In this issue

Attrition.org is a security web site well known for the largest collection of information on web site attacks, in particular defacements of pages. This week they published statistics from their mirror showing defacements by webserver over the last year. Their results so far show that over half of all defacements were on Windows-based machines running IIS. Apache servers only account for 29% of defacements, well below the 65% market share reported by surveys such as Netcraft.

Our favourite Satirical zine, NTK report on the Apache Java project in "sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering". "Gulping back our natural scepticism regarding Big Projects, java.apache.org does seem to be where all server-based Java action is occurring these days, and if your knowledge of that language extends only as far as that test Pong game you wrote in 1997, this might be the place to have another look. " NTK hopes that the Java projects will help combat the takeover of Microsoft's .NET, just like Apache stopped their domination of the web server.

Apparently there are two towns in Europe just a few miles from each other with Unix-like names. The town of "Perl" in Germany, and the neighbouring town of "Apach" in Luxembourg. We thought someone was winding us up, but here is the proof.

Apache Site: www.apache.org/httpd
Release: 1.3.12 (Released 25^th February 2000) (local download sites)
Beta: None
Alpha: 2.0a6 (Released 18^th August 2000) (local download sites)

Apache 1.3.12 is the current stable release. Users of Apache 1.3.11 and earlier on Unix and Windows systems should upgrade to this version. Read the Guide to 1.3.12, the Guide to 1.3.11 for information about changes between 1.3.9 and 1.3.11 and the Guide to 1.3.9 for information about changes between 1.3.6 and 1.3.9.

Apache 2.0 alpha 6 was released today, after the slightly inaccurate report from C|Net last week which stated there would be no more Apache alpha releases. The Apache group will continue to release alpha versions of the server until such time as the API is standard; once Apache reaches the beta phase there really should be no API changes or significant features added. The biggest new feature in alpha 6 is initial support for filtering, using a "bucket brigade" scheme (imagine firemen putting out a fire by standing in a long line and passing buckets of water). The only filters currently in the code are the core filter and a chunking filter; but after the release of this alpha developers can start work on the more interesting filtering applications such as PHP and SSL.

Just over 500 Apache Week readers entered our "Apache Pocket Reference" book competition. Unfortunately we only have 4 copies of each book to give away and our apologies if you're not one of the people listed below. Surprisingly, there were a quite a few wrong answers, with people thinking Xena really was an Apache-XML project. Perhaps it is now time to create an XML processor that destroys evil and wears skimpy outfits.

The winners, chosen at random, were: Charles Hoard, Andy Kim, Eric Lind, and Daniel Osborne. Your books and collectable Apache Week postcards are in the post.

Apache Week is to be acquired by Red Hat this month, but fear not -- because with the addition of Red Hat's resources, we will soon be able to offer more features, technical stuff, reviews, and news. Will Apache Week still cover non-Linux platforms? Of course!