[users@httpd] Nonprofit seeks advanced assistance with proxypass and rewrites

[Cliff Missen <mi...@widernet.org>]

Friends,

Our nonprofit works with people who lack Internet access in developing countries and U.S. prisons.  We have created an offline solution that contains snapshots of over 3,600 Web sites on a 8TB hard drive that, when attached to their local area network, looks and acts just like the Internet.  This solution has been adopted by over 2,000 universities, hospitals, prisons, and libraries around the world that serve millions of users.

   http://www.egranary.org

The core of this innovation has been Apache.  It has given us the ability to rewrite HTTP requests to map them to directories on a local file system, while providing the foundation to provide a full WAMP stack and foster the creation and sharing of local content using industry standard open source tools.

We seek volunteer consultants to assist us with this very rare use of Apache.

First low hanging fruit:  we have Apache running on 127.0.0.1:9980 and another server (XOWA's offline Wikipedia) running on 127.0.0.1:9981  (same machine, different ports.) We'd like to create a ProxyPass setting that would have requests for "Wikipedia.org" to be fetched from the XOWA server on port 9981 and served up transparently up by the Apache server.  Is this even possible?

Second: we have 16 years of rewrite statements and configuration code cobbled together by many volunteers with varying levels of experience.  Given all the improvements made to Apache over this time, I suspect that there may be better ways to handle this mishmash.  I'd love to have someone with far more experience than myself and our current volunteers look over this work and suggest changes.

Third: We want to get small!  Like Android phone and USB flash drive small.  To do so, we need to shrink the footprint of the core code that provides the basic services.  We can experiment with randomly deleting Apache folders and files that seem inconsequential, but I'm hoping to find someone who already knows where to cut the fat.

Forth: We are migrating from OpenDS to Apache Directory.  We have a couple CompSci / Information Science students working on making the switch who could use some coaching.

One of the natural consequences of serving the poor is that we run on really tight budget (putting the "non" in nonprofit for 20 years!)  I draw no salary and the few paid part-time staff we have salivate at the prospect of landing a job at Wal-Mart.

I know this is an unusual request for a support list, but I figure that more Apache experts hang out here than anywhere else, so I hope you'll forgive me if this is off-topic.

Can you help us out?  Or, can you suggest a better avenue for finding volunteers?
Best regards,
--  Cliff
 "Access to Knowledge Makes a World of Difference"
The eGranary Digital Library
- - - - -
Cliff Missen
Director, WiderNet
Durham/RTP, North Carolina
tel: 919-240-4622
http://www.widernet.org<http://www.widernet.org/>

Re: [users@httpd] Nonprofit seeks advanced assistance with proxypass and rewrites

[Eric Covener <co...@gmail.com>]

> We seek volunteer consultants to assist us with this very rare use of Apache.

I work in RTP and can help with some of it HTTPD and tomcat stuff.  I
may even know enough LDAP to help student volunteers, but I don't
actually know ApacheDS.

Cliff  -- drop me a note off-list to get the ball rolling.

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