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Why I Hate the Apache Web Server
schon writes "Today's the last day of ApacheCon Europe; There was a hilarious presentation entitled 'Why I Hate the Apache Web Server' for anyone who has expressed frustration with the various inconsistencies and nuances of the Internet's favourite config file. And yes, it includes a comparison to Sendmail."
I think the subject was supposed to read, "Why I hate PDF files."
"Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Thoreau
OK, so this is a PDF file that looks like a Powerpoint presentation and it is about how much he hates Apache. *head explodes*
Here is a html version, I doubt it will stay cached for very long though.
Coincidence? I think not!
atleast a decent Apache install can keep on chugging along even when faced with a slashdotting.
It's not the PDF format that sucks, it's Acrobat Reader. Use Preview or XPDF.
Complaining about PDFs is like complaining about HTTP cause you don't like IIS.
News for Nerds
Wow, you ain't fuckin kidding, are ya?
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Apache is great but it could be *significantly* easier for beginning webmasters. And for companies to fund changes.
Don't be silly. PDF files are very useful to distribute printable materials, such as books, spec sheets, PR and corporate bullshit (ugh), brochures, etc... Remember that PDF is essentially Postscript wrapped in an Adobe straightjacket.
What does piss me off is:
- People who use PDFs to make read-only documents
- People who use PDFs where html or text is adequat and sufficient.
I don't see why they require me to lauch that hateful Acrobat Reader when a browser does a better job.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I love Apache, but in the same way I love my wife: with some trepidation. Fast and stable, flexible and reliable, but make one little syntax error and you can lose your ass.
This isn't as much "normalization" as it is "don't take so many drugs when you're designing tables."
Well, until they feel like adding a PDF warning, you should get the PDF Download extension for firefox. It's small, simple, and prevents PDF ambushes from raping your system's resources.
I suspect most people here are able to position the cursor over the article link and look in the status bar, note the .pdf at the end of the URL, and know that this is a PDF.
Assuming they are able to do it is one thing. Expecting them to do it every time they follow a link is another thing entirely.
NOT A FONT. ok? Repeat after me, Comic Sans Is Not a Font! In 1995 Microsoft released the font Comic Sans originally designed for comic book style talk bubbles containing informational help text. Since that time the typeface has been used in countless contexts from restaurant signage to college exams to medical information. These widespread abuses of printed type threaten to erode the very foundations upon which centuries of typographic history are built. While we recognize the font may be appropriate in a few specific instances, our position is that the only effective means of ending this epidemic of abuse is to completely ban Comic Sans. http://bancomicsans.com/home.html
Put this in your userContent.css:
:link[target="_blank"]:after, :visited[target="_blank"]:after,
:link[target="_new"]:after, :visited[target="_new"]:after
a[href$=".pdf"]:after {
font-size: smaller;
content: " [pdf]";
}
I also find the following useful:
{
font-size: smaller;
content: " [new]";
}
a[href^="javascript:"]:after
{
font-size: smaller;
content: " [shite]";
}
But... Why would you have your browser opening the file directly without asking you, if you don't like that behaviour?
n gine or the like. It's a totally different content type. You have every way of choosing what to do with it.
It's not like it's a HTML page with a lot of process consuming javascript, java-that-requires-a-lot-of-loading-of-the-java-e
Instead you choose to be annoyed. I don't get it.
- Peter Brodersen; professional nerd
I'm also a big fan of the "Grumpy Editor's Guide" series of articles at Linux Weekly News.
PASSV does NOT fix this. Passive still uses second ports it just changes the direction of the connection. On all firewalls you have to load extra stuff to properly allow the connection to work or fully open all outbound traffic. On IP Tables there is an ftp_contrack module to load, on PIX there is a fixup protocol to load. The fact is FTP is the most broken protocol there is. There is no reason that everything cannot be handled over a single port and the security issues involving race conditions, bounce scans, clear text sign on and transfer, are unacceptable. The ONLY thing going for it is tradition.
The basic auth logout: yes, people have been asking for it for years, but it's HTTP itself that doesn't provide a mechanism for logging out users, it's not Apache's fault.
