or
select a redirect and click the Edit (/) button.
9 Choose one of the following options from the Type pop-up menu.
Alias: Maps from the URL term to a location in the file system.
Alias Match: Maps a regular expression pattern for a path to a location in the file
system.
46 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
Redirect: Maps a URL term to redirect to another server.
Redirect Match: Maps a regular expression pattern for a path to redirect to another
server.
10 In the Pattern field, enter the pattern for the alias or redirect.
This is the pattern input from the incoming URL.
11 In the Path field, enter the path for the alias or redirect and click OK.
This is the path in the file system or the redirect that gets sent back to the requester.
12 Click Save.
Setting Up a Reverse Proxy
You set up a reverse proxy using the Proxy pane in the Sites pane of Server Admin. A
reverse proxy differs from a forward proxy by appearing to client computers as a
normal web server. The client computers make requests to the web server. The reverse
proxy then determines the location to send the requests to and returns web content as
if it were the web server. Client computers do not need configuration changes to use a
reverse proxy.
You can use a reverse proxy to provide Internet users access to a server located behind
a firewall. A reverse proxy can also balance network traffic among several back-end
servers or provide caching for a slower back-end server. Administrators also use a
reverse proxy to bring several servers into the same URL space.
Mac OS X Server v10.5 provides both forward and reverse proxy. The forward proxy is
configured in the Web service Settings pane. For information about setting up a
forward proxy, see “Configuring Proxy Settings” on page 27.
To enable reverse proxy:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Proxy below the websites list.
6 Select the Enable Reverse Proxy checkbox.
7 In the Proxy Path field, enter the proxy pathname.
8 In the Sticky Session Identifier field, enter a sticky session identifier or choose one from
the pop-up menu.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 47
A sticky session identifier is used to bind a user that is browsing your site to the server
that the session started on. This keeps users that are browsing a website that is
supported by multiple web servers connected to the server that they started with.
9 To add balancer members, click the Add (+) button below the Balancer Members list;
enter a Server URL (worker URL) and define its route and load factor, then click OK.
A balancer member is a server (designated by its worker URL) that shares the network
traffic generated by website sessions. Multiple balancers share the website traffic by
binding and routing a predetermined load to each server. This prevents a single server
from being inundated by web traffic and it improves performance.
The route of the worker URL is a value appended to the sticky session ID.
The load factor is a number between 1 and 100 that defines how much load the worker
will handle.
10 Add additional balancer members as necessary, depending on your network
requirements.
11 Click Save.
Enabling Optional Web Services
You can enable additional web services such as wikis, blogs, or webmail.
To enable optional web services:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Web Services below the websites list.
6 Select the Webmail checkbox to enable webmail for your website.
Webmail adds mail functionality for each user of your website. For more information
about setting up Webmail, see “Configuring Webmail” on page 79.
7 Select the Blog checkbox to enable blogs for your website.
A blog is a chronological journal on your website that is updated with content added
by users. For more information, see “Setting Up User and Group Blogs” on page 75.
8 Select the Wiki and blog checkbox to enable group website functionality.
This website functionality makes it easy for groups to create and distribute information
in their own shared websites. For details, see “Setting Up a Wiki” on page 64.
9 Select the Web calendar checkbox if you want calendar functionality for your website.
Users can access a group calendar to track meetings and deadlines.
48 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
For details, see “Setting Up a Web Calendar” on page 72.
10 Select the Mailing list web archive checkbox if you want mailing list functionality on
your website.
A mailing list is a discussion group that uses mass mail to facilitate communication. For
details, see “Setting Up Mailing List Web Archives” on page 80.
11 Click the Add (+) button below the Users/Group list to add users and groups that will
create wikis on your site.
Select the Moderator checkbox for each user or group that you want to designate as a
moderator.
If the list is empty, all users can create wikis.
12 Click Save.
Connecting to Your Website
After you configure your website, view the site with a web browser to verify that
everything appears as intended.
To connect to your website:
1 Open a web browser and enter the web address of your server.
You can use the IP address or the DNS name of the server. If SSL is enabled, use “https”
in the URL instead of “http.”
2 If you are not using the default port, enter the port number.
3 If you’ve restricted access to specific users, enter a valid user name and password.
WARNING: Do not try to access the server through the direct ports. Instead, allow
your access to be proxied through Apache as it is set up. For instance, Server Admin
provides no obvious way to configure wikis and will return the xmlrpc error. Do not
access the wiki server on port 8086 or 8087.
4 Verify that the website default index page appears.
Website Management
This section describes typical tasks you might perform after you create a website on
your server. Initial website setup information appears in “Setting Up Your Website” on
page 37.
Viewing Website Settings
You can use the Sites pane of Server Admin to see a list of your websites. The Sites
pane lists configuration information for each site, including:
 Whether a site is enabled
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 49
 The DNS name and IP address for a site
 The port being used for the site
To view website settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
You can view or change the settings for a site by selecting the site in the Sites pane list
and clicking a setting pane.
Changing the Web Folder for a Site
The web folder is used as the root for the site (known as DocumentRoot in Apache). In
other words, the default folder is the top level of the file system structure for the site.
To change the web folder for a site hosted on your server:
1 Log in to the server you want to administer.
You need access to the file system on the server.
2 Drag the contents of your previous web folder to your new web folder.
3 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
4 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
5 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
6 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
7 In the website General pane, enter the path to the web folder in the Web Folder field,
or click the Browse button and navigate to the new web folder location.
8 Click Save.
Changing the Access Port for a Website
By default, the server uses port 80 for connections to websites on your server. You
might need to change the port used for an individual website (for example, if you want
to set up a streaming server on port 80).
Make sure the number you choose does not conflict with ports being used on the
server (for FTP, Apple File Service, SMTP, and others). If you change the port number for
a website you must change all URLs that point to the web server to include the new
port number you choose.
50 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
Note: If you turn SSL on for a site, the port for that site is changed to 443. If you turn
SSL off, the port changes to 80, regardless of what it was previously. A message on the
screen alerts you to the port change when you turn off SSL.
To set the port for a website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 In the General pane, enter the port number in the Port field.
6 Click Save.
WARNING: Do not try to access the server through the direct ports. Instead, allow
your access to be proxied through Apache as it is set up. For instance, Server Admin
provides no obvious way to configure wikis and will return an xmlrpc error. Do not
access the wiki server on port 8086 or 8087.
Enabling a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) Script
Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripts (or programs) send information between your
website and applications that provide different services for the site.
If a CGI script is to be used by only one site, install the CGI in the Documents folder for
the site. The CGI name must end with the suffix “.cgi.”
If a CGI script is to be used by all sites on the server, install it in the /Library/WebServer/
CGI-Executable folder. In this case, clients must include /cgi-bin/ in the URL for the site
(for example, http://www.example.com/cgi-bin/test.cgi).
Make sure the file permissions for the CGI script permit it to be executed by the user
www. Because the script typically isn’t owned by www, Everyone should be able to
execute it.
To enable a CGI for a website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 In the Options pane, select CGI Execution.
6 Click Save.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 51
Note: Disabling CGIs for a site does not disable CGIs in the CGI-Executables folder.
Enabling Server Side Includes (SSI)
Enabling Server Side Includes (SSI) permits a block of HTML code or other information
to be shared by different webpages on your site. SSIs can also function like CGIs and
carry out commands or scripts on the server.
To enable SSI in Server Admin:
1 In Server Admin, click Web in the list for the server you want.
2 Click Sites in the button bar.
3 In the Sites pane, click the site in the list.
4 In the Options pane, select Server Side Includes (SSI).
5 Click Save.
Creating Indexes for Searching Website Content
Use the Sites Options pane in Server Admin to enable Spotlight searching on your
website. This turns the mod_spotlight_apple Apache module on, which allows
browsers to search through an index of your website content.
The Spotlight indexing mechanism is turned off by default in Mac OS X Server v10.5.
Spotlight searching is still enabled, but you must turn indexing on to provide Spotlightbased search capability for Web service.
To create an index for your website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 In the Options pane, select the Spotlight Searching checkbox.
This enables mod_spotlight and causes the Spotlight processes to create an index for
the Document Root of the website. Several minutes after indexing is enabled for the
first time, the index is available and searching is possible.
6 Click Save.
7 Copy the template.spotlight file from /Library/WebServer/Document into
DocumentRoot of each virtual host for which you want the Spotlight search to be
available.
You can customize the title, maximum permitted hits, and other aspects of the
presentation by modifying a copy of this file.
8 Advise clients to append “.spotlight” to the URL for websites.
52 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
An example URL is httpd://vhost1.example.com/.spotlight. This presents a simple search
page that searches the contents of DocumentRoot for the website. Results are sorted
with the most relevant hits first, although no relevance score is presented.
Monitoring Website Activity
Use website logs to monitor your website activity and server events. You can configure
logs to record events as messages for specific website activity. Website logs are used to
track who accesses a website and what errors occur on a website. This information is
useful when troubleshooting problems or monitoring malicious activity.
For more information on setting up logs, see “Enabling Access and Error Logs for a
Website” on page 42.
To view website logs:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Logs, then select the log for your website in the list.
The log messages display below the log list.
Switch between logs by selecting them in the list.
5 Search the contents of a log by entering a search term in the Filter field located in the
lower right corner below the log.
Using a Passphrase with SSL Certificates
If you manage SSL certificates using Server Admin and you use a passphrase for your
certificates, Server Admin ensures that the passphrase is stored in the system keychain.
When a website is configured to use the certificate and that web server is started, the
getsslpassphrase(8) utility extracts the passphrase from the system keychain and
passes it to the web server, as long as the certificate name matches the virtual host
name.
