Server Name⇑
Description
A unique name for this server. You can use $HOSTNAME as value.
DOCUMENTATION
Server General
Table of Contents
Server Name | Number of Processes | Running As | Priority | CPU Affinity | Chroot Path | Enable chroot | Cloud-Linux | Max I/O Buffer Size | Swapping Directory | Auto Fix 503 Error | Enable HTTP/2 Over Cleartext TCP | Graceful Restart Timeout (secs)
MIME Settings | Suffixes | MIME Type | Disable Initial Log Rotation | Server Signature | Hide Error Page Signature | Enable GeoLocation Lookup | Use Client IP in Header | External Application Abort | Check For Update | Download Updates | Administrator Email
Load Apache Configuration | Auto Reload On Changes | Apache Binary Path | Apache Configuration File | Apache Port Offset | Apache IP Offset | Apache Handled Content | Ignore Apache Modules | Just In Time Configuration | PHP suEXEC | PHP suEXEC Max Conn | Enable FrontPage Extension | Apache Environment Variables
Number of Processes⇑
Description
[Only Available For Web Host Elite Licenses]
Specifies the number of lshttpd workers. Enter 0 to have this number be decided automatically.
Syntax
Integer value between 0 and 128.
Tips
Set an appropriate number to suit your needs. Adding more processes may not necessarily mean better performance.
Running As⇑
Description
Specifies the user/group that the server process runs as. This value is set during installation. In order to change it, you must download the installation package and perform an upgrade via the command line.
Apply
Reinstall required.
Tips
Server should not be run as a privileged user, such as "root". It is critical that the server is configured to run as an un-privileged user/group combination that does not have login/shell access. A user and group of nobody is generally a good choice.
Priority⇑
Description
Specifies priority of the server processes. Value ranges from -20 to 20. A lower number means higher priority.
Syntax
Integer number
Tips
Usually a higher priority leads to slightly higher web performance on a busy server. Do not set priority higher than that of database processes.
See Also
External App Priority, CGI Priority
CPU Affinity⇑
Description
CPU affinity binds a process to one or more CPUs (cores). It is beneficial for a process to always use the same CPU because then the process can make use of data left in CPU cache. If the process moves to a different CPU, there is no use of CPU cache and unnecessary overhead is required.
The CPU Affinity setting controls how many CPUs (cores) one server process will be associated with. The minimum value is 0, which will disable this feature. The maximum value is the number of cores the server has. Generally, 1 is the best setting because it creates the strictest use of CPU affinity and thus makes the most use of CPU cache.
Default value: 0
Syntax
Integer value from 0 to 64. (0 will disable this feature)
Apply
Reinstall required.
Chroot Path⇑
Description
Enterprise Edition Only Specifies the directory where the chroot environment is rooted. Only "root" user can run the server in chroot mode. Whether to run in chroot mode is controlled by Enable chroot option. The installer program will set up the initial chroot environment automatically. This entry is read-only, and if you want to change it, please run the installer again from the command line.
In the chroot environment, the server and its child processes cannot access file systems outside of the chroot jail. Chroot is an advanced security feature and additional administration may be required to make it work properly. All required executables, libraries, configuration files, and device files should be recreated within the chroot jail.
As the root directory is changed, you need to pay special attention to path configuration when an absolute path is used. A Unix domain socket or swapping directory is always relative to the new root directory. All other path configurations are always relative to the real root.
Apply
Reinstall required.
Tips
Use chroot for better security.
Enable chroot⇑
Description
Enterprise Edition Only Specifies whether to start the server in chroot mode. The new root directory is set by Chroot Path during installation.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Cloud-Linux⇑
Description
Specifies whether to enable CloudLinux's Lightweight Virtual Environment (LVE) when it exists. You can use LiteSpeed with LVE to achieve better resource management. For more information, please check http://www.cloudlinux.com.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Max I/O Buffer Size⇑
Description
Specifies the maximum buffer size that is used to store a request body and its dynamically generated response. When this limit is reached, the server will start to create temporary swapping files under Swapping Directory.
Syntax
Integer number
Tips
Set the buffer size large enough to accommodate all concurrent requests/replies to avoid memory to disk swapping. If there is frequent I/O activity to the swap directoy, by default /tmp/lshttpd/swap/, this buffer size is too low and LiteSpeed is swapping to disk.
See Also
Swapping Directory⇑
Description
Specifies the directory where the swapping files should be placed. When the server is started in chroot mode, this directory is relative to the new root directory, otherwise it is relative to the real root directory.
