NeoWebScript™ Installation

These are instructions for installing NeoWebScript™, an extension of the fabulously popular Apache webserver. The current release is 2.1, and is delivered along with Apache-1.1.3. The next release will be 2.2, and will work with Apache-1.2. Release 2.2 is currently in beta test.

After you have unpacked this release, execute the install.sh script which resides in this directory. Install.sh (doc the new version)

Install.sh prompts the user for several pieces of information relevant webserver to installing the webserver and creates runtime directories and configuration files from their templates. Install.sh configures assuming that SERVER_ROOT is the httpd directory just below this one.

Note install.sh WILL NOT OVERWRITE previously existing files, so if you repeat the install script, you must remove the files to be changed (probably httpd/conf/*.conf).

You may set DOCUMENT_ROOT to another location if you wish.

Below this directory are the following directories, whose purposes are:

./doc
./doc/rfc
        rfc1876.txt: MIME upload 
	documentation.
./httpd
        Server root.
./httpd/conf
        Server configuration directory.
	Also contains most of the Tcl
        source which makes it go.
./httpd/htdocs
./httpd/htdocs/gifs
        A couple of NeoWebScript gifs.
./httpd/htdocs/neowebscript
        NeoWebScript documentation, 
	demos, tests, etc.
./httpd/logs
        A logs directory.  Must be 
	writable by the server daemon.  
	You must create this diretory.
./httpd/icons
        Icons, for directories, folders
	stuff like that.  Copied in by
        install.sh.
./src/webunpack
        Source for the webunpack tool.
./httpd/bin
        Where the webunpack binary goes.
./httpd/neoscript-data/users
        The tree in which support files
	for user databases will be created.
./httpd/neoscript-data/system
        Where some system-wide db files 
	exist, for hit counters and
        various other things.
./httpd/neoscript-tcl
        Library of Tcl code which can be
	autoloaded into the user's safe 
	interpreter while executing 
	NeoWebScript™ Tcl.
./apache*
        This is Apache tree, with
	NeoWebScript modules integrated.
To build this release you need the following (copies of which can be found on our web/ftp site):

Tcl7.5 or later, and corresponding versions of TclX and Neo7.6.0, all of which you should be able to find from the same site you found this package (www.neosoft.com/neowebscript).

You probably will also want Gd1.2 (www.boutell.com/gd), maybe Postgres95 (www.postgresql.org), Otcl (you'll need our interpreter-safe version), and/or Itcl. (Itcl is not particularly designed to work with with safe interpreters as it has its own model for restricting access to commands). Basically, get all of the Tcl extensions you want. If you already have Tcl built on your system, then great, the NeoWebScript module will work right in.

Step by step instructions:

  1. If you haven't already, build and install Tcl, TclX, Neo, and any other packages you need. We suggest going with shared libraries. Note that Neo contains db.1.85, but if your system comes with it already, and you trust it, then configure it using
    --with-db=system

    so that it will not attempt to build db. One advantage of this is when your native DB lib may be a shared library.

    Note we discourage using --exec-prefix in your configure commands.

  2. Cd to the apache-1.1.3 directory and follow the instructions there for building Apache for your operating system and hardware. The Configuration.tmpl file should be copied to Configuration to start with. This file already contains customizations to put all NeoSoft/NeoWebScript modules into your server. Look through the Configuration file for additional comments on OS-specific changes, especially PREFIX and EXTRA_LIBS, as well as defining your OS.

    Find the line that contains PREFIX and point it to your Tcl install prefix, eg. /usr/local or what you used with the --prefix configure option.

    Mod_neoscript.c contains conditional compiling code to optionally support the several additional Tcl packages. Add or delete -DPackageName to/from CFLAGS as appropiate for your installation to include initialization code for your Tcl packages.

    PackageName/Description

    MIT_OTCL
    An object-oriented Tcl extension written by David Wetherall and the MIT Lab for Computer Science
    POSTGRES95
    The Tcl interface that comes with Postgres95.
    PQATCL
    Another interesting Tcl interface to Postgres which uses channel drivers for connecting to the database.
    GDTCL
    The graphical drawing package by Thomas Boutell.

    If you want to use another package, you will need to modify the C function "init_neoscript" in mod_neoscript.c, to add a call to the init function, and to perform the Tcl_StaticPackage function so that Tcl knows the package is bound into the program.

    We have tended towards linking all packages we think we'll need into the server. This way when it comes time to load a package into a slave, the static package can be referenced instead of a pathname providing faster initialization. However, loading rarely used packages via the Tcl "Load" command is a viable option.

    After you have built httpd, use ldd to make sure the correct shared libraries are being accessed. We have spent many hours chasing segmentation violation errors which turned out to be due to the webserver being restarted with an incorrect LD_LIBRARY_PATH, resulting in execution with incompatable libraries.

    Move the binary into your server root httpd. Note there are two httpd directories; the one under apache* subdirectory is a copy.

  3. Build webunpack. You need webunpack if you are to support MIME uploads. Go to src/webunpack, make any necessary changes to the Makefile and "make" it. Copy the webunpack binary to httpd/bin/.

  4. Go to httpd/conf/. Review the configuration files and set things as you prefer. Note that generate-image and server-subst handlers are commented out in srm.conf. If you wish to use these handlers, uncomment them.

    Check httpd.conf, especially for Port and ServerName settings. To experiment, use port 8080 or whatever. If this is your first webserver, go ahead and set Port to 80.

    Check access.conf. Note that server-side includes will not happen unless "Options Includes" applies. We strongly recommend using "Options Includes IncludesNOEXEC", which allows includes, but disallows shell scripts.

    Note that httpd.conf, access.conf and srm.conf all have legacy pathnames for DocumentRoot and ServerRoot.

Apache-2.* or adding neoscript to your existing Apache Web Server:

This release should pretty much drop into an existing Apache-1.1.3 tree with relatively minor effort. You will need:

  1. The Tcl packages as described above.
  2. *neo*.c and mod_auth_tcl.c (and appropriately add these modules to your Configuration file).
  3. A copy of httpd/neoscript-tcl and httpd/conf/*.tcl.

Also, you may wish to

  1. Put a copy of httpd/htdocs/neowebscript under your htdocs.

And we request that you

  1. Modify your httpd.h file to indicate you are running NeoWebScript-2.1. We would appreciate you doing this, so that your server will show up in the NetCraft surveys as a NeoWebScript instead of just Apache.