Apache Http Server Open Source

Apache Open Source Software
Apache Http Server Open Source Download

Since the Apache Software Foundation came into being, it has played a developmental role in how open source communities collaborate to create great, practical software. Today Apache HTTP is the most popular web hosting platform in the world and is used across industries and sectors to host all types of applications. Below we will explore some common Apache applications and best practices that may help you overcome obstacles in your own Apache environment.

What Is Apache HTTP Server?

Apache HTTP Server is the world’s most used web hosting platform. Now commonly referred to as simply “Apache,” the open-source software project began in 1995 and by 2016 was estimated to power nearly half of the world’s web servers. Without Apache, the World Wide Web that gives us the www URL prefix would have been a far slower process and exponentially more expensive.

The Apache HTTP Server Project is an effort to develop and maintain an open-source HTTP server for modern operating systems including UNIX and Windows. The goal of this project is to provide a secure, efficient and extensible server that provides HTTP services in sync with the current HTTP standards. Apache Geronimo is an open source server runtime that integrates the best open source projects to create Java/OSGi server runtimes that meet the needs of enterprise developers and system administrators. Our most popular distribution has previously been a fully certified Java EE 6 application server runtime. Originally designed as a replacement for the NCSA HTTP Server, it has grown to be the most popular web server on the Internet. As a project of the Apache Software Foundation, the developers aim to collaboratively develop and maintain a robust, commercial-grade, standards-based server with freely available source code. Learn to host your own website with Apache, a solid, well-known, and easy-to-configure web server.

Originally developed for use with Unix, Apache is now a cross-platform solution for hosting and developing web applications. Its international community of open source contributors and security specialists make it an affordable, dependable backbone for web services. Below we will take a look at some popular aspects and features of Apache and how to put them to work in your environment.

Expand Server Capabilities with Apache Tomcat

Apache HTTP Server has more than 20 years of proven reliability providing essential web services, but the advent of the Java interactive scripting language required more than basic HTTP functionality. Enter Apache Tomcat, a Java Server Page (JSP) and Java servlet server that can run alone or be configured to pair with existing Apache HTTP servers to add power.

Apache Tomcat seamlessly processes incoming JSP and servlet requests in a designated container and passes the ensuing data to the section of the web delivery pipeline with no disruption to the end user experience.

Data Storage in Apache

Scalable, fault-tolerant data storage is a cornerstone of any modern network environment. Apache addresses this need with Cassandra, the durable and decentralized storage and management system, which serves some of the world’s largest tech companies.

Apache Cassandra relies on a powerful network of data centers strategically positioned around the world to provide unsurpassed fault tolerance. For instance nodes impacted by power outages or natural disaster are automatically replaced from partner sites, resulting in zero downtime. This unparalleled reliability has made Cassandra, a NoSQL database, the go-to data storage solution for major companies such as eBay, GoDaddy, and Netflix and it hosts more than 2500 nodes and serves more than a trillion requests per day.

Top Tools for Apache Web Server

With more than two decades of proven success, it’s natural that a host of tools to augment Apache’s capabilities sprung up around the software. As with most any task, using the right tools in Apache HTTP make jobs easier and faster. Here’s an incomplete look at some of the more popular—and powerful—options for expanding Apache.

Apache Cloudstack.Cloudstack is a turnkey, all-in-one solution for deploying and managing large virtual networks in the cloud. Cloudstack includes a native (and open-source) API, a sharp user interface, and supports the most popular hypervisors, including VMware and Hyper-V. GUI, command line, or web-based administrator interfaces give you pinpoint control over your cloud or hybrid Apache environment.
Apache Axis 2. With a super fast runtime engine that can operate independently or as a service on Apache Tomcat, Apache Axis 2 is a web creation and management toolkit that works with most popular plugins.
Apache Synapse. Easily apply and manage load balancing, switching, protocol routing, and other advanced network tasks with Apache Synapse. Install Synapse as its own unique services gateway or run it as a proxy service on Apache HTTP to stably support staggering amounts of concurrent clients with a minimal amount of overhead.
Apache CouchDB. An open source database hosting solution designed for the modern web, CouchDB stores disparate data types as JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) files, allowing blazing fast nonlinear storage and retrieval through a simple query language.
Apache Thrift. Developed by FaceBook, Apache Thrift operates within the remote procedure call (RPC) framework to greatly speed the deployment of applications across platforms. Essentially Thrift wraps a complete software stack and a code generation into a package that lets your original code create working replicas of itself for other platforms, eliminating the need to tediously code versions for every common language.

