Multiple projects - Apache

joe · August 11, 2009, 8:32pm

Hi,
I’m trying to configure Apache so I can create multiple rails projects
without modifying httpd.conf everytime. Right now, I have one project
setup and a apache virtualhost that points to it. Here is how I have it
configured.

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName rails.example.com
DocumentRoot /var/www/rails_project/public
RailsEnv development

I would like to be able to set my documentRoot to /var/www and access my
projects by appending the project directory name to the url (e.g.
rails.example.com/rails_project).

For instance, when I set it up like that it I can access a project that
is located in /var/www/rails_project, by going to
rails.example.com/rails_project/public.

But I have routing problems after that. Here is what I get when clicking
on “About your applications environment”

Not Found
The requested URL /rails_project/public/rails/info/properties was not
found on this server.

I’m stuck here, so any help is really appreciated.

Thanks

joe · August 12, 2009, 2:28pm

Excerpts from Joe’s message of Tue Aug 11 14:31:53 -0400 2009:

Hi,
I’m trying to configure Apache so I can create multiple rails projects without
modifying httpd.conf everytime. Right now, I have one project setup and a
apache virtualhost that points to it. Here is how I have it configured.

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName rails.example.com
DocumentRoot /var/www/rails_project/public
RailsEnv development

Hi Joe,

AFAIK, that’s not possible with passenger. I believe that a new vhost is
needed for every rails application on your machine (someone please
correct me if I’m wrong).

If you have an existing vhost with something else on it, you can specify
that your rails application is in a subdirectory of that document root
like this:

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName rails.example.com
DocumentRoot /var/www/rails_project/public
RailsEnv development
RailsBaseURI /rails

Regards,
Jason

joe · August 12, 2009, 3:06pm

Hi friends.

The way I’m doing this is to have a single directory I symlink all of my
app’s ‘public’ directory to. I set this as my DocumentRoot and then have
a
single VHOST file for all of my apps. It isn’t pretty, but it’s fairly
easy
to parse with Ruby. So, my VHOST file looks something like this:

<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot /u/apps
RailsBaseUri /foo
RailsBaseUri /bar

etc…

I have had zero luck using multiple VHOST files. This may be due to my
own
lack of knowledge in using Apache though.

You may wish to redirect your query to the Passenger mailing list
though.
They’ll likely be of more help. Keep me posted though. I’d love to hear
what
your resolution is.

James H.

joe · August 12, 2009, 6:17pm

On Aug 12, 2009, at 4:04 PM, James H. wrote:

I have had zero luck using multiple VHOST files. This may be due
to my own
lack of knowledge in using Apache though.

There’s a free preference pane for OS X that’s floating around
somewhere that essentially does this:

NameVirtualHost *:80 ServerName _default_ Include /path/to/passenger_vhosts/*.conf

The is optional - just protects against idiots like me -
and then a sample foo.conf would look like …

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName foo.local
DocumentRoot “/u/rail_sites/foo/public”
RailsEnv development
<directory “/u/rail_sites/foo/public”>
Order allow,deny
Allow from all

Adding a vhost just needs an apache reload.

joe · August 12, 2009, 7:46pm

Thanks for the reply. I ended up doing pretty much the same thing. I
create the project, link to the public folder and then in an .htaccess
file, I add RailsBaseURI /railsProject.

The only problem I have, is that it requires a trailing slash after the
project name when accessing it via the web.

----- Original Message ----
From: James H. [email protected]
To: ruby-talk ML [email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 2009 8:04:46 AM
Subject: Re: multiple projects - Apache