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Apache – Configure hundreds of similar sites without specifying each one

Lets say I have this folder structure on disk:

/var/www/site1.domain.com
/var/www/site2.domain.com
/var/www/site3.domain.com
/var/www/site4.domain.com
/var/www/site5.anotherdomain.com
/var/www/site6.anotherdomain.com
/var/www/site7.anotherdomain.com
/var/www/site8.anotherdomain.com

These are all similar plain html/css/js websites configured in exactly the same way.

Is it possible to set up apache in such a way that incoming requests for each domain are directed to the appropriate directory without configuring hundreds of <VirtualHost..> nodes? I guess I could auto generate them, but I’m hoping for a fancy go look in the request’s domain’s folder kind of configuration..

Is this possible? Even if it is possible, are there any concerns with this security or otherwise?

If it is not possible, is there another web technology like nginx for example that can do this?

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3

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  1. Chosen as BEST ANSWER
    0

    So it turns out there is an apache module for this:

    sudo a2enmod vhost_alias

    Read more about the module here:

    http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/mod/mod_vhost_alias.html

    Here is the config that worked for me:

    #Define SNAME 999

<VirtualHost *:80>
        ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost
        ServerName domainname.com
        ServerAlias *.domainname.com

    VirtualDocumentRoot /var/www/domainname.com/%0

    #RewriteEngine on

        #This sets the variable to env:
        #RewriteRule .* - [E=SNAME:%{SERVER_NAME}]

        ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/domainname.com.error.log

        # Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit,
        # alert, emerg.
        LogLevel debug

        CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/domainname.com.access.log combined


</VirtualHost>

  2. 0

    It’s super easy with nginx:

    location / {
    root /var/www/$host;
}

    Plus nginx is blazingly fast. If you wish to stick to Apache though, you ought to read this: https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/vhosts/mass.html

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  3. 0

    Yes there are security and other concerns. Is better to have one virtualhost per site with separate logging and separate SSL certificates etc.

    If they are different sites is better to have they separated because:

    • Is easier to set a log file for each one
    • Is easier to configure the SSL certificates for HTTPS if they use different domains.
    • Remember that the users can modify the $host header easy so if someday you create the directory: /var/www/site1.domain.com-backup or /var/www/secret-logs they can be accessed.
    • Monitoring per site.
    • If someday you need special configuration for some site, set a basic auth, change some parameter etc. you can with different virtualhosts. With all of them mixed would be difficult and dirty.

    Is better to auto-generate them. You can use many templating tools from a simple bash script which accepts some parameters on envvars to more complex tools like SaltStack / Ansible.

    Here a simple bash script to do it, it should be adapted to your needs:

    #!/bin/bash                     

cat << EOF > /etc/nginx/sites-available/$SERVER_NAME.conf
server {                        
    listen 80;                  
    server_name $SERVER_NAME $ADDITIONAL_SERVER_NAMES;

    access_log /var/log/nginx/$SERVER_NAME-access.log;
    error_log /var/log/nginx/$SEVER_NAME-error.log;

    location / {                
        root /var/www/$SERVER_NAME;
    }                           
}                               
EOF                             

# Enable config on nginx        
ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/$SERVER_NAME.conf /etc/nginx/sites-enabled

# Test configration and apply if no errors                                                                                                                                                                                                                    
nginx -t && service nginx reload

    To execute the script name it nginx-site-generator, give execution permissions and:

     SERVER_NAME=site1.com ADDITIONAL_SERVER_NAMES=www.site1.com ./nginx-site-generator
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