Building a L.A.M.P. Server on OS X framework - PART 1

For my L.A.M.P. project, running on an older machine and acting as a test server I was going to use an old Macintosh G4 (the Original Graphite), but decided against it. Why? Seems that a 512MB - G4 running at 400MHz machine might not be enough to do the job. So, I selected an iBook G4 (1GHz with 1.2GB of RAM), 14.1” screen. This also gives me the ability of taking my test server with me if I want to work on the road.

I will be downloading and installing the following software, which are freeware for the most part. There are many sites that actually have step-by-step instruction and how-tos that cover every aspect of the operation. L.A.M.P. stands for Linux – Apache – MySQL and PHP. This L.A.M.P. in reality will be an O.A.M.P., since I replaced the Linux with OS X. So here is a list of server software that is needed to setup a functioning L.A.M.P. Server:

1. Operating system: I chose Apple Mac Server Tiger (10.4.11) as the operating system of my new L.A.M.P. machine. I was going to use the Leopard server (10.5.4), but then I decided against it. The tiger version already is a strain on this hardware

2. MySQL: I downloaded the MySQL server from their site directly. I chose the version 4.1 that is used very widely because of its stability and bug fixes. As it is with the most UNIX and Linux program that you download, you have to recompile the whole thing locally and it is highly suggested that you compile the whole thing on the same machine that you want to run it on. I was thinking to compile the whole thing under my newer and faster Mac. But no cigar – must be compiled on target machine. This will be an overnight job. So tonight before I go to bed, I will setup the little iBook to compile the whole big-bad-wolf MySQL (poor iBook, talk about torture!).

3. Apache 2.2: This is an adventure by itself. Apple ships OS X server with the Apache 1.3. I am planning to use Apache 2.2+ in my L.A.M.P. But this is more complicated than it seems, since they suggest that you remove the older version first and then download and recompile the newer one. I am looking forward to this, since I have never removed Apache server in its entirety.

Here was what has been done up to now. In part two, I will go thru the details of installing and configuring the MySQL server.