Apache 2.2.0 Released

ikewillis writes "According to an announcement on apache.org, Apache 2.2.0 has been released. From the announcement: 'This version of Apache is a major release and the start of a new stable branch. New features include Smart Filtering, Improved Caching, AJP Proxy, Proxy Load Balancing, Graceful Shutdown support, Large File Support, the Event MPM, and refactored Authentication/Authorization.' View the ChangeLog or check out the new feature list."

Comments

How does 2.2 stack up to 1.3?

[green pizza]

I read the feature list and changelog earlier today but without taking the time to set up a test server and experiment with it I really have no idea how it compares to 1.3. For the most part we have stuck with 1.3.x for it's stability, performance on our older hardware (from 256MB dual 75MHz SPARCstation 20 to 1 GB 440 MHz Netras), and rock solid compatibility with mod_perl and Perl 5.6.

I'll be willing to try upgrading in the near future in hopes of experimenting with and making use of the some of the newer featues, but I would like to hear some first-hand information from those who have recently made the leap to 2.2, if at all possible.

Re:How does 2.2 stack up to 1.3?

[epiphani]

I would be more curious if this now means the apache people are actively suggesting 2.0 on full-on production servers. Even a few months ago I briefly looked at switching my web cluster to 2.0, and I found posts saying "if there is no specific feature you require, stick with 1.3".

I'd like to start moving forward and make the big jump, but 1.3->2.2 probably isnt going to happen. What are people saying about 1.3->2.0 now?

Re:How does 2.2 stack up to 1.3?

[Knetzar]

The biggest reason I've seen people switch is because the multi-process model doesn't scale as well as the mutli-threaded model.

Re:How does 2.2 stack up to 1.3?

[Not The Real Me]

Slashdot is still running "Apache/1.3.33 Unix mod_gzip/1.3.26.1a mod_perl/1.29"

In the meantime, you should upgrade to 2.2, post a link, tell us what happens to your server.

Inertia

[code65536]

That's interesting how they jumped from the 2.1.x beta versions to 2.2.0. They didn't do this when they went from the 2.0.x beta to the 2.0.x stable (hence the large .55 attached to 2.0.x right now). It's kinda like what Perl does with having devel and stable versions have odd and even numbers, respectively.

Anyway, I guess the big question is, how many people will actually adopt 2.2.0. I still remember when 2.0 came out to mostly a yawn as most people kept using 1.3.x. Even today, most of the servers that I come across or administer are still using 1.3.x because unless you were running Windows, 2.x didn't really offer spectacular improvements over 1.3.x, and looking at the changes for 2.(1|2).x (anyone who's going to transfer a >2GB file over HTTP is crazy ;)), I have this feeling that we might see the same 1.3->2.0 inertia.

CGI continuations

[trout0mask]

When are they adding the continuation-stored-in-the-server feature? Having to do a CPS transform essentially by hand to all CGI scripts is ridiculous. Oh yeah...Perl/PHP/etc. don't support that. Why not?

Combining mod_proxy with mod_cache

[paulproteus]

I've been struggling with setting up a mirrors server for our computing club here. I'd like to mirror all of Debian, for example, but I'm finding that storing (and, worse, updating) 80 gigs only to serve a tiny fraction of the files to our users is a dismal trade-off. I had been experimenting with ProxyPass, but since it didn't cache the results locally, it wasn't really providing a speed benefit.

mod_disk_cache plus mod_proxy's ProxyPass seems like just the ticket - I could give it a few servers to proxy for, give it a few hundred gigs of cache, and it would then automatically intelligently cache for those servers. This would be a great, easy plug-in solution.

Has anyone used mod_proxy and mod_cache in this fashion? It'd be great to hear about others' experiences or configuration examples.

Re:Combining mod_proxy with mod_cache

[fiddlesticks]

apt-proxy?

Name
              apt-proxy - A proxy for saving bandwidth to Debian servers

SYNOPSIS
              apt-proxy [options] [logfile]

DESCRIPTION
              apt-proxy is a python program designed to be run as an stand alone
              server via twistd, and provides a clean, caching, intelligent proxy for
              apt-get, which speaks HTTP to apt-get clients, and http or ftp to the
              backend server(s). Usually it is run on port 9999, mainly because that
              is the default configuration, and people are lazy.

CLIENT CONFIGURATION
              Once apt-proxy is configured on a host SERVER, users then edit their
              sources.list file to point to the proxy (which uses the http protocol
              to serve clients), like so:

              deb http://server:9999/debian stable main contrib non-free
              deb-src http://server:9999/debian stable main contrib non-free

              deb http://server:9999/debian-non-US stable/non-US main contrib non-free
              deb-src http://server:9999/debian-non-US stable/non-US main contrib non-free

              deb http://aptproxy:9999/security stable/updates main contrib non-free

              What path should be specified after the server name and port number
              depends on the configuration of apt-proxy (which can restrict paths and
              send different paths to different servers). See SERVER CONFIGURATION
              below.

              Note that you can also use the nicknames `unstable', `frozen' etc, but
              Packages/Sources files may get duplicated, so it is advised use either
              the symbolic or the code name and stick with it.

SERVER CONFIGURATION
              See apt-proxy.conf(5) for details of how to set up apt-proxy to use
              backends near to you.

CARE AND FEEDING OF MIRRORS
              apt-proxy reduces the bandwidth requirements of Debian mirrors by
              restricting the frequency of Packages, Releases and Sources file
              updates from the back end and only doing a single fetch for any file,
              how ever many users request it from the proxy.

wtf?

[Anonymous Coward]

Storing state in the server and retrieving it via cookies, etc., is not CPS, it's just saving and retrieving state. And who still uses CGI anyway?

And who says continuations are a valid way to write web apps? I prefer to use request/response because that's the model of the underlying architecture. I also want my URLs to represent named entry points, not continuations within some arbitrary program.

And how the heck would Apache know how to save a continuation in any arbitrary programming language? Or is Apache supposed to turn into a set of libraries, one for Smalltalk, one for Ruby, one for Lisp.. ?

Explain what you mean, son....

Different mirrors for different directories

[paulproteus]

But I want /debian/ to be a Debian cache, and /ubuntu/ to be an Ubuntu cache, and it'd be nice to have e.g. a Cygwin cache in /cygwin/ . Many "mirrors" sharing one disk cache space allocation on one easily-administered server.

Can Squid handle that kind of flexibility? That's what drew me to Apache's ProxyPass.

When are they going to fix mpm_perchild

[kobaz]

When apache first introduced mpm I was looking forward to the ability to have each virtual domain run under a seperate user. Right now it will spawn a seperate process for each user specified. So if you are hosting 1000 domains on one machine and specify unique users for each domain, you have 1000 idle listener processes when you start up the server.

I'm thinking the way it should be is only spawn processes for the specified user when an incomming request needs to be served, keep the process around to serve new requests if there are more to serve, and kill it off if there is no requests in X period of time. This would surely make hosting things like cgi much more secure.

Re:When are they going to fix mpm_perchild

[Cronq]

AFAIK there is 0 interest in fixing perchild in apache community. Too bad because this is the biggest disadvantage of apache. There is simply NO WAY to run vanilla apache + mod_python/mod_php/mod_perl/mod_whatever in a SECURE way in multiuser enviroment :-(

but WHEN!

[jaimz22]

i just want to know when i'll be able to restart each vhost independently, like in IIS. or atleast have it rehash the config with out shutting the server down ( or is that already possible )?