1. Web Servers

2. Popular Web Servers Who’s running the show? What are they?
The big two:
Popular Web Servers

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_web_server We’re number one!

4. Apache Apache HTTP Server, referred to simply as Apache: Apache
A web server
Notable for playing a key role in the initial growth of the World Wide Web
Apache
First viable alternative to Netscape Communications Corporation web server
Currently known as Sun Java System Web Server
Evolved to rival other Unix-based web servers
Functionality and performance
Since April 1996 Apache has been the most popular HTTP server on the World Wide Web
September 2007: Apache served 50% of all websites

5. Apache Project's name was chosen for two reasons:
Respect for the Native American Indian Apache tribe
Well-known for their endurance and their skills in warfare
Project's root is a set of patches to the codebase of NCSA HTTPd 1.3
Making it "a patchy" server
Apache is developed and maintained by
Open community of developers
Under the auspices of the Apache Software Foundation
Available for a wide variety of OSs
Microsoft Windows
Novell NetWare
Unix-like operating systems
e.g. Linux and Mac OS X
z-OS (IBM mainframe)
and more…
Released under the Apache License
Apache is free software / open source software.

6. Apache History

7. History
First version of the Apache web server created by Robert McCool
Heavily involved with the National Center for Supercomputing Applications web server
Known simply as NCSA HTTPd
When Rob left NCSA in mid-1994
Development of httpd stalled
Left a variety of patches for improvements circulating through s
Rob McCool was not alone in his efforts
Several other developers helped form the original "Apache Group":
Brian Behlendorf, Roy T. Fielding, Rob Hartill, David Robinson, Cliff Skol nick, Randy Terbush, Robert S. Thau, Andrew Wilson, Eric Hagberg, Frank Peters, and Nicolas Pioch

8. History
Version 2 of the Apache server was a substantial re-write of much of the Apache 1.x code
Strong focus on further modularization and the development of a portability layer, the Apache Portable Runtime
Apache 2.x core - several major enhancements over Apache 1.x:
UNIX threading
Better support for non-Unix platforms
New Apache API
IPv6 support
First alpha release of Apache March 2, 2000
First general availability release on April 6, 2002
Version 2.2 introduced a new authorization API that allows for more flexibility
Also features improved cache modules and proxy modules

9. Features

10. Features Apache supports a variety of features
Many implemented as compiled modules
Extend the core functionality
Range from server-side programming language support to authentication schemes:
Common language interfaces support
mod_perl, mod_python, Tcl, and PHP
Popular authentication modules include
mod_access, mod_auth, and mod_digest

11. Features Other features include: Custom log files Filtering support
SSL and TLS support
mod_ssl
A proxy module
A useful URL rewriter
AKA a rewrite engine, implemented under mod_rewrite
Custom log files
mod_log_config
Filtering support
mod_include
mod_ext_filter
Apache logs can be analyzed via web browsers with free scripts
AWStats/W3Perl
Visitors

12. Features
Virtual hosting allows one Apache installation to serve many different actual websites
For example, one machine, with one Apache installation could simultaneously serve:
test47.test-server.test.com
And more…
Apache features
Configurable error messages
DBMS-based authentication databases
Content negotiation
Also supported by several graphical user interfaces (GUIs)
Permit easier, more intuitive configuration of the server

13. Usage

14. Usage Apache can serve both static content and dynamic Web pages
Many web applications are designed expecting the environment and features that Apache provides
Apache is the web server component of the popular XAMPP web server application stack
Partners with OS
LAMPP – Linux
WAMPP – Windows
MAMPP – Mac OS X
MySQL
PHP/Perl/(Python) programming languages

15. Usage
Apache is redistributed as part of various proprietary software packages including the
Oracle Database
IBM WebSphere application server
Mac OS X integrates Apache
Its built-in web server
Support for its WebObjects application server
It is also supported by Borland
Kylix and Delphi development tools

16. Usage Apache included with Novell NetWare 6.5
Default web server
Apache used for many tasks where content needs to be available in a secure and reliable way
Sharing files from a personal computer over the Internet
User who has Apache installed on their desktop can put arbitrary files in the Apache's document root which can then be shared
Programmers developing web applications
Locally installed version of Apache
Preview and test code as it is being developed

17. Resume 10/19

18. License

19. License Software license
From the Apache Foundation
Distinctive part of the Apache HTTP Server's history
Apache License allows distribution of both open and closed source derivations of the source code
Free Software Foundation does not consider the Apache License to be compatible with version 2 of the GNU General Public License (GPL)
Software licensed under the Apache License cannot be integrated with software that is distributed under the GPL

20. License Free software license:
Incompatible with the GPL
Has a specific requirement that is not in the GPL
Has certain patent termination cases that the GPL does not require
Version 3 of the GPL includes a provision
(Section 7e) allows it to be compatible with licenses that have patent retaliation clauses, including the Apache License
Apache is a registered trademark
May only be used with the trademark holder's express permission

21.
We’re # 2…
Microsoft IIS

22. IIS Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS)
Formerly called Internet Information Server
Set of Internet-based services for servers using Microsoft Windows
World's second most popular web server in terms of overall websites
July 2010: it served 25.87% of all websites and 36.63% of all active websites (Netcraft)
IIS Services currently include servers for:
FTP
SMTP
NTP
NNTP
HTTP/HTTPS

23. History of IIS
Initially released as additional set of Internet based services for Windows NT 3.51
IIS 2.0
added support for the Windows NT 4.0
IIS 3.0
introduced the Active Server Pages dynamic scripting environment
IIS 4.0
dropped support for the Gopher protocol
Bundled with Windows NT as a separate "Option Pack" CD-ROM

