I am using apache as my webserver.

in my httpd.conf

Document root is /var/www/html/
Directory is /var/www/html/

now when I try to put a directory within it:

/var/www/html/nmap-web/

and try to run a php script

http://localhost/nmap-web/index.php

it doesn't run. it gives a 403 forbidden erro. All the permissions are set rite. php is enabled and yet the problem continues to exist.

Is there a way to access this directory somehow? Do I have to change anything in httpd.conf? I don't know, can anyone point me to right direction?

Thank you
--p

Take a look at the apache error_log to see what's the problem.

When you say all the permissions are set right, what do you mean? What files/directories have you checked the permissions for? did you check that /var, /var/www, /var/www/html, /var/www/html/nmap-web, and /var/www/html/nmap-web/index.php had the correct permissions? all directories in the document root path needs to be 755. php, i'm not sure if it's 644 or 755, but it's one of those. If it's not permissions, I can think of a couple of things. Check the user and group (User and Group in httpd.conf) apache is running under. Although, if you're permissions are right, apache should still be able to access those resources no matter what the user or group is. The other thing I can think of is, did you add a php handler (AddHandler php-script .php)?

And check the error_log suggested earlier.

Yes, i made sure permissions were 755. module is added directory index is added but still it doesn't go through. error log and access log doesn't give me anything. before it said file not found. when i run it in browser it gives me 403 permission denied. i have working on this since a week now and i don't know what exactly is going wrong. i checked my httpd conf file setting are rite...permissions are rite for the directories still something is wrong. If it was malfunction code shouldn't it give me an internal error?

its all running as root

any help is appreciated.
thanks
--p

I was just thinking, in the <Directory> directive for you document root, are your options set to allow the running of scripts and what-not? I'm not sure what apache sees php as, but it could be something to look at since by default apache doesn't let a whole lot of options happen.

What distro are you running ?

If you're running SELinux (FC3/4 or recent RedHat AS/ES) then the context of the file may be wrong.

Do a ls -Z in the directory to show the SELinux file contexts. If your file is different you need to do something like chcon --reference=/var/www/html <file>. Check the results with another ls -Z.

Hope this helps
Paul