Configuring a single document-root directory for two web-servers running on a dual-boot computer

Whether you do all of your own web-development under Linux or not, there is at least one task that still require Windows and Internet Explorer. Many of the visitors to your site will be using Internet Explorer, and you will no doubt want to leave a good impression on all of your visitors, and customers!, regardless of their web browser. Having a dual boot web-server will allow you to see just how your web-pages will be displayed in all of the major browsers, including Internet Explorer, even when your web-server is not connected to a local network.

Where would I put a “shared” document-root directory?

Anyone who has configured a dual-boot computer in the past will understand what I am talking about when I say that Windows is dumb when it comes to file systems. Windows understands Windows, nothing else. Linux, on the other hand, is very smart when it comes to file systems. It understands Windows file systems as well as it's own. Currently, Linux has a much easier time writing to FAT32 (or FAT) partitions than to NTFS partitions, so a Windows FAT32 partition that both operating systems have full permissions to is then the natural choice for a home to park the shared document-root directory. A FAT partition will also work but will have tighter size restrictions than FAT32 has.

A “getting started” overview:

A typical dual-boot system begins life with Windows being installed first, using just enough physical drive space for the “C:” drive partition as is necessary. This partition can be formatted to any file-system that your version of Windows supports including FAT, VFAT, FAT32 or NTFS. Your web-server of choice (IIS, Apache...) should be installed and configured with temporary settings and made operational now. Next, a second Windows partition needs to be created which will be shared between Linux and Windows. When this partition is created, don't forget to leave enough free-space for your future Linux installation. This partition needs to be formatted FAT32 or FAT. This will typically be your D: or E: drive, depending on the drive letter chosen by Windows. Now you will need to create a directory on your new FAT32 partition that will become the shared document-root directory. If you installed IIS, you should have a directory called “inetpub” on your “C:” drive, which contains a few default web pages in it's own document-root directory, “wwwroot”. The easiest thing to do here is to copy-and-paste the entire “inetpub” directory, including all subdirectories and files, to your new FAT32 partition. Once you have done this, start your IIS configuration utility, and change the document-root setting to point to the new location. You will need to restart your IIS services in the control panel, or just do the old Windows reboot trick. That's it for Windows. Viewing http://localhost/ in Internet Explorer, under Windows, should now be using the files on your new FAT32 partition. Create a new html document and place in your new shared document-root directory and try it !

What about Linux and Apache?

Next, install Linux on your remaining hard drives free-space. A Linux distribution such as Mandriva will have your web-server and all web-services such as PHP and MySQL running on the very first boot if you select those options during the initial installation. Another thing that Mandriva will do for you during installation is locate, and mount, existing Windows partitions for you automatically, typically in a directory like

/mnt/win_c for the “C:” drive. If you installed Windows after Linux, or if you're using another distribution that doesn't automatically mount windows partitions for you, then you will have to tackle this part on your own. Typically though, an entry similar to this in your fstab should get it mounted for you assuming the /mnt/win_d directory already exists AND your “D:” drive is hda2 as mine is:

/dev/hda2 /mnt/win_d vfat umask=0,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850 0 0

What's next?

Linux uses the Apache web-server. The default document-root directory in a Mandriva installation is /var/www/html. Next, a symbolic link is created inside the /var/www/html directory that points to the new document-root directory on the FAT32 partition, which is mounted in /mnt/win_d. To create the symbolic link, open a terminal, do an “su” to root, change working directory to /var/www/html, then create the link like this:

ln -s /mnt/win_d/Inetpub/wwwroot wwwroot

It may, or may not, be necessary to change the permissions on the link. To grant full permissions to all users:

chmod 777 wwwroot

How will Apache web-server know about the document-root directory change?

You will have to make a small change in the Apache configuration file, and restart the web-services for the change to become effective in Linux. Locate your Apache configuration file, typically /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf (or httpd2.conf if using Apache 2.x). Find the entry for the Document root and add the symbolic link name to it as you would if it were a directory.

It should look like this before making any changes:

DocumentRoot /var/www/html

And like this after your change is made:

DocumentRoot /var/www/html/wwwroot

Is that it?!

Just about. You need to restart Apache. From a terminal prompt, as root:

service httpd restart

or you can just reboot if you're used to Windows. You are now using the same web-server document-root directory whether in Windows or Linux.

What else should I consider before tackling this?

Other services such as PHP, Perl, MySQL can be made to work with this configuration with a little massaging, which is beyond the scope of this document. Your computer name (hostname) should be the same and your IP address should be the same (if networked) under both operating systems. Other than that, you're ready to go!