in reply to mod_perl configuration of Apache2

I was able to get it to work using the same Ubuntu 9.04 (jaunty) configuration, using the apache2-mpm-prefork model. (Hooray for virtual machines!)

I added the snippet you provided to /etc/apache2/httpd.conf, which is ok since that file is included by /etc/apache2/apache2.conf. I fixed the one typo, changing "PerlOptions _ParseHeaders" to "PerlOptions +ParseHeaders".

Then I put the following "Hello World" program in the /var/www/perl directory, named hello.pl. I was surprised that I did not have to make it executable. 

#!/usr/bin/perl
print "Content-type: text/html\r\n\r\n";
print "<HTML>\n";
print "<HEAD><TITLE>Hello World!</TITLE></HEAD>\n";
print "<BODY>\n";
print "<H2>Hello World!</H2>\n";
print "</BODY>\n";
print "</HTML>\n";
exit (0);

[download]

And after stopping/starting the server, I got the expected output. I did do a full stop then start on the server. A restart will warn about the typo but not stop the server from executing. Perhaps this is your problem.

I didn't do anything special with permissions: 

root@jackalope 680# ls -ld /var /var/www
drwxr-xr-x 15 root root 4096 Dec 12 09:11 /var
drwxr-xr-x  3 root root 4096 Dec 12 09:41 /var/www
root@jackalope 681# ls -lRA /var/www
/var/www:
total 8
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   45 Dec 12 09:11 index.html
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Dec 12 09:58 perl

/var/www/perl:
total 4
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 232 Dec 12 09:58 hello.pl

[download]

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Re^2: mod_perl configuration of Apache2
by Bruce32903 (Scribe) on Dec 12, 2009 at 21:36 UTC
    Thanks for the reply.

    The machine that I was working on is at work and I will not have access to it again until Monday. Thus, I am trying to set up mod_perl on a home machine. Hopefully what I learn at home this weekend will help me at work on Monday morning.

    I don't know if the typo was present in apache2.conf or if it was introduced as I was working on my posting. I'll check that early Monday. By following the provided guidance I added the lines to my home machine. This is a machine that I tried to set up mod_perl on about a year ago (unsuccessfully) and therefore I don't have a "clean install" at home.

    At home I am getting perl execution, but it is CGI perl and not mod_perl. I know this due to a modified version of the program from page 76 of "MySQL and Perl for the Web" by Paul DuBois (ISBN 0-7357-1054-6). The test program is:
    #!/usr/bin/perl -w
# FILE: cgi_or_mod-perl.pl

use strict;
use warnings;

use CGI qw(:standard);
print header(), start_html ("CGI or mod-perl test");

print "If 'GATEWAY_INTERFACE = CGI/1.1' then regular CGI.<BR>";
print "If 'GATEWAY_INTERFACE - CGI-Perl/1.1' then mod-perl.<BR>";
print "<BR>";

print "========== TESTING ABILITY OF A PERL SCRIPT TO ACCESS ENVIRONME
+NT VARIABLES ========<BR>";
print "REMOTE_ADDR = $ENV{REMOTE_ADDR}<BR>";
print "REMOTE_PORT = $ENV{REMOTE_PORT}<BR>";
print "HTTP_REFERER = $ENV{HTTP_REFERER}<BR>";
print "<BR>";

print "========== FULL DUMP OF ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES ==========<BR>";
print map { "$_ = $ENV{$_}<BR>\n"} sort(keys(%ENV));
print "<BR>";

print end_html();

exit (0);

    [download]
    The test code worked well years ago when I used it to set up mod_perl on Debian machines (that also was a pain to get the mod_perl to run).

    My current status is:

    WORK COMPUTER - Current status is a mystery but the above discovered typo is a possibility. I'll know more Monday morning.

    HOME COMPUTER - When a browser hits a perl script the script will execute and the "expected" results will be returned. BUT, THIS WAS CGI PERL AND NOT MOD_PERL. The cause of this is still a mystery and I am working on it.

    Thanks,
    Bruce
[reply]
[d/l]
      When I run the script from my previous posting I get the following:
      If 'GATEWAY_INTERFACE = CGI/1.1' then regular CGI.
If 'GATEWAY_INTERFACE - CGI-Perl/1.1' then mod-perl.

========== TESTING ABILITY OF A PERL SCRIPT TO ACCESS ENVIRONMENT VARI
+ABLES ========
REMOTE_ADDR = 127.0.0.1
REMOTE_PORT = 45469
HTTP_REFERER =

========== FULL DUMP OF ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES ==========
DOCUMENT_ROOT = /var/www
GATEWAY_INTERFACE = CGI/1.1
HTTP_ACCEPT = text/xml,application/xml,application/xhtml+xml,text/html
+;q=0.9,text/plain;q=0.8,image/png,*/*;q=0.5
HTTP_ACCEPT_CHARSET = ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.7
HTTP_ACCEPT_ENCODING = gzip,deflate
HTTP_ACCEPT_LANGUAGE = en-us,en;q=0.5
HTTP_CONNECTION = keep-alive
HTTP_HOST = 127.0.0.1
HTTP_KEEP_ALIVE = 300
HTTP_USER_AGENT = Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686 (x86_64); en-US; rv:
+1.8.1.6) Gecko/20070802 SeaMonkey/1.1.4
MOD_PERL = mod_perl/2.0.2
MOD_PERL_API_VERSION = 2
PATH = /usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin
QUERY_STRING =
REMOTE_ADDR = 127.0.0.1
REMOTE_PORT = 45469
REQUEST_METHOD = GET
REQUEST_URI = /perl/cgi_or_mod-perl.pl
SCRIPT_FILENAME = /var/www/perl/cgi_or_mod-perl.pl
SCRIPT_NAME = /perl/cgi_or_mod-perl.pl
SERVER_ADDR = 127.0.0.1
SERVER_ADMIN = webmaster@localhost
SERVER_NAME = 127.0.0.1
SERVER_PORT = 80
SERVER_PROTOCOL = HTTP/1.1
SERVER_SIGNATURE =
Apache/2.0.55 (Ubuntu) PHP/4.4.2-1build1 mod_perl/2.0.2 Perl/v5.8.7 Se
+rver at 127.0.0.1 Port 80

SERVER_SOFTWARE = Apache/2.0.55 (Ubuntu) PHP/4.4.2-1build1 mod_perl/2.
+0.2 Perl/v5.8.7

      [download]

      Based upon the DuBois text I conclude that mod_perl is installed but not being used when the perl code is executed.

      Bruce
[reply]
[d/l]
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
        Thank you gmargo. That seems to put an end to my problem. Making this work was so much trouble that I was starting to wonder if I was trying to fix something that wasn't broken. The bad news is that I was. The good news is that you put an end to my suffering and I can move forward knowing that I will have "good" mod_perl code and not "in need of slight rework" CGI code.

        Thank you,
        Bruce
[reply]

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