(If you do not want to rely on this mechanism, you can have the Apache web server
prompt you for the passphrase when you start or restart it. Use the serveradmin
command-line tool to configure this.)
To configure Apache to prompt you for a passphrase when it starts:
1 Open Terminal and enter the following command.
$ sudo serveradmin settings web:IfModule:_array_id:mod_ssl.c:SSL
PassPhraseDialog=builtin
2 Start Apache with the command:
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 53
$ sudo serveradmin start web
3 When prompted, enter the certificate passphrase.
Using WebDAV to Manage Website Content
WebDAV lets you or your users make changes to websites while the sites are running.
With WebDAV, users or groups can collaboratively manage website files and folders. For
more information on how WebDAV works, see “Understanding WebDAV” on page 19.
Work with WebDAV as explained in the following sections:
 “Enabling WebDAV on Websites” on page 54
 “Using WebDAV to Share Files” on page 55
 “Configuring Web Content File and Folder Permissions” on page 55
Enabling WebDAV on Websites
If you enable WebDAV, you must also assign access privileges for the sites and web
folders.
To enable WebDAV for a site:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Options below the websites list.
6 Select the WebDAV checkbox.
This option turns WebDAV on, allowing users to make changes to websites while the
sites are running. If you enable WebDAV, you must also assign access privileges for the
sites and web folders.
Note: If you turned off the WebDAV module in the Modules pane of Server Admin, you
must turn it on again before WebDAV takes effect for a site. This is true even if the
WebDAV option is selected in the Options pane for the site. For more about enabling
modules, see “Apache Web Module Overview” on page 99.
7 Click Save.
After WebDAV is turned on, you can use realms to control access to the website. For
more information about configuring realms, see “Using Realms to Control Access” on
page 40.
54 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
Using WebDAV to Share Files
You can use WebDAV to permit authorized users to connect to a website and to share
files on that site. The steps below provide a brief example of setting up and sharing
files using WebDAV.
 Turn on WebDAV for the site in Server Admin. See “Enabling WebDAV on Websites”
on page 54.
 Set up realms for the site in Server Admin to control access to the site. See “Using
Realms to Control Access” on page 40.
For example, you could create a folder for shared documents inside the website
folder and give specific people Browse and Read/Write access to that folder.
 Tell authorized users how to connect to the site using the WebDAV client built into
Mac OS X (or Mac OS X Server).
Users can connect to the website using a WebDAV-enabled application, such as the
Finder in Mac OS X, Adobe GoLive, Adobe Dreamweaver, or Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Browsers are not generally WebDAV-enabled, but a browser can access a WebDAVenabled site and perform read operations (limited by realm permissions configured on
the web server), because WebDAV is a superset of HTTP.
Write operations cannot be performed by a web browser. They require a WebDAV
client, such as Goliath, or the client built into the Mac OS X file system and typically
used through the Finder. For more information about Goliath, see www.webdav.org/
goliath.
To use Finder to connect to a website using WebDAV:
1 Open Finder.
2 Choose Go > Connect to Server.
3 In the Server Address field, enter the HTTP URL.
The URL for connecting is http://<serverURL>:<server port>/<folder, or folder where
collaborative files are stored>.
4 Click Connect.
Note: To connect from another platform, see the platform-specific documentation for
the relevant WebDAV client. Microsoft platforms use an authentication mechanism that
can make it difficult or impossible to mount WebDAV volumes from Mac OS X.
Configuring Web Content File and Folder Permissions
You can use file and folder permissions to control WebDAV access to website content
that is located by default in the /Library/WebServer/Documents/ folder.
Mac OS X Server imposes the following constraints on web content files and folders:
 For security reasons, web content files and folders must not be writable by Everyone.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 55
 Web content files and folders are owned by user Root and Group Admin by default,
so they are modifiable by an administrator but not by user or group www.
 To use WebDAV, web content files must be readable and writable by user or group
www, and folders must be readable, writable, and executable by user or group www.
 If you need to change web content files and folders while you are logged in as an
administrator, those files or folders must be modifiable by the administrator.
To use WebDAV you must enable it in Server Admin. When enabled, Server Admin
changes the group ownership of the WebDAV folder to www.
If you are using WebDAV and you want to make changes to web content files or folders
while logged in as an administrator, you must change the web content file and folder
permissions to admin, make your edits, and then restore the file and folder permissions
to www.
To add sites to your web server while using WebDAV:
1 Change the group privileges of the folder containing your websites to admin.
The default folder location is /Library/Webserver/Documents/.
2 Add your new site folder.
3 Change the group privileges of the folder containing your websites back to www.
Managing Multiple Sites on One Server
You can create multiple sites on the same web server, at the same IP address (also
referred to as virtual hosts), or at separate, secondary IP addresses (referred to as
multihoming).
Virtual hosts are multiple sites on the same server. These sites can be name-based
(such as www.example.com) or they can use IP addresses (such as 10.201.42.73). You can
use Server Admin to manage name-based and IP-based websites.
If you configure multiple sites on your server using the Sites pane in Server Admin,
each site is considered a virtual host. For more information on setting up a site, see
“Creating a Website” on page 38.
A multihomed site is a site that has more than one connection to the Internet.
Multihoming is typically done to improve reliability and performance. Those multiple
connections might be through the same Internet service provider (ISP) or through
multiple ISPs, and they might involve multiple IP addresses or one address.
Using Aliases to Have a Site Respond to Multiple Names
If you want a website to respond to multiple names, choose one name as the primary
and add the other names as aliases.
56 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
To set up a website this way, use the primary name as the site name in Server Admin
(by clicking the site and entering the primary name in the General pane for the site,
then adding the other names in the Aliases pane for that site). For the procedure, see
“Managing Access to Sites Using Aliases” on page 45.
For example, if you want your website to respond to example.com, www.example.com,
and widget.example.com, you could set it up as follows (the names and IP addresses
are examples only):
Primary name: www.example.com (entered in the General pane for the site)
Secondary names: example.com and widget.example.com (entered in the Web Server
Aliases list for the site)
Make sure your DNS server aliases your web server address to all three domain names.
Websites and Multiple Network Interfaces
By default, the web server is configured with a single wildcard website or virtual host.
Such a website is useful for these reasons:
 It responds on all network interfaces and on all IP addresses on all those interfaces.
 It responds to the DNS name that maps to one of those addresses.
Other websites can be added using the Sites pane in Server Admin. When websites are
added, the administrator can associate a specific IP address or a wildcard address with
each website.
If the web server has multiple interfaces and multiple addresses, configuring Apache to
use them is a matter of configuring websites to use the desired addresses. An even
simpler scenario is to let the wildcard website respond to all addresses, which it does
by default.
User Content on Websites
Mac OS X client has a Web Sharing feature, which allows a user to place content in the
Sites folder of his or her home folder and have it visible on the web. Mac OS X Server
also has a much broader web service capability, which can include a form of personal
web sharing, but there are important differences between Mac OS X client and
Mac OS X Server.
Web Service Configuration
By default, on Mac OS X Server Web service ignores files in the /etc/httpd/users/ folder,
and folder listings are not enabled for users. All folder listings in Web service use
Apache’s FancyIndexing directive, which makes folder listings more readable.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 57
In Server Admin, the Options pane in the Sites pane for each site has a Folder Listing
checkbox. This setting enables folder listings for a specific virtual host by adding a
“+Indexes” flag to Apache’s Options directive for that virtual host. If folder listings are
not explicitly enabled for each site (virtual host), file indexes are not shown.
The site-specific settings do not apply outside the site; therefore, site-specific settings
do not apply to home directories. If you want users to have folder-indexing capability
on their home directories, you must add suitable directives to Apache’s configuration
files.
For a specific user, you add the following directives inside the <IfModule
mod_userdir.c> block in the httpd.conf file:
<Directory "/Users/refuser/Sites">
Options Indexes MultiViews
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
</Directory>
Default Content
The default content for the user’s Sites folder is an index.html file along with a few
images. This index.html file has text that describes the Personal Web Sharing feature of
Mac OS X client. The user must replace the index.html file with one suited to the
content of his or her Sites folder.
Accessing Web Content
After the home folder is created, the content of the Sites folder in the user’s home
folder is visible when Web service is running. If your server is named example.com and
the user’s short name is refuser, the content of the Sites folder can be accessed at http:/
/example.com/~refuser.
If the user has multiple short names, one name can also be used after the tilde (~) to
access that same content.
If the user places a content file named foo.html in his or her Sites folder, that file must
be available at http://example.com/~refuser/foo.html.
If the user places multiple content files in his or her Sites folder and cannot change
index.html to include links to those files, the user might benefit from the automatic
folder indexing described previously. If the “Enable folder listing” setting is enabled, an
index listing of file names is visible to browsers at http://example.com/~refuser.
Indexing settings also apply to subfolders placed in the user’s Sites folder. If the user
adds a content subfolder named Example to the Sites folder and an index.html file is
present inside the Example folder, or if folder indexing is enabled for that user’s site, the
folder is made available to browsers at http://example.com/~refuser/Example.
58 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
Securing Web Content on Case Insensitive File Systems
The recommended practice for serving web content whose access is controlled via the
Realm mechanism is to serve it from case-sensitive volumes, such as UFS or HFSX,
where a folder named “Protected’ and another folder named “PrOtECted” are two
different folders.
If you use the default case-insensitive HFS file system to serve access-controlled web
content, consider using location-based realms rather than folder-based realms.
However, if you need to use folder-based realms on a case-insensitive file system, Apple
provides a layer of protection for that scenario, for both Apache 1.3 and Apache 2.2, by
using mod_hfs_apple.