This one baffled me as well. How could you have a "logout" function in a stateless protocol? Logins don't persist beyond the fulfillment of a single request. The storing of a username and password for HTTP authentication is implemented on the client side, it has nothing to do with the web server or even the protocol. Complain to Microsoft/Mozilla/Opera Software or whoever makes your browser if you don't like it.
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
He has some great points, and if some non-fan boys would catch things, he's an apache developer. He has the right to hate some things in apache.
I'm glad to see that someone who works with the project has some of the same frustrations I do:
mod_imap - why does anyone still need this?
http and https needing seperate entries in vhost
vhosting in general
And to those whining about PDFs would you rather to have this posted in a PPT file? Comic Sans probably means Powerpoint is at the root of this. And I'm guessing he didn't need to put the out there, so he picked a format everyone can read without resorting to PowerPoints horrible html conversion. I hate PDFs, and really hate them viewed in the browser, but that's what "save as" is for. And I'll bet you didn't have to go get a viewer just to read this. There is no pleasing the Slashbots who would rather whine about a PDF than take the criticism in stride, and with the humor it was presented in. If you have to whine about the delivery, then you're too childish to pay attention to the message. He may not have OpenOffice installed at his work (there are places who don't allow that), and this may have been the best he could do under reasonable effort.
I'd prefer his effort go into the server than in giving us an HTML page rendered just for us. He could use that time to fix some of the annoyances! Some have better things to do than to please everyone.
And I say we give him a pony!
I am, and always will be, an idiot. Karma: Coma (mostly effected by
Why I Hate The Apache Web Server
Lessons learned from IRC - Rich Bowen
Note: Opinions expressed are those of our users, as expressed on IRC. The goal of this talk is to make people aware of things which those "outside" see as problems, but which we tend to be so used to that we don't see at all. If I get carried away, feel free to throw fruit.
Why do I hate thee? Let me count the reasons.
- Fragile
- Confusing
- Missing stuff that EVERYONE asks for
Fragile
- Breaks easily. Small changes have big results
The first of these forbids Indexes. The second one permits them. Huh?
... wow, don't get me started
Disclaimer
"But that's not supported syntax!"
Then it should throw an error and break, not do something utterly unexpected. Unfortunately, several major Linux distros ship with this broken-but-almost-looks-right configuration, or variants thereof
Example 2
Vhosts
That vhost is silently ignored. Yeah. That's intuitive.
...
Discussion
"But the docs say not to do that!" Yes, I know. I wrote that line in the docs. It's still really irritating.
Another
Unlike every other Apache config setting, "Require" is case sensitive, so that's not valid valid_user would be nice too. Oh, and "Require User" and "Require Group" don't work either.
Missing (asked daily on IRC)
- Can I set a variable and use it later?
- Can I have an if/else syntax?
- Can I please reload my configuration file without restarting my server?
- How do I make ServerTokens return "Bob's Handy Dandy HTTP Server"? (Yes, this is silly, but it would sure shut a lot of people up finally.)
What else? mod_imap: how many of you have actually used that module? How many of you who are not committers know what it does? Why is it on by default? Come on folks. Netscape added client-side image maps in 1995!
And while we're on the topic mod_cern_meta: Who even knows what this module does? For the record, yes, I do. But I doubt any of you have ever used it.
CONFUSING
NumServers ServerLimit ThreadLimit ThreadsPerChild StartThreads StartServers MaxSpareThreads MinSpareServers MaxSpareServers MinSpareThreads MaxClients MaxThreadsPerChild MaxRequestsPerChild MaxRequestsPerThread ThreadStackSize
Oh sweet God make it stop
What's that directive called?
RLimitMem, RLimitCPU, RLimitNProc? I have to look these up every time. Of course, since they don't seem to do what the docs say, maybe that's not a bad thing.
Am I running out of time yet?
- Why do I have to set up two separate vhosts for http://example.com/ and https://example.com/ when they're the same website?
- Why are dynamic vhosts so darned hard?
