Lighttpd and FastCGI

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This document will describe how to set Ruby on Rails and PHP up on lighttpd with fastcgi.

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Contents 1 Installing lighttpd and fcgi 2 Installing php-cgi 3 Ruby on Rails related 4 Configuration of /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf 5 Troubleshooting

Installing lighttpd and fcgi

# pacman -S lighttpd fcgi

Now you have lighttpd with fcgi support. If it was that what you wanted you're all set. People that want Ruby on Rails and/or PHP should continue.

Installing php-cgi

# pacman -S php-cgi

Now check if you got the php-cgi version by entering php-cgi --version

PHP 5.3.0 with Suhosin-Patch (cgi-fcgi) (built: Sep 27 2009 22:01:58)
Copyright (c) 1997-2009 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v2.3.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2009 Zend Technologies

If you get a similar output your PHP is installed successfully

Note: Please keep in mind if you receive errors like No input file found after attempting to access your php files then make sure /etc/php/php.ini has the directives enabled:

cgi.fix_pathinfo=1
open_basedir = /home/:/tmp/:/usr/share/pear/:/another/path:/second/path

Ruby on Rails related

Considering you want to use Ruby on Rails I assume you have ruby installed. If not do so.

We need rubygems and ruby-fcgi. Check the AUR!

Rubygems

$ sudo pacman -S rubygems

ruby-fcgi

$ wget http://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ruby-fcgi/ruby-fcgi/PKGBUILD
$ makepkg
$ sudo pacman -U ruby-fcgi-x.x.x-x-xxx.pkg.tar.gz

Now we have rubygems. Let's get rails!

$ sudo gem install rails --include-dependencies
$ sudo gem install fcgi --include-dependencies

If this fails, run

# pacman -S fcgi

or get [1] and compile it yourself.

$ wget http://fastcgi.com/dist/fcgi.tar.gz
$ tar zxvf fcgi.tar.gz
$ cd fcgi-2.4.0
$./configure
$ make
# make install

And repeat the gem install.

Check if you have more than one fcgi.so

$ find /usr -name fcgi.so

If you have two, delete the one that doesn't have "/site_ruby/" in its path.

For documentation how to use Ruby on Rails please consult [2].

Configuration of /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

I only show those you should change. The config is well commented and documentation can be found on [3].

server.modules = (
"mod_access",
"mod_fastcgi",
"mod_accesslog" )

server.indexfiles = ( "dispatch.fcgi", "index.php" ) #dispatch.fcgi if rails specified

server.error-handler-404   = "/dispatch.fcgi" #too

fastcgi.server = (
".fcgi" =>
  ( "localhost" =>
    (
      "socket" => "/tmp/rails-fastcgi.socket",
      "bin-path" => "/path/to/rails/application/public/dispatch.fcgi"
    )
  ),
".php" =>
  ( "localhost" =>
    (
      "socket" => "/tmp/php-fastcgi.socket",
      "bin-path" => "/usr/bin/php-cgi"
    )
  )
)

Troubleshooting

Lighttpd FAQ