24. History of IIS Current shipping versions of IIS: 8.5 8.0 7.5 7.0 6.0
Windows Server R2
Windows 8.1
8.0
Windows Server 2012
Windows 8
7.5
Windows 7
Windows Server 2008 R2
7.0
Windows Vista
Windows Server 2008
6.0
Windows Server 2003
Added support for IPv6
(support ending July 14,2015)

25. History of IIS Windows Vista and 7 do not install IIS 7 by default
Can be selected among the list of optionally installed components
IIS 7.0 on Vista does not limit the number of connections allowed
Restricts performance based on active concurrent requests

26. Security

27. Security Earlier versions of IIS had lot of vulnerabilities
Chief among them CA
Led to the infamous Code Red worm
Version 7.0 currently has no reported issues
In perspective, as of 11 September 2007, the free software Apache web server has one unpatched reported issue
Affecting only MS Windows systems
Rated "less critical“

28. Security
IIS 6.0 opted to change the behavior of pre-installed ISAPI handlers
Many of which were culprits in the vulnerabilities on 4.0 and 5.0
Reduced the attack surface of IIS
IIS 6.0 added a feature called "Web Service Extensions“
Prevents IIS from launching any program without explicit permission by an administrator

29. Security IIS 7.0 the components were modularized
Only the required components have to be installed
Further reducing the attack surface
Security features such asURLFiltering were added
Rejects suspicious URLs based on a user defined rule set

30. Security In IIS 5.1 and lower: By default all websites were run
In-process
Under the System account
a default Windows account with elevated rights

31. Security
In IIS 6.0 all request handling processes have been brought under a Network Services account
Has significantly fewer privileges
If there is an exploit in a feature or custom code
Wouldn't necessarily compromise the entire system
Given the sandboxed environment the processes run
Contains a new kernel HTTP stack (http.sys)
Stricter HTTP request parser and response cache for both static and dynamic content

32. Authentication mechanisms

33. Authentication mechanisms
IIS 5.0 and higher support the following authentication mechanisms:
Basic access authentication
Digest access authentication
Integrated Windows Authentication
.NET Passport Authentication

34. Internet Information Services 7.0

35. Internet Information Services 7.0
Debuted with Windows Vista
Included in Windows Server 2008
IIS 7.0 features a modular architecture
Instead of a monolithic server which features all services
IIS 7 has a core web server engine
Modules offering specific functionality can be added to the engine to enable its features
Advantages
Only the features required need be enabled
The functionalities can be extended by using custom modules

36. Internet Information Services 7.0
IIS 7 ships with a handful of modules
Microsoft will make other modules available online
Following sets of modules ship with the server:
HTTP Modules
Security Modules
Content Modules
Compression Modules
Caching Modules
Logging and Diagnostics Modules
Integrates with the new configuration store
New management environment

37. Internet Information Services 7.0
Significant change from previous versions:
All web server configuration information is stored solely in XML configuration files
Instead of in the metabase
Server has a global configuration file
Provides defaults
Each virtual web's document root (and any subdirectory thereof) may contain a web.config
Containing settings that augment or override the defaults

38. Internet Information Services 7.0
Changes to these files take effect immediately
Marks a significant departure from previous versions whereby web interfaces, or machine administrator access, were required to change simple settings such as default document, active modules and security/authentication
Eliminates the need to perform metabase synchronization between multiple servers in a farm of web servers

39. Internet Information Services 7.0
Features a completely rewritten administration interface
Takes advantage of modern MMC features such as
Task panes
Asynchronous operation
Configuration of ASP.NET is more fully integrated into the administrative interface.

40. nginx

41. nginx NGINX Plus is the web server, reinvented
World’s most popular open source web server for high-traffic websites.
NGINX Plus adds enterprise-ready features
load balancing
session persistence
monitoring
advanced management.

42. nginx High-performance HTTP Server Web Accelerator Application Gateway
Delivers web and video assets with
Unparalleled speed
Maximizing performance and efficiency
Web Accelerator
Provides SSL and SPDY acceleration
HTTP connection optimization
High-performance caching
HTTP compression
Application Gateway
PHP, Ruby, Java and other application types supported
Supports FastCGI, uWSGI and HTTP Proxy interfaces
Load Balancer and Application Delivery solution
Gives
reliability
control
consistent performance for HTTP and TCP applications.

43. The "spiel" The following from

44. Capability Future-proof, IPv6-ready reverse proxy with: For:
Load balancing
High availability
For:
HTTP and TCP services
Application request routing
Content acceleration and caching

45. Predictability Works predictably, without spikes, on:
Low power chipsets
Virtual machines with limited RAM
Eliminate unexpected issues with operations
Reduce infrastructure costs

46. Simplicity Flexible, logical, easily scalable setup
Ten lines of directives enable:
Load balancing
- or -
Static content delivery
Don’t waste engineering hours on tweaking unreadable configurations

47. nginx
Virtualized
Built to optimize CPU and memory resource utilization.
Extremely efficient in virtualized public and private cloud environments
Pay less, get more

48. nginx Automation Easily automated with tools like Puppet and Chef
Can be managed by independent development teams
Shift engineering focus from maintenance to innovation

49. Scalability and Performance
Serves
Million users or more per server
Tens of thousands of requests per second
Best in class multi-tenancy for virtual hosts
Easily scales for unparalleled efficiency

50. Summary

51. Summary Concentrated on HTTP servers
Apache and IIS are the main web serving tools
nginx is rising fast
Apache still king
Currently declining
IIS Up and down, wandering
Usage tracked
Netcraft Web Server Survey