Run Apache in Docker

This tutorial makes following assumptions:

  1. You are using Ubuntu. It might also work in other Debian based Linux systems, although not guaranteed.
  2. You have already set-up Docker.

Steps to run Apache inside Docker in following:

  1. Create a directory called apache-docker 
    mkdir apache-docker
cd apache-docker
  2. Create Dockerfile and open in text editor 
    touch Dockerfile
nano Dockerfile
  3. Use ubuntu:20.04 as base image. You can also use more recent version of ubuntu image. 
    FROM ubuntu:20.04
  4. Prevent interactive dialogs like timezone selection 
    ARG DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
  5. Update package information and perform an upgrade 
    RUN apt-get update -y && apt-get upgrade -y
  6. Install Apache 
    RUN apt-get install -y apache2
  7. Start Apache server 
    CMD /usr/sbin/apache2ctl -D FOREGROUND
  8. Expose port 80 (default port used by Apache server) 
    EXPOSE 80
  9. The Dockerfile should look like this: 
    FROM ubuntu:20.04
ARG DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
RUN apt-get update -y && apt-get upgrade -y
RUN apt-get install -y apache2
CMD /usr/sbin/apache2ctl -D FOREGROUND
EXPOSE 80
  10. Build image using the Dockerfile: 
    docker build . -t apache-docker-image

    Output:

    Sending build context to Docker daemon 2.048kB
Step 1/6 : FROM ubuntu:20.04
---> adafef2e596e
Step 2/6 : ...
...
Successfully built e824dca0aa93
Successfully tagged apache-docker-image:latest
  11. Verify the creation of docker image: 
    docker images

    Output:

    REPOSITORY            TAG      IMAGE ID       CREATED         SIZE
apache-docker-image   latest   e824dca0aa93   2 minutes ago   210MB
  12. Create and start container using the newly created image 
    docker run -it --name apache-docker-container -d -p 8080:80 apache-docker-image
  13. Verify the creation of container 
    docker ps

    Output:

    CONTAINER ID   IMAGE                 COMMAND                  CREATED         STATUS         PORTS                  NAMES
1220c48d2f78   apache-docker-image   "/bin/sh -c 'apache2…"   7 seconds ago   Up 4 seconds   0.0.0.0:8080->80/tcp   apache-docker-container
  14. In web browser, open http://localhost:8080. The default page of Apache is displayed.

The next steps describes how to serve files from the host machine instead of default page of Apache.

  1. Create a folder called public and inside it, create index.html with some content 
    mkdir public
echo 'Hello, World!' > public/index.html
  2. Stop and remove running container 
    docker stop apache-docker-container
docker rm apache-docker-container
  3. Create and start container by passing volume flag 
    docker run -it --name apache-docker-container -d -p 8080:80 -v ${PWD}/public/:/var/www/html/ apache-docker-image
  4. In web browser, open http://localhost:8080. “Hell, World!” text should be displayed.

The next steps shows how to use docker-composer to easily run docker container.

  1. Create docker-compose.yml file and open in text editor 
    touch docker-compose.yml
nano docker-compose.yml
  2. Copy and paste following code into the docker-compose.yml file 
    version: '2.0'
services:
    webapp:
        image: apache-docker
        build:
            context: .
        volumes:
            - ./public/:/var/www/html/
        ports:
            - 8081:80
  3. Start docker container: 
    docker-compose up -d
  4. To stop running container: 
    docker-compose down

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Tags 
apache
docker