Do I have to duplicate the Virtualhost directives for port 80 and 443?

Question

I have a long and intricate list of <VirtualHost> directives, and I have to duplicate them into separate <VirtualHost> groups for ports 80 and 443 because I'm using SSL. Whenever I update my mod_rewrite rules I have to remember to do it in both places or else I'll break my app... this duplication is asking for trouble. Is there a way to combine or alias these -- the only difference between the two is that the port 443 version contains the SSLEngine, SSLCertificateFile and the like.

My <Virtualhost> contains many mod_rewrite rules, LocationMatch rules, CGI directives, etc.

Also, I can't use .htaccess files.

Answer 1

Can't you use an include directive to include the common rules. here

article

eg.:

<VirtualHost _default_:80>
    ...
    include conf/common_rule.conf
</VirtualHost>

<VirtualHost _default_:*>
    ...
    include conf/common_rule.conf
</VirtualHost> 

<VirtualHost _default_:443>
    ... #SSL rules
    include conf/common_rule.conf
</VirtualHost>

Answer 2

You could put the common configuration into a separate file and include it in both VirtualHost segments:

Include conf/common.conf

Include conf/common.conf (put your ssl specific cofiguration stuff here ...)

Answer 3

You could also specify the common directives within a container instead of within the itself. That's what I do, mostly because I prefer mod_rewrite rules at the directory level instead of at the server level, but it should work equally well for you too.