Apache Handlers Web Hosting

When Apache sees a file, it has an action built in for that file type, and will perform that action. If you wish Apache to do a different action, you will need to make a handler to tell Apache to perform that action.

Some apache handlers you may want to add for certain file extensions:

• application/x-httpd-php - for PHP scripts
• application/x-httpd-cgi - for CGI (Common Gateway Interface)
• application/x-tar - for .tgz compressed files
• application/zip - for .zip compressed files

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Some web hosts that support custom Apache handlers provide an easy to use control panel to help create and manage custom Apache handlers.

For those web hosts that do not have an easy method to create and manage custom Apache handlers, you still may be able to setup custom Apache handlers using a .htaccess file.

Example:
Lets say you want to run PHP code in a .html file.

Step 1:
Create a plain text file using a text editor such as Windows Notepad.

Step 2:
Add the following text...

Step 3:
Save the file as a plain text file. Name the file ".htaccess"

Step 4:
Upload the .htaccess file in ASCII mode to your web space using an FTP application.

Step 5:
Try it out. Upload a php script to your web space (script.php). Rename the php script to use a .html extension (script.html). Go to the script in a web browser.