The server uses its own virtual memory to reduce system memory usage. Virtual memory and disk swapping are used to store large request bodies and dynamically generated responses. The swapping directory should be placed on a disk with enough space.
Default value: /tmp/lshttpd/swap
Syntax
Absolute path
Tips
Place the swapping directory on a separate disk or increase Max I/O Buffer Size to eliminate swapping.
See Also
Auto Fix 503 Error⇑
Description
Specifies whether to try to fix the "503 Service Unavailable" error by restarting the server gracefully. A "503" error is usually caused by malfunctioning external applications and a web server restart can often fix the error temporarily. If enabled, the server will restart automatically whenever there are more than 30 "503" errors within a 30 seconds span.
Default value: No
Syntax
Select from radio box
Enable HTTP/2 Over Cleartext TCP⇑
Description
Specifies whether to enable HTTP/2 over non-encrypted TCP connections. Default is disabled.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Graceful Restart Timeout (secs)⇑
Description
During a graceful restart, even after the new server instance is up, the old instance will continue to handle existing requests. This timeout defines how long the previous instance shall wait before exit. Default value is 300 seconds. -1 means wait forever. 0 means no wait and abort immediately.
Syntax
int
MIME Settings⇑
Description
Specifies the file that contains the MIME settings for this server. It is always relative to the real root when an absolute path is given in chroot mode. Click on the filename to view/edit the detailed MIME entries.
Syntax
Filename which can be an absolute path or a relative path to $SERVER_ROOT.
Tips
Click the filename to edit the MIME settings.
Suffixes⇑
Description
You can list multiple suffixes for the same MIME type, using comma to separate.
MIME Type⇑
Description
A MIME type consists of a type and subtype in the format of "type/subtype".
Disable Initial Log Rotation⇑
Description
Specifies whether to disable rotation of server error log file at startup. Initial log rotation is enabled by default for standard installations. Servers using cPanel, however, always write to the Apache error log and thus ignore this setting.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Server Signature⇑
Description
Specifies whether to show the server signature and version number in the response header's "Server" value. There are three options: when set to Hide Version, only LiteSpeed is shown. When set to Show Version, LiteSpeed and the version number are shown. Enterprise Edition Only When set to Hide Full Header, the entire Server header will not be shown in the response header.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Tips
Set to Hide Version if you do not wish to expose the server version number.
Hide Error Page Signature⇑
Description
Specifies whether or not to show the lines
Powered By LiteSpeed.on your default error pages.
LiteSpeed Technologies is not responsible for administration and contents of this web site!"
Syntax
Select from radio box
Enable GeoLocation Lookup⇑
Description
Enterprise Edition Only Specifies whether to enable/disable IP Geolocation lookup. Can be set at server, virtual host, or context level. IP Geolocation is disabled by default when using value "Not Set".
Syntax
Select from radio box
See Also
Use Client IP in Header⇑
Description
Specifies whether to use the first most valid IP IP address listed in the "X-Forwarded-For" HTTP request header for all IP address-related features, including connection/bandwidth throttling, access control, and IP geolocation.
This feature is useful if your web server is behind a load balancer or a proxy server. If you select Trusted IP Only, then X-Forwarded-For IP will be used only when the request is coming from trusted IPs defined in the server-level Allowed List.
Keep Header from Trusted IP is the same as Trusted IP Only, but the X-Forwarded-For header used for the backend will not be modified to include the connecting peer address.
Use Last IP (for AWS ELB) will use the last IP address in the "X-Forwarded-For" list. Select this option if you are using AWS Elastic Load Balancer or expect the real IP to appended to the end of the "X-Forwarded-For" list.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
External Application Abort⇑
Description
When a client breaks a connection with the server, LiteSpeed Web Server can automatically abort external application processes generating responses for that client. Some users, however, may have (long-running) processes that they wish to continue running whether or not the client is still connected.
There are three options for this:
- No Abort: Never abort external applications because of a broken connection.
- Enable Abort for Requests from External IPs: Only processes started by requests from external IPs will be automatically aborted because of a broken connection. This is the default setting. It is a good setting if you have some internal long-running processes, like some cron jobs.
- Enable Abort for All Requests: External application processes will be automatically aborted if the connection is broken, regardless of the source of the request.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Check For Update⇑
Description
Specifies how often the update agent will check for a new product release. Options are "Daily", "Weekly", "Monthly" and "Disable".