The HFS Extended volume format commonly used for Mac OS X Server preserves the
case of file names but does not distinguish between a file or folder named “Example”
and one named “eXaMpLe.” Without mod_hfs_apple, this insensitivity could be an issue
when your web content resides on such a volume and you are attempting to restrict
access to all or part of your web content using security realms.
If you set up a security realm requiring browsers to use a name and a password for
Read-Only access to content in a folder named “Protected,” browsers would need to
authenticate to access the following URLs:
 http://example.com/Protected
 http://example.com/Protected/secret
 http://example.com/Protected/sECreT
However, they could bypass it by using something like the following:
 http://example.com/PrOtECted
 http://example.com/PrOtECted/secret
 http://example.com/PrOtECted/sECreT
Fortunately, mod_hfs_apple prevents those types of efforts to bypass the security
realm, and this module is enabled by default.
Note: mod_hfs_apple operates on folders; it is not intended to prevent access to
individual files. A file named “secret” can be accessed as “seCREt”. This is correct
behavior, and does not permit bypassing security realms.
Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites 59
60 Chapter 3 Creating and Managing Websites
4 Creating and Managing Wikis and
Blogs
4
This chapter shows you how to use Server Admin to create
and manage a wiki and blog on your website.
Mac OS X v10.5 makes it easy for groups to collaborate and communicate through their
own wiki-powered intranet website, complete with group calendar, blog, and mailing
list archive functions.
Users can create and edit wiki pages, tag and cross-reference material, upload files and
images, add comments, and search content with drag-and-drop ease.
Wiki Overview
Wikis allow you to create project-specific websites for a group. Groups can then
collaborate and communicate through wiki-powered intranet websites, complete with
a group calendar, blog, and mailing list.
You can select from more than 20 built-in themes with different colors, fonts, and
layout styles. You can customize these templates with your own banner image and a
custom sidebar title that displays pages with a user-defined tag at initial login.
After you set up your wiki it is easy to add, delete, and edit your content. No syntax or
markup knowledge is required—the wiki comes with full drag-and-drop support.
You can insert hyperlinks, link between pages, add images, attach files, and change
webpage formatting. Because wikis feature RSS support, group members can be
automatically notified when content is added or edited. The wiki maintains a complete
change history, so you can always revert to a previous version of your document.
After you create a wiki on your website and give access to group members, everyone
can contribute to the site. The group’s owner and administrator can grant access
controls for viewing and editing.
Users can access a group calendar to track meetings and deadlines or send messages
to a mailing list to keep others informed. The blog feature is ideal for brainstorming or
commenting on work.
61
About Wiki Pages
The following is a list of the wiki pages and their description:
 Groups page: Page that links to all groups hosted by the wiki website.
 Wiki Home page: The home page of a group’s wiki. Contains links to pages, a group
calendar, group blog, and search, as well as to the default sidebars (for example,
"What's hot" and "Recent Changes").
 Document pages: Pages that group members create. They are dynamically linked to
and from other webpages and are found by using search and tags.
 Calendar pages: Pages that show a group calendar that uses iCal service to provide
a shared calendar to group members. For more information on iCal service, see iCal
Service Administration.
 Mailing list pages: Pages that provide a web archive of a group's mailing list traffic.
For more information about Webmail, see Chapter 5, “Configuring and Managing
Webmail.”
 Blog Pages: Pages that show a user or group blog. Blogs are created and updated
when users or members of the group (that have Read and Write access to a group
blog) add comments to the blogs. For more information about blogs, see “Setting Up
User and Group Blogs” on page 75.
About Wiki Security
The level of website security determines the level of wiki security. Wiki security is
established when the website that the wiki is configured on is secure.
Methods you can use to help secure data moving to and from your wiki include the
following:
 Set up SSL for the website your wiki is running on. SSL provides security for a site
and its users by authenticating the server, encrypting information, and maintaining
message integrity. For more information, see “Enabling Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)”
on page 43.
 Restrict user and groups that can create wiki pages on your website by adding users
and groups to the Web services list. For more information, see “Enabling Web
Calendar Service for a Website” on page 72.
About Wiki File and Folder Hierarchy
By default wiki content is stored in the /Library/Collaboration/ folder. This folder can be
changed in the Web service Settings Web Services pane in Server Admin.
The following list shows the default wiki file and folder hierarchy. This includes where
all wiki files are stored and the folder structure for the wiki content. In the list,
groupname is the name of the group, pagename is the name of the wiki page, and page
is the name of the webpage.
 /Library/Collaboration/ contains all files for the wiki.
62 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/ contains all files for one group’s services.
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/wiki/pagename.page/ contains the
component files of a wiki page.
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/wiki/pagename.page/page.html contains
the main text of the wiki (html content).
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/wiki/pagename.page/page.plist contains
the metadata for the wiki page.
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/wiki/pagename.page/revisions.db
contains the version history database for that wiki page.
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/pagename.page/images/ contains the
images for that wiki page.
 /Library/Collaboration/Groups/groupname/pagename.page/attachments/ contains all
attachments for that wiki page.
Wiki Setup Overview
Here is an overview of the basic steps for setting up a wiki.
Step 1: Configure your web server
The default configuration works for most web servers that host a single website but
you can configure all basic features of Web service and websites using Server Admin.
For more information, see Chapter 2, “Working with Web Service.”
Before you create and configure wikis or blogs, set up default web services settings. For
details, see “Configuring Web Services Settings” on page 29.
Step 2: Set up your website
With your web service configured and running, you can create websites. Creating a
website establishes the framework that you use to provide web-hosted content in
various formats, including wikis and blogs. For details, see Chapter 3, “Creating and
Managing Websites.”
Step 3: Enable wiki web services for your website
To create a wiki, you must enable the wiki web service on your website. For details, see
“Enabling Web Calendar Service for a Website” on page 72.
Step 4: Create groups for the wiki
After the wiki web service is enabled on your website, you must create groups in
Workgroup Manager or Directory and give them access to the wiki web service for the
wiki site. For more information about using Directory, see Directory help.
Wikis are provisioned for groups as they are created and enabled for web services in
Workgroup Manager. You can modify the Write and View permissions for users within
the group for wiki pages. For details, see User Management.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 63
Step 5: Connect to your wiki
To make sure the wiki is working properly, open your browser and try to connect to it
over the Internet. For details, see “Connecting to a Wiki” on page 65.
Setting Up a Wiki
The following sections provide instructions for setting up a wiki on your website.
Enabling Wiki Web Services for a Website
You can enable wiki web services on your website. In addition, blogs, calendaring, and
mailing list web services are available for your site.
Wiki will not work without a local Open Directory master. Your server can be connected
to another directory server simultaneously, but for wiki to work, your server must be an
Open Directory master. For more information, see Open Directory Administration.
To enable wiki services on your website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
5 Click Web Services below the websites list.
6 Select the Blog checkbox to enable user blogs for your website.
This gives users the ability to create and maintain personal blog pages. A blog is a
chronological journal on your website that is updated with content added by users. For
more information, see “Setting Up User and Group Blogs” on page 75.
7 Select the “Wiki and blog” checkbox to enable group website functionality.
This website functionality makes it easy for groups of people to create and distribute
information in their own shared websites. This also enables group blogs on your wiki
pages.
8 If you want calendar functionality for your website, select the “Web calendar” checkbox.
Users can access a group calendar to track meetings and deadlines. For details, see
“Setting Up a Web Calendar” on page 72.
9 If you want mailing list functionality on your website, select the “Mailing list web
archive” checkbox.
A mailing list is a discussion group that uses mass email to facilitate communication.
For details, see “Setting Up Mailing List Web Archives” on page 80.
64 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
10 Click the Add (+) button below the Users/Group list to add users and groups who will
create wikis on your site, then select the Moderator checkbox for each user or group in
the list that you want to designate as a moderator.
If you leave the list empty, all users can create wikis.
11 Click Save.
Connecting to a Wiki
If wiki web service is enabled on your website you can connect to the wiki.
To connect to your wiki:
1 Open a web browser and navigate to website.
2 To access the wiki, click Groups on the top of the webpage.
The available group wikis are listed on the page. As groups are created and enabled,
their wikis will appear on this page.
3 Select the wiki you want to connect to.
This opens the wiki page for the group.
Changing Wiki Settings
If you are the group owner or server administrator, you can change wiki settings such
as how wiki pages look and whether readers can add comments to pages. You can also
add a sidebar to the homepage for showing specific content.
To change wiki settings:
1 Open your wiki homepage.
Log in as a group owner or administrator.
2 Click Settings in the Admin Functions sidebar.
3 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar to change the following options.
Title: The name of your site.
Theme: The theme of your site. Click Choose to change the appearance of your site.
The theme is applied dynamically as pages are served to users. If the theme uses a
banner image, you can upload a JPEG or PNG image.
Custom Sidebar: The title of a custom sidebar on the homepage and the tag that
causes items to appear in the sidebar list.
Comments: The users, if any, that can post comments to wiki pages. You can also turn
on moderation of comments to prevent a comment from appearing until a moderator
approves it.
Podcast: Whether podcast entries are allowed in the blog, and the category they
should appear when a user subscribes to the podcast using iTunes Music Store.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 65
4 Click “save.”
Managing Wiki Pages
This section describes typical day-to-day tasks you might perform after you set up a
wiki on your website. Initial wiki setup information appears in “Setting Up a Wiki” on
page 64.
Adding Document Pages
You can add document pages to your wiki from your Internet browser.
To create a wiki page:
1 Click “wiki” if you're not already viewing a wiki page, or navigate to the wiki page that
you want to add a new page to.
2 Click the New Page (+) button in the toolbar.
3 In the New Page dialog that appears, enter the page title and click Create.
The editing toolbar appears and a new page is created.
