Installing Apache + SSL is very easy on FreeBSD.

Note: Tested on FreeBSD 9

1. First install FreeBSD. Instructions for installing FreeBSD is contained in this article.
   How I install FreeBSD?
   How I install FreeBSD 9?
2. Second update FreeBSD and install the ports tree. Instructions for this are in this article.
   What are the first commands I run after installing FreeBSD?
3. Install the latest version of Apache, which is Apache 2.2 as of writing this.

   
   #
   
   #
   cd /usr/ports/www/apache22
   
   make BATCH=yes install
   

   This will download the Apache 2.2 source and compile and install it. A few other dependencies will be installed as well.

   Apache will not start automatically which is fine because we are not ready to start it yet.

4. Configure Apache to automatically start when the FreeBSD system boots up. This is done using the /etc/rc.conf file.

   #
   
   #
   echo # Apache 2.2 >> /etc/rc.conf
   
   echo 'apache22_enable="YES"' >> /etc/rc.conf
   

5. In order for Apache to use SSL, you must create a certificate. Now you may or may not know how to create one. I have made it easy for you by doing everything in a shell script. I have used SHA-256, because in this day an age, you need higher security than MD5 or SHA1.

   makesha256key.sh
   

   #!/bin/sh
   mkdir -p /root/mycert
   cd /root/mycert
   
   mkdir -p /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.key
   mkdir -p /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.crt
   chmod 0400 /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.key
   chmod 0400 /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.crt
   
   openssl genrsa -des3 -out $1.key 1024
   openssl req -new -x509 -nodes -sha256 -days 365 -key $1.key -out $1.crt
   
   cp $1.key $1.key.orig
   openssl rsa -in $1.key.orig -out $1.key
   
   cp $1.key /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.key/
   cp $1.crt /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.crt/
   chmod 0400 /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.key/$1.key
   chmod 0400 /usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.crt/$1.crt
   

   This is NOT a fully functional shell script that shows you the command line options and everything. It is really just a list of commands to make this easier for you. Copy this to a shell script and run it. It takes one parameter, the cert name and you should call it like this:

   ./makesha256key.sh certname

   IMPORTANT: The commands in the script will prompt you for a Certificate password, and your Certification information. The only thing you need to make certain of is that when prompted for the “Common Name” you use the URL. For example, if your web site is www.rhyous.com, then www.rhyous.com is your Common Name.

   Or you can run the commands from the shell script manually one at a time if you want (replacing $1 with your desired certificate name).

   Note: In this script, the certificate will be a self-signed certificate, but you can get a signed certificate free here: http://cert.startcom.org

6. Now configure Apache to read the httpd-ssl.conf file when it starts.

   Open the /usr/local/etc/apache22/httpd.conf using the easy editor or ee.

   #
   ee /usr/local/etc/apache22/httpd.conf
   

   Near the end of the file, remove the comment symbol, the # sign, from the following line:

   Include etc/apache22/extra/httpd-ssl.conf

   Note: While you are in this file you may want to remove the comment from the line for enabling Virtual Hosts too if you are going to have multiple URLs hosted at this page.

7. Configure the httpd-ssl.conf.

   #
   ee /usr/local/etc/apache22/extra/httpd-ssl.conf
   

   I only change the two lines to point to the correct certificate. Here is an sample httpd-ssl.conf without the comments.

   Listen 443
   AddType application/x-x509-ca-cert .crt
   AddType application/x-pkcs7-crl    .crl
   SSLPassPhraseDialog  builtin
   SSLSessionCache        "shmcb:/var/run/ssl_scache(512000)"
   SSLSessionCacheTimeout  300
   SSLMutex  "file:/var/run/ssl_mutex"
   <VirtualHost _default_:443>
     DocumentRoot "/usr/local/www/apache22/data"
     ServerName www.example.com:443
     ServerAdmin you@example.com
     ErrorLog "/var/log/httpd-error.log"
     TransferLog "/var/log/httpd-access.log"
   
     SSLEngine on
   
     SSLCipherSuite ALL:!ADH:!EXPORT56:RC4+RSA:+HIGH:+MEDIUM:+LOW:+SSLv2:+EXP:+eNULL
   
     SSLCertificateFile "/usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.crt/server.crt"
   
     SSLCertificateKeyFile "/usr/local/etc/apache22/ssl.key/server.key"
   
     <FilesMatch "\.(cgi|shtml|phtml|php)$">
       SSLOptions +StdEnvVars
     </FilesMatch>
     <Directory "/usr/local/www/apache22/cgi-bin">
       SSLOptions +StdEnvVars
     </Directory>
   
     BrowserMatch ".*MSIE.*" \
            nokeepalive ssl-unclean-shutdown \
            downgrade-1.0 force-response-1.0
   
     CustomLog "/var/log/httpd-ssl_request.log" \
             "%t %h %{SSL_PROTOCOL}x %{SSL_CIPHER}x \"%r\" %b"
   
   </VirtualHost>
   

8. Now start or restart Apache.

   #
   /usr/local/etc/rc.d/apache22 start
   

Now just open a browser (on another system of course) and connect to your new FreeBSD installed web server. You can connect using name, fqdn, or IP and see which work.

• http://servername
• http://www.YourDomain.com
• http://192.168.0.100

You can also try to connect with SSL.

• https://servername
• https://www.YourDomain.com
• https://192.168.0.100

Common Errors

1. Performing sanity check on apache22 configuration:
   httpd: apr_sockaddr_info_get() failed for F9
   httpd: Could not reliably determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using 127.0.0.1 for ServerName
   Syntax OK
   Starting apache22.
   httpd: apr_sockaddr_info_get() failed for F9
   httpd: Could not reliably determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using 127.0.0.1 for ServerName
   /usr/local/etc/rc.d/apache22: WARNING: failed to start apache22
   

   If you get this error, you need to update your /etc/hosts file and make sure the system’s hostname there.

   ::1                     localhost YourServerNameHere
   127.0.0.1               localhost YourServerNameHere
   

Install other software

It is now very common to install a database server and a scripting language, such as MySQL and PHP. I have separate documents for each install:

How to install MySQL FreeBSD?

How to install PHP5 and PHP5 Extensions on FreeBSD?