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Download Updates⇑
Description
Specifies whether to auto-download a new product release package file when available. If a new package has been successfully downloaded, an online one-click upgrade can be performed via the WebAdmin console under Service Manager - Version Management.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Administrator Email⇑
Description
Specifies the server administrator's email address(es). If specified, administrators will be notified by email of important events (for example, when the LiteSpeed service is restarted automatically due to crash detection or when license is expiring).
Syntax
Comma delimited list of email address.
Tips
Email alert feature will only work if the server has an active MX server such as postfix, exim, or sendmail.
Index Files⇑
Description
Specifies names of index files that will be searched sequentially when a URL is mapped to a directory. You can customize it at the server, virtual host, and context level.
Syntax
Comma-delimited list of index filenames.
Tips
Only set index files that you need.
Auto Index⇑
Description
Specifies whether to generate a directory index on the fly when index files listed in Index Files are not available in a directory. This option is customizable at the virtual host and context level, and is inherited along the directory tree until it is explicitly overridden. You can customize the generated index page. Please check online wiki How-tos.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Tips
It is recommended to turn off Auto Index wherever possible to prevent revealing confidential data.
See Also
Auto Index URI⇑
Description
Specifies the URI that will be used to generate the index page when index files listed in Index Files are not available in a directory. LiteSpeed web server uses an external script to generate the index page providing the maximum customization flexibility. The default script produces an index page with same look as Apache's. To customize the generated index page, please read online wiki How-tos. The directory to be indexed is passed to the script via an environment variable "LS_AI_PATH".
Syntax
URI
See Also
HT Access⇑
Description
The following directives are supported in a directory level access control file (.htaccess file).
- Authentication
- AuthGroupFile
- AuthName
- AuthType
- AuthUserFile
- Require
- Satisfy
- <Limit> (GET, HEAD, POST only)
- <LimitExcept> (GET, HEAD, POST only)
- Access Control
- Allow
- Deny
- Order
- <Limit> (GET, HEAD, POST only)
- <LimitExcept> (GET, HEAD, POST only)
- File Info
- AddDefaultCharset
- AddType
- DefaultType
- ForceType
- Redirect
- RedirectPermanent
- RedirectTemp
- RewriteBase
- RewriteCond
- RewriteEngine
- RewriteOptions
- RewriteRule
- Other
- DirectoryIndex
- ExpiresActive
- ExpiresByType
- ExpiresDefault
- Options
Allow Override⇑
Description
Specifies what directives in an access control file are allowed. An access control file can be placed in a directory to control the accessibility of files under that directory.
- When nothing is checked, inherited default settings will be used.
- When None is checked, access control files will be ignored.
- When Limit is checked, directives "Allow", "Deny", and "Order" are allowed. <Limit> and <LimitExcept> directives are also allowed with limited support for GET, HEAD, and POST requests.
- When Auth is checked, directives "AuthGroupFile", "AuthName", "AuthType", "AuthUserFile", "Require", and "Satisfy" are allowed. <Limit> and <LimitExcept> directives are also allowed with limited support for GET, HEAD, and POST requests.
- When FileInfo is checked, directives "AddDefaultCharset", "AddType", "DefaultType", "ForceType", "Redirect", "RedirectPermanent", "RedirectTemp", "RewriteBase", "RewriteCond", "RewriteEngine", "RewriteOptions", and "RewriteRule" are allowed.
- When Indexes is checked, directives "DirectoryIndex", "ExpiresActive", "ExpiresByType", and "ExpiresDefault" are allowed.
- When Options is checked, directive "Options" is allowed.
Allow Override configuration is available at the Server, Virtual Host, and Context levels. If a configuration is unchecked at the Server level, those controlled directives will be disabled for the entire server regardless of settings at lower levels. Lower levels can disable a setting that is enabled at a higher level, but cannot enable a setting that is disabled at an upper level.
Default values:
Server level: "None" (ignore access control file)
VH level: Inherit Server level setting
Context level Inherit VH level setting
Syntax
Select from checkbox
Tips
If there is no need for directory level configuration customization, check None.
Access File Name⇑
Description
Specifies the name of access control files. These files will be used only if Allow Override is enabled. Default name is .htaccess. You can configure this at server level and virtual host level. Server level is the default setting, and you can override it at virtual host level.
Syntax
Filename starting with "."
See Also
Enable Expires⇑
Description
Specifies whether to generate an Expires header for static files. If enabled, an Expires header will be generated based on Expires Default and Expires By Type.