Want to find a specific Apache tool? Check out the complete list of in production and under development open source software projects for and in conjunction with Apache HTTP.

Apache Log Management

The key to a successful Apache system is knowing how to find, manage, and react to the log data generated by Apache. The enormous number interactions occurring each second in your Apache environment create a corresponding flood of data, but any one string of it can be the key to determining where and how your network is underperforming.

The first step to mastering logging is enabling the appropriate modules in Apache. These include:

Mod_log_config, which lets you define the settings and storage location for your logs.
Mod_log_forensic records system state immediately before and after each request, so narrowing down suspicious activity becomes much easier.
Mod_logio charts all in and out traffic in bytes.

Though through advanced Apache logging analytics administrators can glean a wealth of information, Apache gathers only two distinct types of logs: Access Log and Error Logs.

Apache Access Logs Monitoring

These logs denote all critical information about who is accessing your environment, where they are going, and what they’re attempting to do while visiting. From these logs admins can gather page views and visits, successful and failed access attempts, visiting IP addresses, and more.

Apache Error Logs Monitoring

If access logs record who went where, error logs capture what went wrong. Details from configuration problems, dropped connections, document failures like 400 errors and other mishaps are compiled in these logs.

Between the two of them, access and error logs hold all the information you need to troubleshoot and fine tune your network. Apache’s ubiquity has naturally inspired an array of third-party log analysis tools, but the best ones will key in on five focus areas for Apache activity:

Bytes Delivered
HTTP Errors
Page Hits
Response Time
Web Server

Industry leading log analysis and machine learning Apache partners can scrutinize the access and error logs even further, scouring them for microdetails like:

404 and 500 errors
IP address
Pageview behaviors
User names
User reports by geography

The most important power an Apache log analysis tool should unlock is visualization. Even though only two essential activities are recorded—access and error—the structure and volume of raw data contained in Apache logs can hide the needle you seek in a haystack of codes and numbers. The data you need is contained in native Apache logs, but finding it can be tricky. Here’s an example of how to count visitors.

Through interactive visualization, the right log analytics tools transform that into clear, easy to understand graphs and charts that show you what’s happening in your environment.

Check out these additional links to learn more about advanced logging, react to important metrics like traffic analysis, and isolating and responding to critical errors in Apache.

Optimizing Your Apache Environment

If you are doing business on the web, you’re doing it on or near Apache web services. One of the oldest and largest platforms in the history of the web, Apache still provides powerful, open-source solutions to modern web hosting challenges. They keys to success in Apache are understanding what it can do, expanding its power by adding additional Apache resources, and transforming raw logging data into information you can see and use. Delve deeper into the Apache’s data flow and logging to learn what you can do with Apache.

Additional resources

Both web and application servers respond to user requests for content. Yet, there are several key differences between the two server types, and knowing these distinctions can help you configure the right software and hardware infrastructure for your needs.

Read on to learn the differences between web servers and application serversand their everyday use cases, and see which one is a better fit for your business needs.

App Server vs. Web Server: Key Differences

Here is an overview of the main distinctions between app and web servers:

Web Servers	Point of Comparison	Application Servers
Hosts websites and responds to simple web requests	Main purpose	Hosts applications and delivers complex interactions through business logic
Only delivers static content via HTML	Type of content	Delivers static and dynamic content
HTTP/HTTPS protocols only	Protocols	The client-server interaction can occur via several protocols, including HTTP/HTTPS
No	Application connection	Yes
Has access to a static database	Database connection	Has access to the application database
Web browsers	Typical client	Serves web and mobile applications, and web browsers
Does not support multi-threading	Multi-threading	Uses multi-threading to process multiple requests in parallel
Facilitates traffic that does not consume a lot of resources	Resource consumption	Facilitates resource-intensive processes
Web container only	Containers	Web container (Servlets, JSP, JSF, web services), EJB container (JTA), Application Client container (DI, security)
Very low	Capacity	High
A hypertext document that displays information on a browser	Interaction result	Files that contain data and serve a specific purpose depending on the client needs

What Is a Web Server?

A web server is a computer system that stores, processes, and delivers web pages to clients. The client is almost always a web browser or a mobile application. Depending on the setup, a web server can store one or more websites.

This type of server only delivers static HTML content, such as:

Documents
Images
Videos
Fonts

Web servers and application servers have one thing in common - they need a dedicated server to run the software.

