Apache file permissions problem. {Apache/2.2.6 Fedora 8}

hacker supreme · 01-30-2008, 03:58 PM

I set up a web-server in my spare time (for the experience) and have had repeated issues with files suddenly returning 403 Forbidden.

This happened with my stylesheets, and now has happened with a screenshot I put in the Images directory.

both the file (a PNG) and the directory had the same permissions. And the image is displayed if I move it to another directory.

The directory:
dr-xr-xr-x 2 root userX 4.0K 2008-01-30 15:08 Images

-r-xr-xr-x 1 root userX 333K 2008-01-30 15:07 Screenshot.png

(I did notice the numbers "2" and "1" on the listing, and don't know if this has anything to do with this.)

Code:

Index of /Images
[ICO]	Name	Last modified	Size	Description
[DIR]	Parent Directory	 	-
Apache/2.2.6 (Fedora) Server at xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx Port 80

The logs are filled with entries such as this:
[Wed Jan 30 21:21:02 2008] [error] [client xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx] (13)Permission denied: access to /Images/Screenshot.png denied

I did find one or two threads discussing a similar thing, but they are old (2005-ish) and they didn't have a conclusion.

Is there a way of fixing this, or would I be better off FFR-ing the machine and trying again?

gilead · 01-30-2008, 05:17 PM

It may be related to selinux. If so, the info in these links may help:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...6/#post2901803
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/selinu...ple-setup.html
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/selinu...ple-setup.html

trickykid · 01-30-2008, 05:21 PM

Sounds to me you need to specify or allow Indexes within your <Directory> tag in the httpd.conf file. And never ever bring up a FFR to start over. This is not Windows, there should really never be a reason to reinstall a Linux OS when something is simply misconfigured..

And yes, disable SELinux if you have it enabled, it causes more trouble than it's worth.

hacker supreme · 01-31-2008, 03:47 AM

Indexes are allowed, so I don't think it's that.
I'll have to disable SELinux when I get back home, as I can't configure it from here. (Which means there'll be a bit of a wait before I can say if it's helped or not.)

I'm sure I disabled SELinux when I installed it, but now I'm not so sure. (And yes, it does seem more trouble than it's worth.)

As to FFR-ing, I know, but I was tired and an FFR seemed like the only obvious option at the time.

hacker supreme · 01-31-2008, 10:58 AM

I've taken SELinux out of 'Enforcing' into 'Permissive', and now everything is working as it should be.
Thanks for the help, guys.

frndrfoe · 01-31-2008, 03:26 PM

If you want to run SELinux, and I would recommend it if your learning to make a machine for production, I have some pertinent info at the bottom of a post I made about NFS mounting web directories. You will want to use the chcon command to change the context of the directory and file for the web server to have permission to display the file.

http://pitmanweb.com/blog/index.php?...&c=1&tb=1&pb=1