4 Delete the sample text and enter your own content.
5 Click “save” in the editing toolbar when you're finished.
In the comment field, you can enter a note about the changes you made. This note
appears in the history for the page.
Editing Document Pages
You can edit wiki pages from your Internet browser.
To edit a wiki page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to edit.
2 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar.
3 When the content appears, edit it using the tools in the editing toolbar.
4 Click Save in the editing toolbar to save your changes.
When you save changes to a wiki page, you can also enter a comment that will appear
in the page history.
Your new content replaces the previous page content.
Deleting Document Pages
You can delete wiki pages from your Internet browser.
To delete a wiki page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to delete.
2 Click the Delete Page (–) button in the toolbar.
66 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
3 Click Delete to confirm.
The page disappears but the content is retained so the page can be restored if needed.
Administrators and group owners can permanently delete the page.
Adding a Link to a Wiki Page
You can add hyperlinks that link to other wiki pages or to other websites.
To add a link to a wiki page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to add a link to.
2 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar.
3 Select the text you want to use as the link text.
4 Click the Link button in the editing toolbar and then choose an option from the pop-
up menu that appears:
New Page: Links to a wiki page that doesn't exist (you'll be asked to create the page).
Search: Searches for a wiki page that contains the link text you selected, or allows you
to enter different text to search for.
Enter URL: Links to a page on another website. Enter a complete URL.
Unlink: Removes the link, if the text you've selected is already linked.
5 To make a link that creates a mail message, select Enter URL from the Link pop-up
menu, and then enter a link in this form: mailto:annejohnson@example.com.
6 When you finish, click “save” in the editing toolbar.
Inserting a Table on a Wiki Page
Use the table editor to insert or delete a table on a wiki page. You can also add or
delete table columns, rows, header columns, and header rows, and enter data in table
cells.
To insert a table on a wiki page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to insert a table on.
2 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar to enter edit mode.
3 Position the insertion point where you want to insert the table, then click Insert Table in
the toolbar to reveal the table editor.
4 Click OK to add the table to the page.
Press Tab to move from cell to cell.
5 When you finish, click ”save” in the editing toolbar.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 67
Adding Tags to Wiki Pages
Tags lets you identify, categorize, and quickly find related wiki and blog pages. Use tags
to group and identify related items and provide an easy-to-use organizational system
so everyone contributing to the wiki can keep up with the latest changes and news.
For example, you might add a tag to each page that indicates its department or
project. Any user who can edit the site content can add or remove tags. You can search
for tagged items to quickly find what you’re looking for.
To add a tag to a page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to tag.
2 Click the Add Tag (+) button.
A text field appears.
3 Enter the tag you want to add and then press Return.
If the tag already exists, select it when it appears, then press Return.
4 Continue adding tags as desired.
You can also add tags while editing a page, and delete tags that no longer apply.
Removing Tags from Wiki Pages
If a page has been accidentally or incorrectly tagged, you can remove individual tags.
To remove a tag from a page:
1 View the page.
You cannot remove a tag from the search results, tag view, or history list.
2 Drag the tag you want to delete from the tag bar and then release the mouse button.
It will disappear in a puff of smoke.
To remove a tag while editing a page, click the small x that appears when you move
the pointer near the tag.
Attaching a File to Wiki Pages
The best way to attach a file for downloading is to create an archive (zip) of the file
before uploading it to the server. This is essential if you're attaching a folder of files or
complex types of files such as Keynote presentations.
To attach a file to a page so others can download it:
1 Navigate to the page you want to attach a file to.
2 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar.
3 Position the insertion point where you want the file attachment to appear on the page.
4 Click the Attach File (paperclip) button in the editing toolbar.
5 Click Choose and select the file to attach.
68 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
6 Click Attach to upload the file.
When the upload finishes a file download button appears on the page with the name
of the file on it.
7 When you're finished editing the page, click “save” in the editing toolbar.
A user can now click the name to download the file.
If you're attaching a media file, such as an image, and you want others to see it without
downloading it first, use the Insert Media button instead of the Attach FIle button. The
Insert Media button lets you upload QuickTime image or audio files.
Finding Tagged Wiki Pages
There are two ways to quickly find tagged pages:
 If the page you're viewing has the tag you want to find, click the tag to search for
other pages.
 If the page you're viewing is not tagged with what you want to find, click Search
(magnifying glass), then choose a tag from the pop-up menu, or choose All Tags to
see more selections.
Searching Wiki Pages
Use the search feature to find items on your wiki.
To find items in your wiki:
1 Click the Search (magnifying glass) button.
2 Enter a word or phrase in the text field that appears.
A quick search (find-as-you-type) feature displays a list of pages that have the word or
phrase you entered in the title as you type in the search field.
3 If you don’t find what you are looking for in the quick search list, press Return to search
titles and content.
You will see a list of pages and calendar events that contain the phrase you entered.
After the results appear, you can further refine your search by choosing to show only
wiki or blog pages that contain the tags you select. Use the tag checkboxes on the
right side of the page.
To view the search results in a different order, use the pop-up menus to choose a new
sort order. You can also choose to search all pages or limit the search to just the blog,
wiki, calendar events (only the name and location are searched), or mail messages.
Viewing or Replacing Older or Deleted Wiki Pages
Every time a wiki page is updated, the previous version is retained so you can undo
changes or reactivate an older version of a page.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 69
To view previous versions of a wiki page:
1 Navigate to the page you want to view older versions of.
2 Click the View Document History (>) button.
This button is visible only when you're viewing, not editing, a page.
3 Select any version in the list to view its contents.
4 Click the Compare button to compare the selected version with its previous version.
5 Click the View Alone button to stop comparing versions.
6 To replace the current version of a page with an older version, select the version and
click Restore.
This creates a new revision of the page. Attachments and media associated with the
older version are also restored.
7 To exit without changing the current version of a page, click the Hide Document
History (V) button.
Restoring Deleted Wiki Pages
Wiki files are stored in a file system, so backup is just like backing up ordinary files. The
default files are kept in the /Library/Collaboration/Groups/<groupname>/ folder.
Each wiki maintains its own history. You can restore any page individually by using the
wiki history function.
To restore a deleted wiki page:
1 Perform any search, then choose Deleted Entries in the Search Summary area of the
results page.
2 Click the title of a deleted page.
3 Click Undelete Page to restore the deleted page.
Customizing Wiki
You can customize your wiki pages to have a personal look. For example, you may want
to include organization logos or employee images in your wikis.
Choosing Font Styles and Formatting
Use the editing toolbar to style and format text when you're editing a page.
The following tools are available:
 Paragraph Style: To change the style of the current paragraph or selected
paragraphs, click the Paragraph Style button and choose a new style from the popup menu.
 Text Style: To change the style of a word or just a few characters, select the text and
then choose an inline style from the text Text Style menu.
70 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
 List Style: To move the left margin of the current paragraph or selected paragraphs
in or out, or to apply a numbered or bulleted list style, choose an option from the
pop-up menu. To number several lines or paragraphs sequentially, select them all
before choosing Ordered List.
To modify the text style:
1 Navigate to the page you want to modify.
2 Click the Edit (/) button in the toolbar to enter edit mode.
3 Select the text you would like to change.
4 Use the text style tools in the edit toolbar to change the text.
5 Click “save” in the editing toolbar.
Customizing Wiki Themes and Layouts
Wiki administrators can create themes using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and add
custom XSL templates to change the content of pages. Don’t modify the default
templates because they may be changed or replaced during a software update. You
can use the default templates as examples.
You should use the wireframe theme as a starting point. The wireframe theme is
located in the /Library/Application/Support/Apple/WikiServer/Themes/
wireframe.wikitheme/ folder.
A plist file comes with each theme folder. You can modify theme characteristics such as
the sidebar and banner images in the plist file. You can also include javascripts to run
on your wiki pages.
In the CSS file, you can specify display variables such as font definitions and link colors.
Getting Help Using the Wiki
There is a pointer to online help content in the wiki.
To get online help from your wiki:
1 Open any wiki page.
2 Click Help at the bottom of the page.
3 Select the Web service topic for a list of quick search topics.
4 For more specific help, click the Search (magnifying glass) button, enter a topic, and
press Return.
A list of topics appears.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 71
Setting Up a Web Calendar
The following sections provide instructions for setting up a web calendar on your
website.
Web calendar is a web service for groups that lets users access a group calendar to
track meetings and deadlines from the web.
The web calendar uses the iCal service in Mac OS X Server v10.5. iCal service must be
configured and running for a wiki to use the group calendar. For more information, see
iCal Service Administration.
Enabling Web Calendar Service for a Website
You can enable Web Calendar service on your website. You must enable Wiki and blog
group web services before you can enable Web Calendar service.
To turn web calendar on for your website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites.
5 In the Sites list, click the site where you want web calendaring service enabled.
6 Click Web Services.
7 In the Services for Groups section, select the Web calendar checkbox.
8 Click Save.
Navigating the Web Calendar
The calendar includes several navigation buttons that make it easy to skip through
months or weeks, or return to today's date.
In the calendar, there are two types of views: week and month.
 In week view, you see all events scheduled for a given week, including all-day events
and timed events. You can also quickly create all-day or timed events.
 In month view, you see only all-day events and create all-day events by default.
To switch between week and month views, click "week" or "month” in Calendar.
To navigate through the calendar:
1 Open to the web calendar.
2 Click "month" to switch to month view or "week" to switch to week view.
3 In month view, click Previous (<) to view the previous month or Next (>) to view the
next month.
72 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
To view another month, in month view, click the name of the month (between the
Previous and Next buttons), and choose the month you want to view.
4 In week view, click Previous (<) to view the previous week or Next (>) to view the next
week.
