---
layout: post
title: Apache 2 on Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 issue on upgrade
tags: [ development, mac, leopard, apache ]
published: true
---

This weekend I decided to arrange my hard drive in a way that I could have a
5GB partition with sinful Windows XP to play some games with the family. To do
that, I bought a 1TB external hard drive to use as a Time Machine backup for
the process. At the time, my disk was already partitioned for Ubuntu but since
I didn't find it useful anymore, I replaced it for Windows.

Well, the good thing is I can actually play some old games like Empire Earth
and Counter-Strike with the cousins to have some fun. The bad news is my Apache
server settings screwed up. Two things happened. 

_Number one:_ `http://localhost/~user` was thrown a `403 Forbidden` access.
This problem is the result of the user configurations for the server whilst the
reinstallation / upgrade of the system, they don't exist now. What you have to
do is very simple. Go to /private/etc/apache2/users and create a file
`yourshortusername.conf` and type this:

{% highlight apache %}
<Directory "/Users/shortusername/Sites/">
Options Indexes MultiViews
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
</Directory>
{% endhighlight %}

Restart your server and you're ready to go!

Number two: My virtual hosts blew away. I should have kept a record on how to
do this in case I had to a reinstallation, I guess I can kick myself now. (I'm
solving this as I write this post :P) Three steps:

* Go to `/private/etc/hosts` and say you want to assign 127.0.0.1 to your alias,
  like this: `127.0.0.1 youralias`
* Go to `/private/etc/apache2` and uncomment the line that includes the virtual
  hosts configuration file. If you want to use PHP, you might want to uncomment
  the line that includes it as well.
* Finally, go to `/private/etc/apache2/extra` and edit the `httpd-vhosts.conf`
  mentioned on 2. and add this chunk of code:
  
{% highlight apache %}
<VirtualHost 127.0.0.1>
DocumentRoot "/path/to/your/site/"
ServerAlias yoursitename
ServerName yoursitename
</VirtualHost>
{% endhighlight %}

Restart your server and virtual hosts are up and running.