Apache 1.3.14 Released The Apache Software Foundation and The Apache Server Project are pleased to announce the release of version 1.3.14 of the Apache HTTP server. Version 1.3.13 was never released. This version of Apache is primarily a security fix and bug fix release, but there are a few new features and improvements. A summary of the new features is given at the end of this document. We consider Apache 1.3.14 to be the best version of Apache available and we strongly recommend that users of older versions, especially of the 1.1.x and 1.2.x family, upgrade as soon as possible. No further releases will be made in the 1.2.x family. Apache 1.3.14 is available for download from http://httpd.apache.org/dist/ Please see the CHANGES_1.3 file in the same directory for a full list of changes. Binary distributions are available from http://httpd.apache.org/dist/binaries/ As of Apache 1.3.12 binary distributions contain all standard Apache modules as shared objects (if supported by the platform) and include full source code. Installation is easily done by executing the included install script. See the README.bindist and INSTALL.bindist files for a complete explanation. Please note that the binary distributions are only provided for your convenience and current distributions for specific platforms are not always available. The source and binary distributions are also available via any of the mirrors listed at http://www.apache.org/mirrors/ For an overview of new features in 1.3 please see http://httpd.apache.org/docs/new_features_1_3.html In general, Apache 1.3 offers several substantial improvements over version 1.2, including better performance, reliability and a wider range of supported platforms, including Windows 95/98 and NT (which fall under the "Win32" label). Apache is the most popular web server in the known universe; over half of the servers on the Internet are running Apache or one of its variants. IMPORTANT NOTE FOR WIN32 USERS: Over the years, many users have come to trust Apache as a secure and stable server. It must be realized that the current Win32 code has not yet reached the levels of the Unix version, but is of acceptable quality. Any Win32 stability or security problems do not impact, in any way, Apache on other platforms. Apache 1.3.14 Major changes The security fixes are: * A problem with the Rewrite module, mod_rewrite, allowed access to any file on the web server under certain circumstances * The handling of Host: headers in mass virtual hosting configurations, mod_vhost_alias, could allow access to any file on the server * If a cgi-bin directory is under the document root, the source to the scripts inside it could be sent if using mass virtual hosting The main new features include: * Support for a directory-based configuration system. If any of the configuration directives point to directories instead of files, all files in that directory (and in subdirectories) will be also parsed as configuration files * Support name-based virtual hosting without needing to specify an IP address in the Apache configuration file. This enables sites that use dynamic IP addresses to support name-based virtual hosting as well as allowing identical machines to share a configuration file, say in a load-balanced cluster * The SetEnvIf and BrowserMatch range of directives are now able to be used in .htaccess files. * Administrators who are nervous about their full server version details being public can use the new keyword 'ProductOnly' in the ServerTokens directive. This keyword forces the server to only return the string "Apache" as the server version. * The new digest authentication module, mod_auth_digest has had a number of fixes and upgrades applied Selected new features that relate to windows platforms: * The project files have been converted to work with Microsoft Visual C 6.0 * The DBM package "sdbm" is now bundled with Apache * Windows 95 and 98 can now benefit from an emulation of the NT services, including install and uninstall options. The Apache server therefore can start when the OS loads and will not stop if the current user logs off for example * A comprehensive review of the Windows documentation has been performed. * Preparations for allowing Apache to be built using the free Borland bcc 5.5 compiler Selected new features relating to other platforms: * Support for the new FreeBSD accept filters feature. This feature postpones the requirement for a child process to handle a new connection until a HTTP request has arrived, therefore increasing the number of connections that a given number of child processes can handle * A number of alterations for the MPE platform including fixing error reporting, updating the DSO code to be compatible with a recent OS patch, refining user and group management, and initial support for the proxy module * The default serialised accept has been changed for AIX 4.3 to provide a substantial performance improvement on multiple CPU machines serving large numbers of concurrent clients * DSO support added for BS2000 and OS/390 USS platforms * A directory layout for Solaris 8 has been added to the configuration system * The proxy module mod_proxy has been patched so that it can be built on BeOS 4.5.2 * Updated configuration script to allow building on IBM's IA-64 version of AIX