5 To open a minicalendar, in week view, click the name of the week and navigate to a
specific week or month:
To go to the previous month in the minicalendar, click Previous (up arrow).
To go to the next month in the minicalendar, click Next (down arrow).
6 To view the week that includes today's date, click Today (diamond).
7 To view a specific week, click one of the days in that week.
8 To view a specific month, click the name of the month.
Creating Timed Calendar Events
Timed events are events such as meetings or appointments. You can create timed
events in week view or month view, but they're easier to create in week view.
To create a timed event in the web calendar:
1 Navigate to the web calendar.
2 In week view, drag from the start time to the end time of the event.
3 Enter the name of the event in the Summary field and the location of the event in the
Location field.
To change the start date of the event, click the date, and in the calendar that appears,
click a date. To change the start date to today's date, click Today (diamond); to view the
previous month, click Previous (up arrow); to view the next month, click Next (down
arrow).
To change the start time, use the Start Time pop-up menus.
4 Deselect "All-Day (Banner) event."
5 To change the duration of the event, use the Duration pop-up menus.
If the duration is more than 24 hours, enter a number in the "days" field.
6 Click OK.
Editing Calendar Events
When you edit an event in Calendar, you can change all information associated with
the event, such as name, location, date, and duration. You can also change an event
from an all-day event to a timed event or vice-versa.
To edit a web calendar event:
1 Navigate to the web calendar.
2 In week or month view, click the event.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 73
3 To change the name of the event, enter the name in the Summary field.
4 To change the location of the event, enter a new location in the Location field.
5 To change the start date of the event, click the date and in the calendar that appears,
click the date of the event.
To change the start date to today's date, click Today (diamond); to view the previous
month, click Previous (up arrow); to view the next month, click Next (down arrow).
6 To change the start time of the event, use the pop-up menus next to the date.
The pop-up menus are in HH:MM format.
7 To change the event from all-day to timed or vice versa, select or deselect "All-Day
(Banner) event."
8 To change the duration of the event, use the Duration pop-up menus.
If it is an all-day event, or if the duration is more than 24 hours, enter a number in the
"days" field.
9 Click OK to save your settings.
Deleting Web Calendar Events
When you delete an event in Calendar, it is permanently deleted and you can't undo
the deletion. However, you can create the event again.
To delete an event from the web calendar:
1 Navigate to the web calendar.
2 In week or month view, click the event.
3 Click Delete.
4 Click OK.
Using the Web Calendar with iCal
You can subscribe to a web calendar in iCal and configure your iCal calendar to retrieve
updates from the web calendar. In iCal, the web calendar is read-only, so you can't edit
it.
The web server firewall must allow traffic through port 8008.
To subscribe to a web calendar in iCal:
5 In iCal, choose Calendar > Subscribe.
6 Enter http://serverurl:8008/calendars/groups/groupname/calendar/.
Replace serverurl with the URL of your web server, such as www.example.com. Replace
groupname with the name of your group.
7 Click Subscribe.
8 Authenticate using your web name and password and then click OK.
74 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
9 In the Title field, enter a name for your calendar.
10 To enable autoupdating of your iCal calendar, select Refresh and choose the updating
frequency.
11 Click OK.
Setting Up User and Group Blogs
A blog is like a diary or journal, with entries that are arranged in the order they were
created in. On the other hand, a wiki contains shared content that doesn't appear in
chronological order. The type of information you want to put on your site helps
determine whether it appears in a wiki or in a blog.
The following sections provide instructions for setting up user and group blogs on your
website.
Enabling Blog Service for a Website
You can enable user and group blog service on your website. Mac OS X Server includes
a group wiki and a group blog. These are enabled together. Group blogs let users in a
group access and post entries to the same blog.
Users can also publish their own personal blog using Web services associated with their
server account. This gives users the ability to maintain personal blogs on their own user
pages.
For more information, see “Enabling Web Calendar Service for a Website” on page 72.
Adding a Blog Page
Entries appear in the order they were created in, with the most recent entry appearing
first. Only the most current entries appear on the main page of the blog. Older entries
are still available and can be found and viewed by searching or navigating using the
date controls.
To add a blog page:
1 Click "blog" if you're not already viewing a blog page.
2 Click the New Page (+) button in the toolbar.
3 In the New Entry dialog that appears, enter a title.
4 If the blog is configured for podcasting and you have an audio or video file for this
entry, select Podcast and choose the file.
5 Click Create.
The editing toolbar appears and a new page is created.
6 Delete the sample text and enter your content.
7 When you finish, click Save in the editing toolbar.
Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs 75
Setting Blog SACL Permissions for Users
Web services administrators can use service access control lists (SACLs) to specify which
users have access to blogs. Use Server Admin to set SACL permissions.
Important: To change SACL settings for blogs, you must use the server interface, not
the Web interface.
To set user SACL permissions for a blog:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Select the server.
The list of services appears.
3 Click Settings.
4 Click Access.
5 Click Services, if it is not already displayed.
6 Select the level of restriction that you want for the services.
To restrict access to all services, select “For all services.”
To set access permissions for blogs, select “For selected services below” and then select
Blog from the Service list.
7 Select the level of restriction you want for users and groups.
To provide unrestricted access, click “Allow all users and groups.”
To restrict access to specific users and groups, select “Allow only users and groups
below,” click the Add (+) button to open the Users and Groups pane, and then drag
users and groups to the list.
8 Click Save.
76 Chapter 4 Creating and Managing Wikis and Blogs
5 Configuring and Managing
Webmail
5
This chapter shows you how to enable Webmail for the
websites on your server in order to provide access to basic
mail operations via a web connection.
Webmail adds basic mail functions to your website. If your web service hosts more than
one website, Webmail can provide access to mail service on all sites. The mail service
looks the same on all sites.
Webmail Overview
The Webmail software is included in Mac OS X Server and is disabled by default.
The Webmail software is based on SquirrelMail (v1.4.9a), which is a collection of open
source scripts run by the Apache server. For more information about SquirrelMail, see
www.squirrelmail.org.
Webmail User Services
If you enable webmail, you users can:
 Compose and send messages
 Receive messages
 Forward or reply to received messages
 Maintain a signature that is appended to each sent message
 Create, delete, and rename folders and move messages between folders
 Attach files to outgoing messages
 Retrieve attached files from incoming messages
 Manage a private address book
 Set webmail preferences, including the color scheme displayed in the web browser
Users access the Webmail page of your website by appending /webmail to the URL of
your site (for example, http://mysite.example.com/webmail/).
77
To use your Webmail service, a user must have an account on your mail server.
Therefore, you must have the mail service set up if you want to offer Webmail on your
websites.
Users log in to Webmail with the name and password they use for logging in to their
regular mail service. Webmail does not provide its own authentication. For more
information about mail service users, see Mail Service Administration.
When users log in to Webmail, their passwords are sent over the Internet in clear text
(not encrypted) unless the website is configured to use SSL. For instructions on
configuring SSL for website, see “Enabling Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)” on page 43.
More information about Webmail is available in the SquirrelMail user manual, located at
http://squirelmail.org/wiki/DocumentationHome.
Webmail and Your Mail Server
Webmail relies on your mail server to provide the mail service. Webmail merely
provides access to the mail service through a web browser. Webmail cannot provide
mail service independent of a mail server.
Webmail uses the mail service of your Mac OS X Server by default. You can designate a
different mail server using Terminal and UNIX command-line tools. For instructions, see
“Configuring Webmail” on page 79.
Webmail Protocols
Webmail uses the following standard mail protocols that your mail server must
support:
 Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP), for retrieving incoming mail
 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), for exchanging mail with other mail servers
(sending outgoing mail and receiving incoming mail)
The SquirrelMail configuration script authorizes setting the IMAP server type:
 The setting macosx = Mac OS X MailServer refers to the older Apple MailServer in
Mac OS X Server v10.2.
 In Mac OS X v10.3, v10.4, and v0.5, the correct setting (set by default) is cyrus =
Cyrus IMAP Server
Webmail does not support retrieving incoming mail using Post Office Protocol (POP).
Even if your mail server supports POP, Webmail does not.
.
Enabling Webmail
Use Server Admin to enable Webmail for your websites hosted on your web server. Any
changes you make take effect when you restart Web service.
78 Chapter 5 Configuring and Managing Webmail
Important: Webmail will not work on a site if the mail protocols and Mail service are
not configured and started.
To enable Webmail for a site:
1 Make sure your mail service is started and configured to provide IMAP and SMTP
service.
2 Make sure IMAP mail service is enabled for the user accounts of the users you want to
have Webmail access.
For details on mail settings in user accounts, see User Management.
3 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
4 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
5 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
6 Click Sites.
7 In the Sites list, click the site you want to have Webmail enabled.
8 Click Web Services.
9 In the Services for Users section, select the Webmail checkbox.
10 Click Save.
When you turn Webmail on, the PHP module is enabled (if it was not already). If you
turn webmail off, PHP remains on until you turn it off. For more information, see “PHP”
on page 104.
Configuring Webmail
After enabling Webmail to provide basic mail functions on your website, you can
change settings to integrate Webmail with your site. You can do this by editing the
SquirrelMail configuration file, /etc/squirrelmail/config/config.php, or by using Terminal
with root privileges to run the interactive configuration script. This Perl script operates
by reading original values from config.php and writing new values back to config.php.
You can configure the following SquirrelMail options to integrate Webmail with your
site:
 Organization Name: The name that appears on the main Webmail page when a
user logs in. The default is Mac OS X Server Webmail.
 Organization Logo: The relative or absolute path to an image file.
 Organization Title: The title of the web browser window while viewing a Webmail
page. The default is Mac OS X Server Webmail.
