Features of NCSA HTTPd 1.5

Multiple Directory Indexes

NCSA HTTPd now accepts a list of index files that it will check for on directory URL references. No more hacks to enable CGI scripts or Server Side Includes as Directory Indexes.

Documentation

Redirects from .htaccess files

NCSA HTTPd now accepts Redirect directives in .htaccess files allowing for users to handle their own redirects.

Documentation

RedirectPermanent

NCSA HTTPd now accepts the RedirectPermanent (and RedirectTemp) directives where appropriate to return different status messages to clients which support them. The Redirect directive is supported for backward compatibility, and is equivalent to RedirectTemp.

Documentation

MD5 Authentication

NCSA HTTPd now supports the MD5 Basic Authentication scheme as proposed by Spyglass. This allows for a more secure authentication as the passwords are not sent across the connection. There is even a timestamp to limit replay attacks.

Documentation

Kerberos v4 and v5 Authentication

NCSA HTTPd now supports Kerberos Authentication. This allows web client users to authenticate themselves to httpd by sending a Kerberos ticket as part of the HTTP request. The server also authenticates itself to the client when it sends back a successful response. This can be used for more flexible access control and authorization checking.

Documentation

HTTP 1.0 KeepAlive

NCSA HTTPd now supports the KeepAlive HTTP directive, allowing multiple requests to be handled in a single connection. On some verification tests, we found a speed increase of up to 30% with a KeepAlive capable client like NCSA Mosaic.

Documentation

DBM Support

NCSA HTTPd now supports DBM format files for password and group information. This provides significantly faster user lookup times for access controlled information with a large user list.

Documentation

Enhanced Access Control

NCSA HTTPd now supports an enhanced access control format, which is backward compatible with the existing format. With the new format, you can control access to directories with AND and OR booleans on restrictions. This would allow, for example, restricting access to a particular domain or a valid user.

Documentation

Multihome/Virtual Interface support

NCSA HTTPd now supports the ability to respond differently to different IP addresses. While similar to the famed APB patches, NCSA HTTPd takes it a step further, making most of the httpd.conf,srm.conf and PEM/PGP hooks configurable per host.

Documentation

[back] Back to NCSA HTTPd 1.5 Upgrade Notes
NCSA HTTPd Development Team / httpd@ncsa.uiuc.edu / Last Modified 08-01-95