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Asked: 2012-02-16 13:54:09 +0800 CST

Organizing .conf apache configuration per domain

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I have a VPS server with CentOS with multiple domains (some I own, some I don't). I host my sites and my friends sites on it.

I have this structure:

/home/myfriendsusername/public_html/
/home/myotherfriendsusername/public_html/
/var/www/mydomain.com/public_html/

So all my stuff is in my /var/www and my friends have their own username in the home folder. Every VirtualHost is in the httpd.conf and it's getting kinda big (I have over 50+ domains including sometimes sub-domains.

Will it be better to create a file in the sites-enabled for each domain I host like:

/etc/apache2/sites-enabled/myfriendsdomain.com
/etc/apache2/sites-enabled/mydomain.com

Is that a good practice? or what I did (using httpd.conf) is correct?

apache-2.2 domain conf

3 Answers

  1. It'll be much easier to manage all vhosts in their own separate configuration file. Here is what I would do (on Debian):

    Place each vhost configuration in its own file inside /etc/apache2/sites-available/. Use a2ensite to create a symlink between the available vhost sites and the /etc/apache2/sites-enabled directory.

    Then just add:

    Include /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/

    To httpd.conf

    This way you can easily take sites offline, with a2dissite vhostname, for example: a2dissite mydomain.com

    Since you have CentOS, the a2ensite script will not be present. Here's a way to simulate the Debian scripting methods:

    http://cosp.org.pk/blog/shoaibi/2009/12/11/open-source/simulating-debian-apache-configuration-management-on-centos/

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  2. By default (at least in CentOS 6.2), Apache is configured to automatically include any configuration files located in the following directory:

    /etc/httpd/conf.d/

    Search your httpd.conf for the following line (add if it's not there):

    Include conf.d/*.conf

    Then just create config files for each virtual host:

    /etc/httpd/conf.d/google.com.conf
/etc/httpd/conf.d/serverfault.com.conf

    And if you want to disable a virtual host, just rename:

    /etc/httpd/conf.d/serverfault.com.conf.backup

    Simple!

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  3. Best Answer

    Here's an excellent link on how to: http://wiki.centos.org/TipsAndTricks/ApacheVhostDir

    basically you create each config file domain in:

    /etc/httpd/conf.d/

    example:

    <VirtualHost *:80>
  ServerName example.org
  ServerAlias *.example.org
  ServerAdmin [email protected]
  ErrorLog /var/log/httpd/example.err
  CustomLog /var/log/httpd/example.log combined
  DocumentRoot /var/www/example.org
  <Directory "/var/www/example.org">
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
  </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

    There might be times when it is desirable to disable a virtual host. Since the include in /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf specifies *.conf, it is possible to hide a virtual host by changing the configuration file name.

    Disable a virtual host by adding a _ to the virtual host file name: 

    mv -v /etc/httpd/conf.d/example.conf{,_}

    Enable a virtual host by removing the _ from the virtual host file name: 

    mv -v /etc/httpd/conf.d/example.conf{_,}

    restart:

    service httpd graceful
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