UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi, like a lot of people that post here, I am new at UNIX. The only UNIX I have ever messed with is my iBook running MacOSX (10.1). I have a grasp of the basic commands and understanding of the system but only to a point.

I searched the archive and FreeBSD.org and apache.org but I couldn't find anything that helped me any.

Anyway, I just set up a FreeBSD Box (4.4) with an AMD K6 333, 2.5G, 32MBs of ram, ect... and I have been haveing fun trying to get it to work properly for me.

I got most of the stuff to work besides the sound card, but I'll mess with that later.

I'm wanting to use it as a webserver but I can't get apache to work. I just reinstalled everything last night. I installed everything in the www install packet. Every time I try to start apachectl it gives me this error

[alert] httpd: Could not determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using 127.0.0.1 for ServerName
/usr/local/sbin/apachectl start: httpd could not be started

As of now, I don't plan to attach a domain to my system, I just want to mirror the IP address to my normal website. I was able to do this with the apache on my iBook with no problem, and, in fact, the apache on the BSD Box was working when I wasn't able to get my NIC card to work.

I don't know what to do with httpd.conf and i don't know if there is anything I should do with any of the hosts files. As you can see, I'm a bit lost.

I have this system behind a linksys router on a cable modem and the BSD box and my iBook are set as DHCP rather than static.

Thanks, and i hope I gave you enough information

Apache will not start if there is a syntax or configuration error in the httpd.conf file.

ok I messed around in the httpd.conf file and I'm not getting " [alert] httpd: Could not determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using 127.0.0.1 for ServerName ", but I'm still getting /usr/local/sbin/apachectl start: httpd could not be started.

What I did was I enabled the NameServer and set it to 127.0.0.1. Should I set this to something else?

Sounds like you have a lot of basic leaning to do with TCP/IP like hostnames, nameservers, IP addresses,etc. The best approach is to get the O'Reilly book on Apache and read it, step-by-step; if you need more information on TCP/IP you might consider keeping the O'Reilly book TCP/IP Network Adminstration next to the Apache book.

Prior to setting up Apache, you need to insure your TCP/IP infrastructure is up and running. What is your IP address? The IP address of your nameserver(s)? Your host and domain names? What is the IP address of your web server?

These are all basic TCP/IP network administration 'things' that you need to know prior to trying to configure an Apache web server.

I seen that book at hastings, I'll pick it up

Thanks