This can be set at server, virtual host and context level. Lower level settings will override higher level ones, i.e. context settings will override virtual host settings and virtual host settings will override server settings.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Expires Default⇑
Description
Specifies default settings for Expires header generation. This setting takes effect when Enable Expires is set to "Yes". It can be overridden by Expires By Type. Do not set this default at the server or virtual host level unless you have to, since it will generate Expires headers for all pages. Most of time this should be set at the context level for certain directories that do not change often. If there is no default setting, no Expires header will be generated for types not specified in Expires By Type.
Syntax
A|Mseconds
The file will expire after base time(A|M) plus specified seconds. Base time "A" sets the value to the client's access time and "M" to the file's last modified time.
Expires By Type⇑
Description
Specifies Expires header settings for individual MIME types.
Syntax
Comma delimited list of "MIME-type=A|Mseconds". The file will expire after base time (A|M) plus specified seconds.
Base time "A" sets the value to the client's access time and "M" to the file's last modified time. MIME-type accepts wildcard "*", like image/*.
MaxMind GeoIP DB⇑
Description
Multiple MaxMind geolocation databases can be specified here. MaxMind has the following type of DBs: Country, Region, City, Organization, ISP and Netspeed. If multiple databases of types "Country", "Region", and "City" are configured, the last configuration will be effective.
DB File Path⇑
Description
Specifies the path to MaxMind GeoIP database.
Syntax
Absolute path
Example
/usr/local/share/GeoIP/GeoLite2-Country.mmdb
DB Name⇑
Description
MaxMind GeoIP database name. As of GeoIP2, this setting is required.
When upgrading from a GeoIP to a GeoIP2, using values "COUNTRY_DB", "CITY_DB", or "ASN_DB" for this setting will automatically populate PHP's $_SERVER variable with some GeoIP compatible entries (listed by DB Name value below) to help ease this transition.
CITY_DB: 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_CODE', 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_NAME', 'GEOIP_CONTINENT_CODE', 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_CONTINENT', 'GEOIP_DMA_CODE', 'GEOIP_METRO_CODE', 'GEOIP_LATITUDE', 'GEOIP_LONGITUDE', 'GEOIP_POSTAL_CODE', and 'GEOIP_CITY'.
COUNTRY_DB: 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_CODE', 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_NAME', 'GEOIP_CONTINENT_CODE', and 'GEOIP_COUNTRY_CONTINENT'.
ASN_DB: 'GEOIP_ORGANIZATION' and 'GEOIP_ISP'.
Example
COUNTRY_DB
Environment Variables⇑
Description
Assign the results of database lookups to environment variables.
Syntax
Variable_Name mapped_DB_data
One entry per line. Path to data can use map keys or 0-based array indexes, both being separated by /.
Example
COUNTRY_CODE COUNTRY_DB/country/iso_code
REGION_CODE CITY_DB/subdivisions/0/iso_code
REGION_CODE CITY_DB/subdivisions/0/iso_code
IP2Location DB File Path⇑
Description
The location of a valid database file.
Syntax
Filename which can be an absolute path or a relative path to $SERVER_ROOT.
DB Cache Type⇑
Description
The caching method used. The default value is Memory.
Syntax
Select from drop down list
Load Apache Configuration⇑
Description
Specifies whether LiteSpeed will read and use a Apache configuration file to configure the web server. Native configurations will have higher priority when there is conflict between LiteSpeed internal and Apache-based configurations.
Syntax
Select from radio box
Auto Reload On Changes⇑
Description
Specifies how to apply Apache configuration changes. When set to "Yes", LSWS will perform a graceful restart whenever the Apache configuration file has been modified. This may cause LSWS to restart multiple times when updating Apache configurations. A better solution (introduced in version 3.3.8) is "Use Apache binary wrapper". This will replace Apache httpd binary with a wrapper script. Whenever Apache is requested to start/stop/restart, the script will tell LSWS to take corresponding action. Apache Binary Path must be set to use this setting. Default is "No" for standard installations. For cPanel servers, the default is "Use Apache binary wrapper". ("Override cPanel restart HTTPD script" is an optional workaround that should only be used if the option "Use Apache binary wrapper" is having problems.) For other control panels default is "Yes".
Syntax
Select from radio box
See Also
Apache Binary Path⇑
Description
Specifies the location of the Apache binary. Usually, it is located at /usr/local/apache/bin/httpd or /usr/local/apache2/bin/httpd, etc. This option must be set when "Use Apache binary wrapper" is used for Auto Reload On Changes.
