apache 2.4/Fedora quirk in welcome.conf


I was trying to set up a directory index via a named vhost under Apache today.  Typically all you need to do for this scenario is something like this in an apache conf file.


ServerName files.gfxmuse.org
DocumentRoot /home/httpd/files

Options +Indexes

Then restart apache and make sure the server name resolves somehow (DNS or /etc/hosts) and you're good to go.

But with Apache 2.4 something changed.  This doesn't work.  You get the nice welcome page that says the web server is running but you don't get the directory index.  I found a solution online that hid the solution behind a requirement to “like” the answer but it became very clear what the problem was: the welcome.conf configuration file overrides my directory index.

In welcome.conf you find this bit of code.


Options -Indexes
ErrorDocument 403 /.noindex.html

That Options -Index line is the problem.  The easiest solution, in this case where all I want is a web server that shows a directly listing, is to comment out that whole block of code.  Restarting the web server and accessing my file server works as expected now.

I had this problem on fedora 21.  I've seen others have it with ubuntu.  So the source of welcome.conf content may be the apache project itself.  In other words, this solution may be applicable to any distribution using Apache 2.4 or later.

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