December 9th, 2008
I’ve finally managed to get this working, so now I need to write some note in case I have to redo it in the future 
This is short howto about enabling https and multiple virtual hosts on Apache 2.0.
Much of the instructions are copypasted from Debian Admin Website where I found great guide I’ve successfully followed.
First of all let’s check that we have all the needed components, or proceed to install them as follows:
Install apache2 in debian etch
#apt-get install apache2
Install openssl using the following command
#apt-get install openssl ssl-cert
Install PHP5 support for apache2 in debian etch
#apt-get install libapache2-mod-php5 php5-cli php5-common php5-cgi
Once you install apache server you need to Generate a certificate,Enable Apache SSL support and Configure your SSL options.
Generate A certificate
Generating a certificate will provide to protect the traffic exchanged between clients and your server, however it will be unsigned by a trusted certificate authority so it will generate warnings.
If you want to avoid these warning messages you need to get a trusted certificate from SSL certificate vendors.If you want to Generating an SSL certificate for Apache2 you need to use the openssl. This will ask you questions interactively then generate the certificate file appropriately.
Note:-For generating certificate you might have used the apache2-ssl-certificate command in debian sarge but in debian etch this command not available.If you want to generate certificates you need to use openssl from you command prompt Use the following command to generate certificates
#openssl req $@ -new -x509 -days 365 -nodes -out /etc/apache2/apache.pem -keyout /etc/apache2/apache.pem
Now you’ll be prompted to configure the Certificate details. Answers are reflecting MY environment… yours might be different…
Generating a 1024 bit RSA private key
………………………………………….++++++
…………………………………….++++++
writing new private key to ‘/etc/apache2/apache.pem’
—–
You are about to be asked to enter information that will be incorporated
into your certificate request.
What you are about to enter is what is called a Distinguished Name or a DN.
There are quite a few fields but you can leave some blank
For some fields there will be a default value,
If you enter ‘.’, the field will be left blank.
—–
Country Name (2 letter code) [AU]:IT
State or Province Name (full name) [Some-State]: Italy
Locality Name (eg, city) []:Milan
Organization Name (eg, company) [Internet Widgits Pty Ltd]:The RoarinPenguin Inc.
Organizational Unit Name (eg, section) []: Certification Department
Common Name (eg, YOUR name) []: The RoarinPenguin
Email Address []:roarinpenguin@roarinpenguin.com
You ahould now have our certificate ready, thus you’ll proceed in setting the proper permissions:
#chmod 600 /etc/apache2/apache.pem
By default the server will listen for incoming HTTP requests on port 80 - and not SSL connections on port 443. So you need to enable SSL support by entering the following entry to the file /etc/apache2/ports.conf save and exit the file.
Listen 443
Enable SSL Support
If you want to enable SSL support for your apache web server you need to use the following command:
#a2enmod ssl
Module ssl installed; run /etc/init.d/apache2 force-reload to enable.
Now you need to restart the apache2 server using the following command
#/etc/init.d/apache2 restart
Configuring SSL Certificate to Virtual Hosts in Apache2
First you need to edit the /etc/apache2/sites-available/default file change
NameVirtualHost *
to
NameVirtualHost *:80
NameVirtualHost *:443
Now you need to configure Virtual hosts using port 80
My apache2.conf reads the following at file end:
# Include generic snippets of statements
Include /etc/apache2/conf.d/
NameVirtualHost *:80
NameVirtualHost *:443
# Include the virtual host configurations:
Include /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/
AddDefaultCharset utf-8
DefaultLanguage it
ServerAdmin marco@rottigni.net
UseCanonicalName off
DocumentRoot /var/www
ServerName webby.rottigni.net
And my /etc/apache2/sites-available/default reads:
<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot /var/www/
ServerName www.rottigni.net
<Directory "/var/www">
allow from all
Options +Indexes
</Directory>
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost *:443>
DocumentRoot /var/www/
ServerName www.rottigni.net
<Directory "/var/www">
allow from all
Options +Indexes
</Directory>
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /etc/apache2/apache.pem
</VirtualHost>
Then I’ve enabled several websites using command
a2ensite followed by site name you want to enable.
Configuration files for VirtualHosts are stored in
/etc/apache2/sites-available#
and the configuration for one of my blog reads
<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot /var/www/myblog
<Directory "/var/www/myblog">
allow from all
Options +Indexes
</Directory>
ServerName myblog.rottigni.net
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost *:443>
DocumentRoot /var/www/myblog
<Directory "/var/www/myblog">
allow from all
Options +Indexes
</Directory>
ServerName myblog.rottigni.net
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /etc/apache2/apache.pem
</VirtualHost>
That should be everything… oh, and don’t forget to reload your Apache config:
# /etc/init.d/apache2 reload
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