See Also
Apache Configuration File⇑
Description
Specifies the location of Apache configuration file. Usually, it is located at /usr/local/apache/conf/httpd.conf or /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf.
Apache Port Offset⇑
Description
Specifies an offset to be added to listening TCP ports specified in the Apache configuration file. In the testing phase, this allows LiteSpeed to run alongside Apache on a different port instead of switching back and forth between LiteSpeed and Apache on a production server.
If set to 0 or not set, LiteSpeed will use the ports specified in the Apache configuration file. When testing, make this setting a non-zero value. LiteSpeed will then add this offset value to the port specified in the Apache configuration and use this port. After confirming that everything works properly, you can stop Apache, set this option back to 0, and restart LiteSpeed.
Apache IP Offset⇑
Description
Specifies an offset to be added to listening IP address specified in the Apache configuration file. This allows LiteSpeed to run alongside Apache in the testing phase instead of switching back and forth between LiteSpeed and Apache on a production server. The calculated IP address has to be available on this server.
Syntax
The offset should be set as an integer (allow negative number), not an IP address. Adding "256" will add 1 to the value of the C class subnet. This option only works with IPv4 address.
Apache Handled Content⇑
Description
Specifies resources to be passed to and processed by Apache on the backend. This feature requires running Apache parallel to LiteSpeed on either another IP or a different port, so either "Apache Port Offset" or "Apache IP Offset" should be set to a non-zero value.
Syntax
Resources are specified by a comma delimited list of URI, file suffixes, or regular expressions. A URI starts with "/"; a suffix starts with ".", a regular expression starts with "exp:". For example: "/svn/, .shtml" lets Apache handle requests with a URI starting with "/svn/" or ending with ".shtml". The same effect can be achieved with the regular expression "exp:^/svn/, exp:\.shtml$".
Ignore Apache Modules⇑
Description
Specifies a list of names of Apache modules that should be ignored by LiteSpeed while parsing the Apache configuration file. LiteSpeed will treat the listed modules as unsupported. This will cause configuration directives related to these modules enclosed in matching <IfModule> or <IfDefined> tags to be ignored.
Syntax
comma delimited list of module names
Just In Time Configuration⇑
Description
With just in time configuration, the web server only finalizes vhost configurations when that virtual host is accessed for the first time, instead of loading all configurations at start up. This allows the web server to save memory and speed up server start up.
Syntax
Select from radio box
PHP suEXEC⇑
Description
Specifies whether to run PHP script in suEXEC mode when "user" and "group" are specified for a virtual host. When set to Yes, PHP scripts will be executed under the user (and group unless Force GID is set) specified. When set to User's Home Directory Only, scripts outside a user's home directory will run as the global user/group that the web server run as. When using DirectAdmin, User's Home Directory Only is recommended. Default is No.
Syntax
Select from radio box
See Also
PHP suEXEC Max Conn⇑
Description
Specifies the maximum number of concurrent PHP processes that can be created by LSWS for each user when running PHP scripts in suEXEC mode. Default value is 5.
Syntax
Integer number
Tips
This limit is per user per lshttpd process. Thus, if you have a 2-CPU license, this limit will be doubled. The limit will be 4x for a 4-CPU license, and so on.
Enable FrontPage Extension⇑
Description
Specifies whether to explicitly enable Microsoft Front Page Server Extension or not. Usually, LSWS will enable it when module "frontpage" has been loaded in Apache httpd.conf. However, when mod_frontpage is statically linked into the Apache binary, configuration for the FrontPage module is not in httpd.conf, and you need to enable it explicitly here. Default is "disabled".
Syntax
Select from radio box
Apache Environment Variables⇑
Description
For shell environment variables used inside the Apache configuration file, LSWS will replace "${ENVVAR}" with the values set here. If the ENVVAR variable is not set here, "${ENVVAR}" occurrences are left unchanged.
Syntax
Name and value pairs, one pair per line in the form of ENV=VALUE
See Also
Apache Env Syntax reference
Apache Style Configurations⇑
Description
Specifies Apache configuration directives (supported by LiteSpeed) that you want to use in LiteSpeed native configuration file. For example, to override the default PHP configurations (php.ini entries) the server will need four directives: "php_value", "php_flag", "php_admin_value" and "php_admin_flag".
Syntax
Same as Apache configuration file.