Re: /var/www or /var/web

[Ben Finney <bignose+hates-spam@benfinney.id.au>]

sean finney <seanius@debian.org> writes:

> hi paul, ben, et al,

Please follow the guidelines for Debian mailing lists: don't send me a
copy of messages unless I ask for one. I read the list.

> On Sat, 2007-01-20 at 12:34 +1100, Ben Finney wrote:
> >     The methodology used to name subdirectories of /srv is unspecified
> >     as there is currently no consensus on how this should be done.
> >     ... Therefore, no program should rely on a specific subdirectory
> >     structure of /srv existing or data necessarily being stored in
> >     /srv. However /srv should always exist on FHS compliant systems
> >     and should be used as the default location for such data.
> > 
> >     <URL:http://www.pathname.com/fhs/pub/fhs-2.3.html#SRVDATAFORSERVICESPROVIDEDBYSYSTEM>
> > 
> > So, for content served by a web server on the system, something under
> > '/srv' is necessary to comply with the FHS. The most obvious choice
> > seems to be '/srv/www'.
>
> in the section you quoted above it specifically says no program should
> rely on a specific subdirectory, which contradicts what you've just
> suggested.

Let's try reading that again:

    ... no program should rely on a specific subdirectory structure of
    /srv existing or data necessarily being stored in /srv. ...

which would apply if the package was going to *rely on the
subdirectory existing, or data necessarily being stored in /srv*,
which isn't the case.

    However /srv should always exist on FHS compliant systems
    and should be used as the default location for such data.

which applies if the package is going to configure a location to
*store data* that falls under the description of this section, "Data
for services provided by this system", which is the case.

In which case, the FHS is explicit that "/srv ... should be used as
the default location for such data".

So much for the FHS: it's clear that data such as that provided by a
web server should be stored somewhere under /srv.

> secondly, even if there were an outright conflict between debian
> policy and the FHS, debian policy wins wrt placement of files and
> directories in debian.

That's true. Is there such a conflict?

The Debian Policy document doesn't specify what document root should
be configured by a web server; the closest I can find is:

    11.5 Web servers and applications
    [...]
    4. Web Document Root

    Web Applications should try to avoid storing files in the Web
    Document Root. Instead they should use the /usr/share/doc/package
    directory for documents and register the Web Application via the
    doc-base package. If access to the web document root is
    unavoidable then use

        /var/www

    as the Document Root. This might be just a symbolic link to the
    location where the system administrator has put the real document
    root.

    <URL:http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-customized-programs.html#s-web-appl>

which speaks only about what web *applications* should expect, and
doesn't speak about what the web *server* package should configure.

-- 
 \          "I object to doing things that computers can do."  -- Olin |
  `\                                                           Shivers |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney