How to list the contents of Apache's cgi-bin directory?

Joel Koltner · 03-27-2009, 12:30 AM

Hello,

I'm fond of Apache's "option indexes" feature that, in lieu of finding an index.html file, will just list the contents of the directory instead. However, I can't get this to work in my cgi-bin directory, despite trying a lot of messing around with my default site configuration file and directory permissions. (Note that I *can* execute CGI scripts just fine -- this isn't a problem.)

Here's my configuration file:

Code:

<VirtualHost *:8080>
    ServerAdmin "webmaster@localhost.com"
	
	DocumentRoot /var/www/

	<Directory />
		Options FollowSymLinks
		AllowOverride None
	</Directory>

	<Directory /var/www/>
		Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
		AllowOverride All
		Order allow,deny
		allow from all
	</Directory>

	ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/
	<Directory "/usr/lib/cgi-bin">
		AllowOverride all
		Options +ExecCGI Indexes Multiviews FollowSymLinks
		Order allow,deny
		Allow from all
	</Directory>

	ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/error.log

	# Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit,
	# alert, emerg.
	LogLevel info

	CustomLog /var/log/apache2/access.log combined

    Alias /doc/ "/usr/share/doc/"
    <Directory "/usr/share/doc/">
        Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride None
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>

</VirtualHost>

...and I'm trying to list the directory using the URL: http://atomix:8080/cgi-bin/ . The result is a "403 Forbidden" error.

Any ideas what I might need to fix? (As mentioned, something like http://atomix:8080/cgi-bin/TestScript works just fine...)

I've also found that even without "+ExecCGI" in the options line CGI scripts are still executed ... I suppose this is the default? (I was trying to make /usr/lib/chi-bin's configuration indentical to /var/www's, which does list the directories as I'd like.)

This is running Apache 2.2.9 and Ubuntu 8.10.

Thanks for the help,
---Joel Koltner

bathory · 03-27-2009, 05:21 PM

You can use a script to show you the cgi-bin directory contents in a browser window. Something like this will do the job:

Code:

#!/bin/sh

echo "Content-type: text/plain"
echo
ls -l

Joel Koltner · 03-27-2009, 05:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bathory

You can use a script to show you the cgi-bin directory contents in a browser window.

Ha... well, that's clever, thanks -- I'll use it.

I'd still love to know what I'm not doing correctly with Apache itself though!

I appreciate the help,
---Joel

bathory · 03-27-2009, 06:13 PM

I'm afraid you cannot list the cgi-bin contents, because this is the way the ScriptAlias directive works. It means that everything in that directory must be executed as script (thus you cannot execute a directory).
You can overcome this by changing ScriptAlias with just Alias and add a "AddHandler cgi-script .cgi .pl" among the other directives inside the Directory definition.

Joel Koltner · 03-27-2009, 11:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bathory

I'm afraid you cannot list the cgi-bin contents, because this is the way the ScriptAlias directive works. It means that everything in that directory must be executed as script (thus you cannot execute a directory).
You can overcome this by changing ScriptAlias with just Alias and add a "AddHandler cgi-script .cgi .pl" among the other directives inside the Directory definition.

Ah, excellent. Thanks for the information!

---Joel