apache2 (8) Linux Manual Page

apache2 – Apache Hypertext Transfer Protocol Server

Synopsis

apache2 [ –d serverroot ] [ –f config ] [ –C directive ] [ –c directive ] [ –D parameter ] [ –e level ] [ –E file ] [ -k start|restart|graceful|stop|graceful-stop ] [ –R directory ] [ –h ] [ –l ] [ –L ] [ –S ] [ –t ] [ –v ] [ –V ] [ –X ] [ –M ]

Summary

apache2 is the Apache HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) server program. It is designed to be run as a standalone daemon process. When used like this it will create a pool of child processes or threads to handle requests.

In general, apache2 should not be invoked directly, but rather should be invoked via /etc/init.d/apache2 or apache2ctl. The default Debian configuration requires environment variables that are defined in /etc/apache2/envvars and are not available if apache2 is started directly. However, apache2ctl can be used to pass arbitrary arguments to apache2.

Documentation

The full documentation is available in the apache2-doc package or at http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/ . Information about Debian specific changes and configuration can be found in /usr/share/doc/apache2/README.Debian.gz .

Options

-d serverroot

Set the initial value for the ServerRoot directive to serverroot. This can be overridden by the ServerRoot directive in the configuration file.

-f config

Uses the directives in the file config on startup. If config does not begin with a /, then it is taken to be a path relative to the ServerRoot. The default is /etc/apache2/apache2.conf.

-k start|restart|graceful|stop|graceful-stop

Signals apache2 to start, restart, or stop. See Stopping Apache for more information.

-C directive

Process the configuration directive before reading config files.

-c directive

Process the configuration directive after reading config files.

-D parameter

Sets a configuration parameter which can be used with <IfDefine> sections in the configuration files to conditionally skip or process commands at server startup and restart.

-e level

Sets the LogLevel to level during server startup. This is useful for temporarily increasing the verbosity of the error messages to find problems during startup.

-E file

Send error messages during server startup to file.

-R directory

When the server is compiled using the SHARED_CORE rule, this specifies the directory for the shared object files.

-h

Output a short summary of available command line options.

-l

Output a list of modules compiled into the server. This will not list dynamically loaded modules included using the LoadModule directive.

-L

Output a list of directives together with expected arguments and places where the directive is valid.

-M

Dump a list of loaded Static and Shared Modules.

-S

Show the settings as parsed from the config file (currently only shows the virtualhost settings).

-t

Run syntax tests for configuration files only. The program immediately exits after these syntax parsing tests with either a return code of 0 (Syntax OK) or return code not equal to 0 (Syntax Error). If -D DUMP_VHOSTS is also set, details of the virtual host configuration will be printed. If -D DUMP_MODULES is set, all loaded modules will be printed.

-v

Print the version of apache2, and then exit.

-V

Print the version and build parameters of apache2, and then exit.

-X

Run apache2 in debug mode. Only one worker will be started and the server will not detach from the console.

See Also

apache2ctl(8), /usr/share/doc/apache2/README.Debian.gz