Changes to the Apache Document Root

For every server we’ve built since the very beginning, we’ve used /home/you/public_html/ as the Apache document root. This is quite common amongst hosts, but starting with davie.textdrive.com, things have changed…

Instead of /home/you/public_html/, it’s now /home/you/web/public/ (or for secondary domains, /home/you/domains/foo.com/web/public/).

Despite some initial confusion, we feel this is a positive step for our directory layouts, and it has some nice benefits for nearly all of our customers:

  • for Ruby on Rails developers, you can use web/ as your RAILS_ROOT, and web/public/ as your public directory, which means there’s no need for symlinks, no funky directory structures, and no need to tweak Apache’s default document root to suit “the Rails way”
  • for PHP/Perl/Python/whatever developers, this is a great place to store sensitive information and non-http files (mysql database passwords, config files, code libraries, includes, etc) above the document root that Apache serves from, without cluttering up your home directory

We’re looking into the possibility of making the same change to all the existing servers, but at this point, it’s “business as usual” on One, Barclay, Bidwell, Nelson, Pendrell et al.

·:· Posted 11 May 2005, 16:46 by Justin French to Server geek  |  

  1. Yeah, this is pretty smart, will really ease the Rails stuff. It would be cool if you guys apply this to dedicated servers too :)

    — Toby    11 May 2005, 18:48    #
  2. I, for one, would be in favor of rolling this into my site, which is on bidwell. You know, just for the record.

    — Danny    11 May 2005, 21:35    #
  3. yeah thats great! would be awesome if it will be adjusted for all other servers too :) the linking stuff is a bit nasty :D

    — ichigo    11 May 2005, 21:59    #
  4. Would be happy to see this on nelson. Makes no difference to my existing work (that’s important), and by all accounts would make it easier to start playing with Rails.

    — Chuck McKinnon    12 May 2005, 19:24    #
  5. I would definitely be in favor of you guys doing this to the existing servers (obviously some notice/warning would be nice).

    — Sean    13 May 2005, 13:54    #
  6. Yeah, I agree. I’m on bidwell and wouldn’t mind seeing this happen.

    — Michael O'Henly    13 May 2005, 17:37    #
  7. I’m voting for this too. I’m on bidwell.

    — Bob Aman    13 May 2005, 17:54    #
  8. I would welcome this change on bidwell as well.

    — Derek    13 May 2005, 18:40    #
  9. I’d love this on one.textdrive

    — Justin    14 May 2005, 15:42    #
  10. yeah this makes it really easy to deploy any rails apps;
    sign me up for this change on bidwell :)
    cheers
    ram

    — ram    2 June 2005, 04:34    #