NOTE WELL: We no longer maintain the CERN httpd. In particular, there is at least one known Y2K-related bug in the latest (July 1996) release of this software.

In May 1996, we released Jigsaw, W3C's leading-edge Web server platform, providing a sample HTTP 1.1 implementation and a variety of other features on top of an advanced architecture implemented in Java.

CERN httpd

The CERN httpd (also known as W3C httpd) is a generic public domain full-featured hypertext server which can be used as a regular HTTP server. The server is typically running on port 80 to serve hypertext and other documents but it can also serve as a proxy -- a server on a firewall machine -- that provides access for people inside a firewall to the outside world. When running as proxy httpd may be configured to do caching of documents resulting in faster response times.

Authors

Ari Luotonen, Henrik Frystyk Nielsen, Tim Berners-Lee

Status

Version 3.0A is the final version. It was generated July 15 1996. We may give out security patches but future server work has been moved to the Java based Jigsaw server. You can also read the W3C position statement on the CERN server

Platforms

The server runs on most Unix platforms. See also the VMS version.

Getting the Source Code

The latest source code is available in the following formats:

• compressed tar file
• gzip'ed tar file

You can also browse through the latest source files on our server!

A packet contains the following components:

• The code definitions (*.c)
• The interface definitions (*.h)
• A Makefile for building the daemon

You can see how to unpack and compile the software in the README file, and you can find more information on how to install the daemon in the Installation Guide and how to use it in the User's Guide.

Copyright

W3C httpd is covered by the MIT Copyright Statement, and with acknowledgement to CERN

Patches, Bug fixes, etc..

When you have modifications and want them to go into our code base then please fill out the form for Corrections, Modifications, and Patches and send it to us. Otherwise we can not use the patch!

More information

• Documentation Overview
• Release Notes
• Installation Guide
• Known Bugs and Patches
• Administration and Customization
• Httpd Utilities: htadm, htimage, cgiparse and cgiutils
• FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
• Change history
• Older versions
• Compiling for WAIS access

Features include

• Can act as proxy server for HTTP, FTP, Gopher, WAIS, News, etc if needed
• Can perform caching when running as a proxy
• server-side executable scripts.
• Forms and clickable image support; see demo.
• Index search interface as a CGI/1.0 script.
• Provides protection against unauthorized access.
• Automatically generates hypertext view of directory tree
• Uses "README" files to document directory listings
• Configurable file suffix <=> content type mapping
• Handles multiple file formats, encodings and languages of same file, selects format apropriate for client capabilities
• Document name to filename mapping for longer-lived document names