 Trash Folder: The name of the IMAP folder where Mail service puts messages when
the user deletes them. The default is Deleted Messages.
Chapter 5 Configuring and Managing Webmail 79
 Sent Folder: The name of the IMAP folder where Mail service puts messages after
sending them. The default is Sent Messages.
 Draft Folder: The name of the IMAP folder where Mail service puts the user’s draft
messages. The default is Drafts.
Important: If you use the interactive configuration script to change SquirrelMail
settings, you must also use the script to enter the domain name of your server. If this is
not done, Webmail can’t send messages.
Webmail configuration settings apply to all websites hosted by your web service.
To configure Webmail options using a Perl configuration script:
1 Open Terminal and enter the following command:
$ sudo /etc/squirrelmail/config/conf.pl
2 Access and change the SquirrelMail settings as needed using the interactive menu
options.
3 Change the domain name to your server’s real domain name, such as example.com.
The domain name is the first item on the SquirrelMail script’s Server Settings menu.
If you don’t enter the server’s domain name correctly, the interactive script replaces the
original value, getenv(SERVER_NAME), with the same value but enclosed in single
quotes. The quoted value no longer works as a function call to retrieve the domain
name, and as a result Webmail can’t send messages.
4 Save your data after you complete the configuration changes.
5 Quit the interactive script.
Webmail configuration changes do not require restarting Web service unless users are
logged in to Webmail.
To further customize the appearance (for example, to provide a specific appearance for
each website, you must know how to write PHP scripts. In addition, you must be
familiar with the SquirrelMail plug-in architecture and you must write your own
SquirrelMail plug-ins.
Setting Up Mailing List Web Archives
Mailing lists are discussion groups that use mail distribution to facilitate
communication between users. Mailing lists distribute a single mail message to
multiple recipients and can be administered by someone other than the workgroup or
server administrator. More importantly, mailing list subscribers do not need an account
(mail or file access) on the list’s server. Any mail address can be added to the list.
80 Chapter 5 Configuring and Managing Webmail
You can create and maintain mailing lists with a web-based interface for users. You can
also configure mailing list archiving, content filtering, and digest delivery options for
mailing lists. For more information about mailing lists, see Mail Service Administration.
Messages sent to a mailing list can be archived and browsed from your website at a
later time. The messages are grouped into archival volumes by time and date. You must
turn mailing list web archive service on for your website to access the mailing list
archive through your web server.
To turn mailing list archiving on for your website:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Sites.
5 In the Sites list, click the site where you want mailing list web archive service enabled.
6 Click Web Services.
7 In the Services for Groups section, select the “Mailing list web archive” checkbox.
8 Click Save.
Chapter 5 Configuring and Managing Webmail 81
82 Chapter 5 Configuring and Managing Webmail
6 Working with WebObjects and
Open Source Applications
6
This chapter helps you become familiar with WebObjects and
the open source applications Mac OS X Server uses to
administer and deliver web services.
WebObjects service is the application server component of Mac OS X Server.
WebObjects offers versatile web development tools that let you extend your web
server in a variety of ways.
In addition, several open source applications provide essential features for Web service.
These applications include:
 Apache web server
 Tomcat servlet container
 MySQL database
 Ruby on Rails
Working with WebObjects Service
WebObjects is the Apple solution for rapid development and deployment of
ecommerce and other Internet applications. WebObjects applications can connect to
multiple databases and dynamically generate HTML content.
The following topics cover WebObjects administration:
 “WebObjects Overview” on page 84
 “Turning WebObjects Service On” on page 84
 “Setting Up WebObjects Service” on page 84
 “Starting WebObjects Service” on page 85
 “Checking the Status of WebObjects Service” on page 85
 “Stopping WebObjects Service” on page 86
 “Opening the Monitor” on page 86
83
WebObjects Overview
Mac OS X Server includes the WebObjects run-time libraries and an unlimited
deployment license to facilitate developing standards-based web services and Java
server applications. You can optionally purchase WebObjects development tools from
the Apple Store (store.apple.com), Apple’s retail stores, and authorized Apple resellers.
You can set WebObjects to start when the server starts. This ensures that WebObjects
modules start after a power failure or after the server shuts down.
For more information and documentation on WebObjects, go to www.apple.com/
webobjects or developer.apple.com/documentation/WebObjects.
Turning WebObjects Service On
Before you can configure your application server, you must turn WebObjects service on
in Server Admin.
To turn WebObjects service on:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click Settings, then click Services.
3 Select the WebObjects checkbox.
4 Click Save.
Setting Up WebObjects Service
Use WebObjects service settings in Server Admin to specify a WebObjects Task Daemon
(wotaskd) port, enable Java monitoring, and set the monitor port. WebObjects
deployment uses wotaskd to manage the application instances running on your
application server.
WARNING: To avoid security problems, any computer that runs JavaMonitor and
wotaskd should always be behind a firewall. In addition, only one server per subnet
should run JavaMonitor at any time.
The main task of wotaskd is to start application instances when the server is restarted.
To accomplish this, wotaskd must be restarted when the server starts up, which is done
by configuring wotaskd as a service started when the computer starts up. By default, a
wotaskd process running on port 1085 is configured as a service on all supported
platforms.
To configure WebObjects service settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 Click WebObjects.
84 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
4 Click Settings.
5 Specify the wotaskd port or the Monitor port as desired.
Monitor and wotaskd are part of the WebObjects deployment strategy. Each machine
that is running a WebObjects application should have wotaskd running on it. To
configure these applications for deployment, run the Monitor application. After
WebObjects is configured, only wotaskd must remain running.
Each wotaskd instance is only responsible for WebObjects applications running on the
same host. The Web server adaptor (or WebObjects HTTP adaptor) communicates with
the wotaskds instance on each host to discover the WebObjects applications that are
available.
Instances of WebObjects communicate their state to wotaskd through the use of TCP
lifebeats, and wotaskd controls instances through special DirectActions calls.
6 If required, turn Monitor on by selecting the Enable Monitor checkbox.
You must run monitor from a machine that is running wotaskd and that is a managed
server. Never run more than one instance of Monitor for a set of servers. Always run
Monitor and wotaskd behind a firewall.
7 Click Save.
Starting WebObjects Service
You start WebObjects service from Server Admin.
To start WebObjects service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select WebObjects.
4 Click Start WebObjects (below the Servers list).
The service runs until you stop it and restarts if your server is restarted.
From the Command Line
You can also start or stop WebObjects using the serveradmin command in Terminal by
entering the following commands:
$ serveradmin start webobjects
$ serveradmin stop webobjects
Checking the Status of WebObjects Service
You can use Server Admin to monitor WebObjects service.
To check the status of WebObjects service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 85
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select WebObjects.
4 Click Overview to see if WebObjects service is running, the time it started if it is
running, and to see if Monitor is running.
Stopping WebObjects Service
You can use Server Admin to stop WebObjects service.
To stop WebObjects service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select WebObjects.
4 Click Stop WebObjects (below the Servers list).
Opening the Monitor
Monitor is a web-based tool that helps you manage and monitor applications running
on WebObjects service. You use this tool to set up applications for deployment through
your web server and to control load balancing across multiple web servers.
For more information, open Monitor and select Help.
To open Monitor:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select WebObjects.
4 Click Settings and select the Enable Monitor checkbox.
5 Click Save.
6 Open a web browser and enter the address for Monitor:
http://localhost:<Monitor port>
Working with Apache
Apache is the open source HTTP web server provided with Mac OS X Server. You can
use Server Admin to manage most web server operations, but in some instances you
may want to add or change parts of the Apache server. In such situations, you must
modify Apache configuration files and change or add Apache modules.
86 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
Mac OS X Server v10.5 supports two versions of the Apache web server—Apache 1.3
and Apache 2.2. Both Apache 1.3 and Apache 2.2 are supported by Server Admin.
Apache 2.2 runs as a 64-bit process on appropriate hardware, but Apache 1.3 is 32-bit
only.
The two versions can be manually configured to run side by side as long as they do not
both attempt to listen on the same IP address / service port combination. Only one
version is managed by Server Admin, and running both concurrently is not supported.
Server Admin manages only one version of Apache at a time. In a clean installation it's
always Apache 2.2. In an upgrade, it is Apache 1.3, until you convert to Apache 2.2.
The locations of key Apache files are listed in the following table.
File Description Apache 1.3 Location Apache 2.2 Location
Configuration file for Web
service
Site configuration files /etc/httpd/sites/ folder /etc/apache2/sites/ folder
Executable file /usr/sbin/httpd-1.3 /usr/sbin/httpd
Web modules /usr/libexec/httpd/ folder /usr/libexec/apache2/ folder
Error log /var/log/httpd/ folder /var/log/apache2/ folder (with a
Temporarily disabled virtual
hosts
Static content for both Apache versions default to /Library/WebServer/Documents/
CGIs for both Apache versions default to /Library/WebServer/CGI-Executables/
/etc/httpd/ folder /etc/apache2/ folder
symlink that lets the folder be
viewed as /Library/Logs/
WebServer/)
/etc/httpd/sites_disabled/ folder /etc/apache2/sites_disabled/
folder
All files in /etc/httpd/sites/ for Apache 1.3 or in /etc/apache2/sites/ for Apache 2.2 are
read and processed by Apache when it performs a hard or soft (graceful) restart. Each
time you save changes, the server does a graceful restart.
If you edit a file using a text editor that creates a temporary or backup copy, the server
restart may fail because two files with almost identical names are present. To avoid this
problem, delete temporary or backup files created when editing files in this folder.
