Trouble sorting out Apache on the Post-Server Mac

A little gentle poking around in the script and Trying Dumb Stuff™ has turned up a new wrinkle:

My web server is working, it turns out.

However, it's on port 8080 instead of 80, because...

# Change this to Listen on specific IP addresses as shown below to

# prevent Apache from glomming onto all bound IP addresses.

#

#Listen 12.34.56.78:80

<IfDefine SERVER_APP_HAS_DEFAULT_PORTS>

Listen 8080

</IfDefine>

<IfDefine !SERVER_APP_HAS_DEFAULT_PORTS>

Listen 80

</IfDefine>

The value was defined, but not used in any meaningful way after I deleted the appThanks again, Server.

My next thrill is going to be upgrading the PHP...

Riiiiiiight...

Deleted Server, because near as I could figure its Apache install was contained in the application bundle, and otherwise it was doing nothing for me in a non-enterprise environment anyway. Then rebooted to make sure that service was properly shut down. That shut down the "Server" Apache, so that's dealt with.

Then, "just following the instructions," I did a sudo apachectl start and got ...nothing. Following that up with an apachectl configtest turned up the same thing when I executed httpd -t above: warnings that the environment variables WFS_SERVER_ADDR, WFS_SERVER_PORT, WFS_SERVER_NAME, and WFS_ACCESS_GROUP had not been defined, and that the port must be specified for WebDav sharing. There is no obvious place to set those environment variables or what their values should be, and the instructions offer no support in those areas. That appears to be the next major hurdle.

Please include the word "similidon" in your next post to assure me that you're actually reading these things.

Do I need Webdav? Not so much; ultimately, that was another vestige of Server to facilitate adding pages to the wiki. The wiki that no longer exists. Yeeeeeah...

The next step was removing the webdav reference from the httpd.conf. But all dav references were commented already. So here's a fun fact: There's a directive at the very end of httpd.conf that includes /etc/apache2/other/*.conf, and that's where the webdav sharing conf file is located — and loaded. I moved it into its own other_disabled folder. That error went away.

The problem after that was the ServerName directive. That was easily enough fixed by uncommenting and setting it.

Finally, httpd -t (and apachectl configtest) returned "Syntax OK". I was ready. I entered sudo apachectl start...

...and the only thing I got out of that was the traditional "Safari can't connect to server" message. It appears I'm still dead in the httpd. From here, I'm not sure how to debug.

Interestingly, those instructions are hauntingly similar to instructions I had pulled down from another link, https://www.dyclassroom.com/howto-mac/how-to-install-apache-mysql-php-on-macos-m ojave-10-14 . Both guides also assume I'm starting from about the same place, and don't have a working Apache install yet.

I'm coming at it through the old Server app, which provided an Apache install of sorts, and which continues serving up pages even after I execute sudo apachectl stop. So I apparently have two Apache installs, one of which is doing not quite enough and the other of which I can control and isn't doing anything. I need either to seize control of the Server's apache server, or kick it out of the way in favor of Mojave's. Those guides, while thoughtful, do nothing for me now.

In its time, Server was an okay thing for some services, like a very convenient web server. Its own wiki was also very easy to use, so I experimented with it alongside doku to determine which I preferred, but I learned of its shortcomings when I had a disk event and couldn't restore it from backups because beside using its own install of Apache, it had its own install of Postgres. Whoops. Meanwhile, dokuwiki stored its pages in plaintext, so that choice was obvious.

But back to the problem at hand:

The error I'd been getting:

• AH00526: Syntax error on line 25 of /private/etc/apache2/other/httpd_webdavsharing.conf:
• Port must be specified

...sure looked like it had something to do with Webdav sharing. Especially since that line 25 reads:

Listen ${WFS_SERVER_ADDR}:${WFS_SERVER_PORT} ${_WFS_PROTO}

...which contains two of my undefined variables.

A bit more research turned up the command line wfsctl — The Webdav File Sharing control utility, which is active.

And entering the command:

sudo wfsctl diagnose

...turned up a few interesting references, not the least of which is the file /etc/apache2/env.plist...

...which contains convenient values for WFS_SERVER_ADDR (127.0.0.1), WFS_SERVER_PORT (81), WFS_SERVER_NAME (terrilith.local), and WFS_ACCESS_GROUP (everyone). But because it's in a .plist and not a .conf file, I don't think the Apache httpd.conf knows to look for it. I think here again, Server organized for itself and screwed me.

Now, what's the best practice for getting those values into Apache? Just cut them into httpd.conf? Write an include for better control?