In this issue

Version 1.0.3 remains the stable, public, released version. No patches were submitted to this release this week.

A number of patches for 1.1b0a were submitted. The new server will probably be released to the public as 1.1b1 in March.

Apache #2 and rising

The popular and extensive Web site survey run by Netcraft found that Apache is nearly the most popular Web server. The NCSA server has 28.2% of the market, Apache has 27.8%.

Apache Module Registry

A module registry site with mailing list was set up to track the standard and third-party plug-in modules that are being written for Apache. The registry is not fully completed so it's URL will be held over until next week.

Secure Apache

Verisign have now agreed to sign certificates for the Apache-SSL-US product. This means that users in Canada and the USA can now obtain a Secure Server product based on Apache. A new version of Apache-SSL (1.0.3a) was released for users outside the USA.

Dynamic Loading

The DLD module allows dynamic loading of modules at runtime. Patches were submitted to extend the module to allow the dynamic removal of modules as well. Another patch was submitted to enable DLD to run with ELF Linux. Using dynamic loading allows you to remove a module, make changes to it, and add it again without stopping or disrupting the server.

Imagemaps

The new (1.1) imagemap module should solve a lot of the problems that occur with browsers that do not support images. An Internet Draft is being written that discusses how such servers and clients should gracefully handle imagemaps.

Developers Revision Control Systems

A great deal of discussion took place about the new CVS procedure used by the Apache group for developing code. The impact on Apache users should be that new features will get added and released in a much shorter time than before.

Netscape FastTrack

Netscape announced their version 2.0 commercial Web server, FastTrack. The server has SSL capability and is priced aggressively.