- Why doesn't the default configuration file match the "security tips" document?
mod_rewrite
I probably don't need to say anything more than just "mod_rewrite". But I will: "Voodoo" and "... flexibility of sendmail". The docs practically scream "GO AWAY!"
RewriteMap
Nice, but have you ever found an actual useful example? Oh, and the example script for generating db map files doesn't actually work. (Note: Paul fixed this 2 weeks ago. See httxt2dbd)
How about this?
If I want these two aliases to work, I have to:
Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.
LOOK, you lot have missed one critical point. The guy is a committer to the apache httpd project itself. He's on the INSIDE. He knows more about apache than YOU.
He's just pointing out some of the sillyness to his own teammates that apache has that people that are involved with and use apache get used to. (And, even if it is documented, that doesn't mean it's not silly.)
mod_imap? Why is that still on by default, for example.
As for the PDF complaints, THIS IS A PRESENTATION AT A CONFERENCE. What would you have perferred? A PPS file? Those that complain about the fonts? Get over yourselves.
This problem is *everywhere*. Why are we still putting up with differently-designed config files for your webserver, your ftp server, your mailserver, your nameserver and heaven knows what else, all supported by their own pieces of custom code which, like Apache's, each have the possibility of growing up to be subtly wrong?
I know the Windows idea of a centralised registry sucks in too many ways (inscrutable binary is no match for human-readable text files), but there's one thing it's got right: all the apps which access their configuration use a consistent API to do so. Is it an impossible dream to hope that someone gets a bunch of large free software projects to agree on what needs to go into a libconfigparse, then implements it, and provides bindings for major languages? Then we might stand a chance of avoiding weird config file problems cropping up in Apache and everywhere else, slightly differently each time.
GROGGS: alive and well and living in
A good number of OSS zealots (of which a good number are found here) have the need to believe that OSS is always better, in every case, and part of that is not admitting faults. You admit faults, you admit the possibility something else could be done better.
I got in to that some time ago over audio apps in Linux. I mentioned that one of the reasons I run Windows is pro audio work, Linux just doens't have the tools. I was told ya it does, so I asked like what? I mean hey, maybe they know something I don't, I'm always looking for new tools. No, I get pointed to the same ones I've tried. So I talk about what is wrong with them, why I don't like them. In response basically every flaw is downloayed, denied, blamed on me, or declared to be "a better way of doing things".
Zealots, of whatever type, want to believe their product/way of life/whatever is the best there is. Thus when presented with real criticism, they are likely to either ignore it, or try and change the argument to something else.
The attitude that so many have of "If you don't like it, fix it yorself!" That's a very harmful attitude to take, it's very abrasive and turns many people off to OSS.
I mean you have to remember, that most of the people in the world CAN'T, even if they want to, because they aren't coders. The majority of the population, well over 90%, does not know how to program. It's stupid to say they should learn how to. The whole point of specialization of labour is that peopel dont' ahve to do everything. Coders code, other peopel use what they make.
Then, of the few that can code, most don't have the time. It's a serious undertaking to make major changes to make major changes to a codebase, and it's really har dwhen it's not yours. You have to spend a lot of time just in learning what the fuck is going on and hwo it all works, before you can start making changes. Well, most coders can't do that, espically for every product they happen to use. There a fixed amount of time, and most of us have most of it taken up by more important things (like a paying job, family time, housework, etc).
Then, even if you do have the ability and time, it's not always easy. I'd not the guy that gave this presentation is an Apache developer, so he IS putting his money where his mouth is. It's just pretty clear that making tha fixes isn't some little 1 hour coding job, it's some major work that needs to happen.
So really, people who want to push OSS shouldn't take this isntantly hostile "Well fix it yourself!" attitude. Problems should be listend to, and should be fixed when possible. When it's not, the reasons should be explained why, and the person should be helped to figure out how ot work with what they have as best as possible.
Oh, and having configured both IIS and Apache, IIS wins hands down. Easy GUI config, options do what you think they do, plenty of context sensitive documentation. That's not to say it's a better web server, and sure as hell not more secure, but when it comes to configuration, that's just no contest.