Editing Apache Configuration Files
You can edit Apache configuration files if you need to work with features of the Apache
web server that are not part of Server Admin. To edit configuration files, you must be
an experienced Apache administrator and you must be familiar with text-editing tools.
Be sure to make a copy of the original configuration file before editing it.
The httpd.conf configuration file handles all directives controlled by Server Admin. You
can edit this file as long as you follow the text conventions and comments in the file.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 87
This file also has a directive to include the .../sites/ folder. That folder contains all virtual
hosts for that server. The files are named with the unique identifier of the virtual host
(for example, 0000_17.221.43.127_80_www.example.com.conf ). You disable specific sites
by moving them to the sites_disabled folder and then restarting Web service. You can
also edit site files as long as the conventions in the file are followed.
One hidden file in the sites_disabled folder is named “default_default.conf.” This file is
used as the template for all new virtual hosts created in Server Admin. An administrator
can edit the template file to customize it, taking care to follow the conventions
established in the file.
For more information about Apache and its modules, see “Apache Web Module
Overview” on page 99.
Restoring the Default Configuration
It is possible to restore a factory setting or default configuration of Apache without
reinstalling Mac OS X Server. The various .default files in the Apache configuration
directories are put there for this purpose and are installed as a Read-Only files to
discourage administrators from modifying them.
To restore the default configuration:
1 Open Terminal.
2 Enter the following command:
$ sudo serveradmin web:command=writeSettings \web:variant=withDefaults
A ReadMe.txt file that describes the Apache configuration is available:
 The Apache 2.2 readme.txt file is installed in the /etc/apache2/ folder.
 The Apache 1.3 readme.txt file is installed in the /etc/httpd/ folder.
This file contains instructions for manually going from Apache 2.2 to 1.3, if that
becomes necessary.
Using the apachectl Script
The default way to start and stop Apache on Mac OS X Server is to use Server Admin.
There are two versions of apachectl commands:
 apachectl controls Apache 2.2. Apache 2.2 runs as a 64-bit process on appropriate
hardware.
 apachectl-1.3 controls Apache 1.3. Apache 1.3 is 32-bit only.
88 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
If you want to use the apachectl script to start and stop Web service instead of using
Server Admin, be aware of the following:
 The web performance cache is enabled by default in Mac OS X Server v10.5. For
upgrade installations, with Apache 1.3, the web performance cache is enabled in
v10.5 only if it was enabled prior to the upgrade. When Web service starts, the main
web service process (httpd) and a webperfcache process start. (The webperfcache
process serves static content from a memory cache and relays requests to httpd
when necessary.) The apachectl script that comes with Mac OS X Server is unaware
of webperfcache, so if you have not disabled the performance cache, you must also
use the webperfcachectl script to start and stop webperfcache.
 When Apache is started using the apachectl script, the soft process limit is 100, the
default limit. When you use CGI scripts, this limit may not be high enough. In this
case, you can start Web service using Server Admin, which sets the soft process limit
to 2048. Alternatively, you can enter
ulimit -u 2048 before using apachectl.
 The apachectl script does not start Apache when the server restarts.
Because of the issues noted above, if you must control Apache from a script, the
recommended approach is to use the serveradmin command-line tool.
To start Apache from a script:
1 Open your script.
2 Enter the following command:
serveradmin start web
This starts Apache and the performance cache (if necessary) and it marks
/etc/hostconfig to start Web service on restart.
3 Save and run your script.
To stop Apache from the command line:
1 Open your script.
2 Enter the following command:
serveradmin stop web
This stops Apache and the performance cache (if necessary), and it marks
/etc/hostconfig not to start Web service on restart.
3 Save and run your script.
About Apache Multicast DNS Registration
Do not use Apache multicast DNS registration with the server.
Important: Do not try to turn on Apache multicast DNS (mdns) registration for the
server. It does not support virtual hosts, and the server uses virtual hosts.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 89
Using Apache Axis
Apache Extensible Interaction System (Axis) is an implementation of Simple Object
Access Protocol (SOAP). More about SOAP can be found at www.w3.org/TR/SOAP. More
about Axis can be found at:ws.apache.org/axis.
You can use Apache Axis by writing web applications that use the Axis libraries and
then deploy the applications in Tomcat. Unlike Tomcat, Axis is not usually used as an
application server.
Mac OS X Server v10.5 includes a preinstalled version of Apache Axis (v1.1), which
operates with the preinstalled Tomcat (v4.1.x).
The Axis libraries are in the /System/Library/Axis/ folder. By default, Apple installs an
example Axis web application into Tomcat. The web application, known as axis, is
found in /Library/Tomcat/webapps/axis/.
After you enable Tomcat in the Web Service Settings pane in Server Admin, you can
validate the preinstalled Apache Axis by accessing:
http://example.com:9006/axis/
Replace “example.com” with your host name. Note the nonstandard Tomcat port.
The first time you exercise the preinstalled Axis by accessing http://example.com:9006/
axis/ and selecting the link entitled “Validate the local installation’s configuration,” you
will see the following error messages:
 Warning: could not find class javax.mail.internet.MimeMessage from file mail.jar
Attachments will not work.
See ava.sun.com/products/javamail.
 Warning: could not find class org.apache.xml.security.Init from file xmlsec.jar XML
Security is not supported
See xml.apache.org/security.
Follow the instructions that accompany the warning messages if you require those
optional components.
Consult the Axis User’s Guide to learn more about using Axis in your own web
applications. This guide is located at ws.apache.org/axis/java/user-guide.html.
Working with Tomcat
Tomcat adds Java servlet and JavaServer Pages (JSP) capabilities to Mac OS X Server.
Java servlets are Java-based applications that run on your server, in contrast to Java
applets, which run on the user’s computer. JavaServer Pages let you embed Java
servlets in your HTML web pages.
90 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
The Java Servlet and JavaServer Pages specifications are developed by Sun
Microsystems under the Java Community Process. The current production series is the
Tomcat 4.1.x series, which implements Java Servlet 2.3 and JavaServer Pages 1.2
specifications.
For more information about Tomcat and documentation for this software, see
http://tomcat.apache.org/.
For information about Java Servlets that you can use on your web server, see:
 java.sun.com/products/servlet
 java.sun.com/products/jsp
By default, the Tomcat management console and status service are turned off. Consult
the Apache Tomcat documentation (http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-6.0-doc/
index.html) to properly enable and secure these service for your deployment
environment. It is recommended that Web service be secured behind a firewall.
For more resources, consult the O’Reilly book Tomcat the Definitive Guide
(www.oreilly.com).
Setting Tomcat as the Application Container
You use Server Admin to work with Tomcat. You can set Tomcat to start when the
server starts. This ensures that the Tomcat module starts after a power failure or after
the server shuts down.
You can use Server Admin or Terminal to enable Tomcat.
To start Tomcat using Server Admin:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click General.
5 Select the Enable Tomcat checkbox.
6 Click Save.
From the Command Line
You can also start Tomcat in Terminal by entering the following commands:
$ cd /Library/Tomcat/bin
$ ./startup.sh start
To verify that Tomcat is running, use a browser to access port 9006 on your website
server by entering the URL for your site followed by :9006. If Tomcat is running, this URL
shows the Tomcat home page.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 91
Working with MySQL
MySQL provides a relational database management solution for your web server. With
this open source software, you can link data in different tables or databases and
provide the information on your website.
The MySQL Manager application is replaced by the MySQL service in Server Admin.
Turning MySQL Service On
Before you can configure your database manager, you must turn MySQL service on in
Server Admin.
To turn MySQL service on:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click Settings, then click Services.
3 Select the MySQL checkbox.
4 Click Save.
Setting Up MySQL Service
Use MySQL service Settings in Server Admin to specify the database location, to enable
network connections, and to set the MySQL root password.
To configure MySQL service settings:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 Click MySQL.
4 Click Settings.
5 Select the “Allow network connections” checkbox to permit users to access MySQL
service.
This grants users access to database information through the web server.
6 Enter the path to the location of your database in the Database location field.
You can also click the Choose button and browse for the folder you want to use.
7 Click Save.
Starting MySQL Service
You start MySQL service from Server Admin.
To start MySQL service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
92 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select MySQL.
4 Click Start MySQL (below the Servers list).
The service runs until you stop it and restarts if your server is restarted.
Checking the Status of MySQL Service
You can use Server Admin to monitor MySQL service.
To check the status of MySQL service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select MySQL.
4 Click Overview to see if MySQL service is running, the time it started if it is running, and
if network connections are allowed.
Viewing MySQL Service and Admin Logs
MySQL service keeps two types of logs, a MySQL service log and MySQL admin logs:
 The MySQL service log records the time of events such as when MySQL service is
started and stopped.
 The MySQL admin log records information such as when clients connect or
disconnect and each SQL statement received from clients. This log is located at
/Library/Logs/MySQL.log.
You can view MySQL service logs using Server Admin.
To view MySQL service logs:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 Click MySQL.
4 Click Logs.
Use the Filter field to search for specific entries.
Stopping MySQL Service
You can use Server Admin to stop MySQL service.
To stop MySQL service:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 93
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select MySQL.
4 Click Stop MySQL (below the Servers list).
Upgrading MySQL
Mac OS X Server v10.5 includes the latest version of MySQL, v5.0. Because it’s
preinstalled, you won’t find it in /usr/local/mysql. Instead, its elements are distributed in
the file system according to standard UNIX file layout as follows:
 MySQL executables are located in the /usr/sbin/ and /usr/bin/ folders.
 MySQL man pages are located in the /usr/share/man/ folder.
 Other MySQL parts are located in the /usr/share/mysql/ folder.
When installed, the MySQL database resides in the /var/mysql/ folder.