Traditionally, web servers do not deal with dynamic content or server-side programming. Web servers accept and fulfill Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP or HTTPS) requests only. Optionally, you can add components for dealing with dynamic content.

What Is an Application Server?

An application server is a software framework that delivers content and assets for a client application. Clients include web-based applications, browsers, and mobile apps.

Application servers provide clients with access to business logic. Through business logic, an app server transforms data into dynamic content and enables the functionality of the application. Examples of dynamic content are:

A transaction result
Decision support
Real-time analytics

This server type is the main link between a client and server-side code. Typical tasks of an application server include:

Transaction management
Security
Dependency injection (DI)
Concurrency

Application servers also handle processes such as clustering, fail-over, and load-balancing.

The Overlap Between Web and App Servers

When web browsers became the main application clients, the line between app and web servers got blurry.

Most web servers have plugins for scripting languages (ASP, JSP, PHP, Perl, etc.) that enable dynamic content generation. For example, if we add a .NET plugin to an IIS environment, we can connect the web server to server-side code and serve clients with dynamic content.

There is an overlap on the app server’s side too. Many application servers offer web server capabilities and use HTTP as a primary protocol.

Because of the overlap in use cases and technology, most popular servers are hybrids of the two types. A hybrid solution that combines server capabilities ensures optimal system speed and functionality.

For an inexpensive way of hosting a static website, consider using Object Storage.

Most Popular Application Servers

Here are the most wide-spread application servers on the market:

Apache Tomcat

Apache Tomcat is an open-source app server often used in conjunction with Apache HTTPD.

Tomcat can execute Java Servlets, deliver pages with JavaServer Page code, and serve Java EE (Java Enterprise Edition) apps.

If you are new to Tomcat, visit our tutorials How To Install Tomcat On Ubuntu or How To Install Tomcat On CentOS.

Oracle WebLogic

Oracle WebLogic Server is an application server for deploying distributed apps using Java EE standards. WebLogic is fully integrated with Oracle’s product and cloud service portfolio.

Glassfish

Glassfish is an open-source Java EE application server that supports Java Servlets and Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB). Glassfish can also function as a web server.

JBoss

JBoss application server is an open-source platform for building, deploying, and hosting Java applications. JBoss operates across platforms, and you can use it on any operating system that supports Java.

App Server vs. Web Server: Which One is the Right Server for Your Business?

Now that you understand the difference between web and application servers, it becomes easier to see which one is the better fit:

Use a web server if you are serving static web pages only.
Use a simpler application server like Jetty or Apache Tomcat if you have an application that requires JSP and Servlet.
Use a full-blown application server like JBoss or Oracle WebLogic if you have an application with complex features like distributed transactions and messaging.

Another option is to use plugins to add functionalities to a web server. In that case, a web server can delegate dynamic response generation to a server-side technology option, such as CGI scripts, JSPs, Servlets, ASPs (Active Server Pages), or server-side JavaScript.

Using Both Server Types in the Same System

A popular setup is to deploy both a web server and an application server in the same system. This setup makes sense for websites that provide both static and dynamic content. In that case, the web server becomes a subset of the application server, and both services run on the same hardware.

The main reason for deploying both types of servers is improved system performance. Each server focuses on its strong points, and you prevent simple web requests from impacting application server performance.

As an example, consider an e-store that provides real-time pricing information. Such sites typically have a form with which a user can purchase products. When the user submits a query, the website does a lookup and returns the results set within an HTML page.

This functionality can operate with and without an application server.

Scenario 1: Using Only a Web Server with Plugins

The web server provides the e-store functionality:

The server receives the request and passes it to a server-side program.
The server-side program looks up the pricing data from a database or a flat-file.
The server-side program formulates an HTML response.
The web server sends the response back to the web browser.

Scenario 2: Using Both a Web Server and an Application Server

The application server stores the business logic for the pricing lookup. The web server delegates the response generation, but the script calls the application server’s lookup service and then formulates an HTML response.

Apache Open Source Software

By placing the pricing logic in the app server, the logic becomes reusable between different parts of the application. In our first scenario, the pricing lookup service is not reusable as data is embedded in an HTML page. Th sound pronunciationielts document.

Conclusion

The overlap between application and web servers means that each use case has several valid solutions. Most systems can operate with a web server, app server, or a combination of the two.

However, not all setups are equally good. Knowing the differences between the two server types helps you save money, scale more easily, and choose a better fit for your use case.