July 13, 2021 . 3 MIN READ
So you’ve installed apache and the rest of your lamp system in Ubuntu, and you’re needing to do some configuring. You’ve got some virtual hosts you need set up and some modules you need enabled. You can dive into the config files and enable everything that way, however apache comes with some nice methods to do this for us. Lets say we want to enable the rewrite module. If you browse the directory structure you will see there is “/etc/apache2/mods-available” and “/etc/apache2/mods-enabled”. This is pretty self explanatory, the trick is mods-enabled directory is really just symbolic links to the modules in mods-available.
Enable Apache Module
Ok, so now that you know the inner workings, here’s how to enable an available module from the terminal without getting our hands too dirty:
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sudo a2enmod rewrite
That wasn’t too bad! Also you can run just “a2enmod” and it will print out all available modules and ask you to type in the one you want.
Enable Apache Site/VirtualHost
Ok, now you have a site you need enabled, “mynewsite”. You’ve already added “mynewsite” to your host file (/etc/hosts). Now you would create a new site file in “/etc/apache2/sites-available” called “mynewsite” and add your virtual host config:
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sudo pico /etc/apache2/sites-available/mynewsite
I’ll let you handle the details of your new site’s virtual host config and move on. Now we can call apache’s tool to enable this site (essentially tell apache to create a symbolic link in sites-enabled):
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sudo a2ensite mynewsite
# running just a2ensite will print available sites and allow you to key in the site you want
And finally restart apache, and we’re done!
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sudo apache2ctl restart
Now after all of this if you need to disable a module or site you can run “a2dismod” or “a2dissite” accordingly. Thats it! You’re enabling and disabling apache modules like a pro!
http://www.unixmen.com/how-to-enable-and-disable-apache-modules/
For Debian / Ubuntu Linux you can enable or disable any apache module using a2enmod and a2dismod. You don’t need to edit the conf file for that unless you are having some problem with this method. The syntax of these commands is really simple. For centos and other redhat based distributions we don`t use a2enmod and a2dismod, but another methode is used to enable and disable modules in apache.
For Debian / Ubuntu Linux
Ubuntu and debian comes with two scripts:
1-a2enmod is a script that enables the specified module within the apache2 configuration. It does this by creating symlinks within /etc/apache2/mods-enabled.
2- a2dismod disables a module by removing those symlinks. It is not an error to enable a module which is already enabled, or to disable one which is already disabled.
To enable a module:
sudo a2enmod module_name
To disable a module:
sudo a2dismod module_name
For instance, to enable mod_expires, execute sudo a2enmod expires in the terminal. If you see the following output, you can be sure that it has been enabled.
pirat9@pirat9-pc:~$ sudo a2enmod expiresEnabling module expires.Run ‘/etc/init.d/apache2 restart’ to activate new configuration!
To disable mod_expires:
sudo a2dismod expires
Restart the server after enabling the module.
sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart
For Centos/Fedora and other redhat based linux distribuntions:
For centos/ fedora and other redhat based distributiosn, things work different than in Ubuntu/ Debian, you need to modify *.conf file stored in /etc/httpd/conf.d/ directory. So for example if you don`t want to use the module expire, to disable this module, you need to rename expire.conf to mod_expire.bkp and then restart apache.
If you want to enable the module again simply rename it to it original name and then restart apache.
Example: To enable module expire, we need to rename mod_expire.bkp to the original name : mod_expire The command will be:
# cd /etc/httpd/conf.d/# mv mod_expire.bkp expire.conf# /etc/init.d/httpd restart
http://trentrichardson.com/2011/06/17/enabling-apache-sites-and-modules-in-ubuntu/