At some point a newer version of MySQL will be posted to www.mysql.com. At that
time you can download the source and build it (if you have the developer packages
installed) or you can download the relevant binary distribution and install it, following
the instructions posted on that website.
By default, such installations reside in the /usr/local/mysql/ folder. If you install your
own version of MySQL, you’ll have two versions of MySQL present on your system. This
causes no harm as long as you don’t try to run the two versions at the same time.
Be sure to use commands intended for the new version by specifying the full path
(starting with /usr/local/mysql/), or make sure your shell’s path variable is set to search
in your local folder first.
Working with Ruby on Rails
Ruby on Rails is a web application framework, becoming very popular because of its
ease of development, scalability, and support for the Model-View-Controller
architecture, and because it uses Ajax via the Prototype and Script.aculo.us libraries.
Details can be found at www.rubyonrails.org.
In Mac OS X Server v10.5, Ruby on Rails is preinstalled with several useful gems
(component packages), including the Mongrel web server.
The Mongrel web server comes with the mongrel_rails tool to manage it. Mac OS X
Server v10.5 supports the deployment of Ruby on Rails applications in the following
ways:
 It includes an enhanced version of the
mongrel_rails_persist, which creates a launchd plist file to run Mongrel persistently
(across reboots) and causes it to register with Bonjour.
mongrel_rails tool called
94 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
This is helpful because it allows the Server Admin Web Site Proxy panel to find
instances of Mongrel running on the same machine, and presents their URLs in the
Balancer Members popup. More details about
mongrel_rails_persist are available
on its main page.
 It allows administration of Apache 2.2 mod_proxy_balancer in the Server Admin web
service Sites Proxy panel. This allows several instances of Mongrel (or another backend http server) to be accessed via a single URL and allows Apache to distribute its
load to those services in a configured proportion.
 It includes mod_fastcgi for customers who have used it to solve configuration issues
and prefer to use it over mod_proxy_balancer. This module is disabled by default.
Managing the Deployment of Ruby on Rails Applications
You can use Server Admin to manage the deployment of Ruby on Rails applications
with the Apache 2.2 mod_proxy_balancer module.
You can dedicate your website (virtual host) to Ruby on Rails or you can share your
website with Ruby on Rails. The following scenarios describe how to do this:
 In the first scenario, the website is dedicated to the Ruby on Rails web application.
 In the second scenario, the website is shared with the Ruby on Rails application.
In these scenarios, we use the default wild-card website which is the website that has
the asterisk in the address column of the websites list, as an example. There are other
variations depending on how you organize your websites and how you organize your
Ruby on Rails applications, but these two scenarios should illustrate the general
mechanism. You can check the knowledge base for additional techniques.
Scenario 1 - Dedicating a Website (Virtual Host) to the Proxied Web Application
1 Open Terminal and enter the following commands to create your Ruby on Rails
application outside the document root of any existing web virtual host (for example in
/Library/WebServer/MyWebApp, where MyWebApp is the name of your rails
application).
$ cd /Library/WebServer
$ rails
$ ...
MyWebApp
2 Start the Mongrel web server using the mongrel_rails_persist command:
$ sudo mongrel_rails_persist start -p 3001 -c /Library/WebServer/
MyWebApp
This wrapper for the mongrel_rails command registers the instance of Mongrel with
Bonjour and provides a launchd plist file so the instance of Mongrel restarts on server
startup.
3 Use Safari to browse the local Rails URL to confirm that the web application is
responding:
http://127.0.0.1:3001
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 95
If you specified a model or scaffold in your Rails application, the URL might be
something like:
http://127.0.0.1:3001/ModelName
You should see the “Welcome Aboard / You’re riding the rails” page.
4 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
5 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
6 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
7 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
8 Click Proxy below the websites list.
9 Select the Enable Reverse Proxy checkbox.
10 Verify that the Proxy path field is set to "/".
This requires all URLs within the website to be proxied to the balancer group.
11 Leave the Stick Session Identifier field blank unless you have reason to specify a value.
12 To add a balancer member, click the Add (+) button below the Balancer Members list.
13 From the Server URL pop-up menu, designate the URL for the load balancer member.
Each instance of Mongrel running locally has its URL shown in the pop-up menu, so
you should be able to select one.
Create additional balancer members if you have multiple instances of Mongrel serving
your web application on this host or other reachable hosts. Each balancer member
corresponds to an instance of Mongrel, running on either the local host or other hosts.
14 If there is only one balancer member, set the Load Factor to 100.
Use the Load Factor field to distribute the load among balancer members.
15 Leave the Route field blank unless you have a specific reason to enter a value.
16 Click OK.
17 Click Save.
18 Start Web Service, if it is not already running.
19 Use Safari to access the proxy URL to confirm that the web application is responding:
http://127.0.0.1
If you specified a model or scaffold in your Rails applicatioin, the URL might be
something like:
http://127.0.0.1/ModelName
It is not necessary to enter a trailing slash.
96 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
Scenario 2 - Sharing a Website (Virtual Host) with the Proxied Web Application
1 Open Terminal and enter the following commands to create your Ruby on Rails
application outside the document root of any existing web virtual host (for example in
/Library/WebServer/MyWebApp, where MyWebApp is the name of your rails
application).
$ cd /Library/WebServer
$ rails
$ ...
MyWebApp
2 Start the Mongrel web server using the mongrel_rails_persist command and using
the --prefix argument:
$ sudo mongrel_rails_persist start -p 3001 --prefix /rails -c /Library/
WebServer/
MyWebApp
3 Use Safari to access the local Rails URL to confirm that the web application is
responding:
http://127.0.0.1:3001/rails/
If you specified a model or scaffold in your Rails application, the URL might be
something like:
http://127.0.0.1/rails/ModelName
You should see the “Welcome Aboard / You’re riding the rails” page.
4 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
5 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
6 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
7 Click Sites, then select the website in the list.
8 Click Proxy below the websites list.
9 Select the Enable Reverse Proxy checkbox.
10 In the Proxy path field enter the prefix you specified to mongrel_rails_persist, but with
both a leading and trailing back slash. In our example, this would be /rails/.
11 Leave the Sticky Session Identifier field blank unless you have a reason to specify a
value.
12 To add a balancer member, click the Add (+) button below the Balancer Members list.
13 From the Server URL pop-up menu, designate the URL for the load balancer member.
Each instance of Mongrel running locally has its URL shown in the pop-up menu, so
you should be able to select one (for example, http://127.0.0.1:3001/rails).
14 If there is only one balancer member, set the Load Factor to 100.
Use the Load Factor field to distribute the load among balancer members.
Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications 97
15 Leave the Route field blank unless you have a specific reason to enter a value.
16 Click OK.
17 Click Save.
18 Start Web Service, if it is not already running.
19 Use Safari to access the proxy URL to confirm that the web application is responding:
http://127.0.0.1/rails/
If you specified a model or scaffold in your Rails application, the URL might be
something like:
http://127.0.0.1/rail/ModelName
If you find that a trailing slash is required, you can use the Server Admin Web Alias
panel for the site, and add a RedirectMatch entry that maps /rails to /rails/.
20 Use Safari to access to the local URL to confirm that other content is available at other
URLs within the website:
http://127.0.0.1
98 Chapter 6 Working with WebObjects and Open Source Applications
7 Managing Web Modules
7
This chapter familiarizes you with Apache web modules that
provide key features and controls for Web service.
The Apache web server includes a series of modules that control the server’s operation.
In addition, Mac OS X Server provides modules with specialized functions for the
Macintosh.
Apache Web Module Overview
Modules plug in to the Apache web server software and add functionality to your
website. Apache comes with several standard modules, but you can purchase
additional modules from software vendors or download them from the Internet. You
can find information about available Apache modules at www.apache.org/docs/mod.
Note: Rails is not based on a separate web module. The discussion of Rails, wherever it
appears, refers to mod_proxy_balancer, which is a standard Apache 2.2 module.
Working with Web Modules
The Apache web server has a modular design that enables you to expand the core
functionality of your web server by enabling additional modules. Modules can be
enabled or disabled using Server Admin.
Although enabling or disabling Apache web modules is easy in Server Admin, generally
you should have a specific functionality goal and fully understand the implications of
enabling or disabling modules.
Some web modules are mutually exclusive or are interdependent. Here are some
examples:
 auth_digest_module and digest_module must never be enabled simultaneously.
 proxy_module must be enabled if proxy_connect_module, proxy_ftp_module,
proxy_http_module, proxy_ajp_module, or proxy_balancer_module are enabled.
 dav_module and dav_fs_module should be in the same state.
99
 encoding_module requires that headers_module, dav_module, and dav_fs_module
are enabled.
 cache_module is required for mem_cache_module and disk_cache_module.
Important: Web modules used with Apache 1.3 are different from web modules used
with Apache 2.2.
Viewing Web Modules
You can view a list of modules in use or available for use on the server.
To view web modules:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click Modules.
5 Scroll through the modules list to see modules in use or available for use on the web
server.
Adding Web Modules
You can use Server Admin to add web modules to your web server.
Before you can add a web module to the server, the module must be installed. To
install a module, follow the instructions that came with the module software. The web
server loads modules from the /usr/libexec/httpd/ folder.
To add web modules to the server:
1 Open Server Admin and connect to the server.
2 Click the triangle to the left of the server.
The list of services appears.
3 From the expanded Servers list, select Web.
4 Click Settings, then click Modules.
5 Click the Add (+) button to add a module to the list of available modules.
6 In the Module Name field, enter the module name.
7 Select the Enabled checkbox if you want the module enabled.
8 In the Module Path field, enter the path to the installed module or click the browse
button to select the folder.
9 Click OK.
10 Click Save.
100 Chapter 7 Managing Web Modules
Loading...