Lighttpd
Contents
Lighttpd
Lighttpd (pronounced "lighty") is a free and open-source web server known for its speed, security, flexibility, and compliance with web standards. It is designed to be lightweight and efficient, making it a popular choice for high-performance environments and embedded systems. Pulsed Media is using Lighttpd in their seedboxes to support user-friendly GUI. You can check out Pulsed Media Software Stack Lighttpd config in their GitHub Here: [ https://github.com/MagnaCapax/PMSS/blob/main/etc/seedbox/config/template.lighttpd] Creator of Pulsed Media Software Stack (PMSS)is Pulsed Media owner Aleksi, who has made most optimized and userfriendly lighttpd configuration.
History
Lighttpd was initially released in March 2003 by Jan Kneschke. It was developed to address the need for a web server that could handle a large number of connections with minimal resource usage, especially for high-traffic websites.
Features
Lighttpd boasts a range of features that contribute to its efficiency and performance:
- Low CPU and Memory Usage: Optimized for speed and minimal resource consumption.
- FastCGI, SCGI, and CGI Support: Enables efficient execution of dynamic content through various interfaces.
- mod_rewrite: URL rewriting engine for clean and user-friendly URLs.
- TLS/SSL Support: Secure communication over HTTPS.
- Authentication: Supports various authentication methods, including HTTP basic and digest authentication.
- Server-Side Includes (SSI): For dynamically generating content on the server.
- Virtual Hosting: Allows hosting multiple websites on a single server instance.
- Load Balancing: Can distribute incoming requests across multiple backend servers.
- Output Compression (mod_compress): Reduces bandwidth usage by compressing content.
- Pipelined Requests: Improves performance by allowing multiple requests to be sent over a single connection.
- Chroot Support: Enhances security by confining the server process to a specific directory.
- Event-Driven Architecture: Utilizes a non-blocking I/O model for efficient handling of concurrent connections.
Use Cases
Due to its performance characteristics, Lighttpd is often used in the following scenarios:
- High-traffic websites and web applications.
- Embedded systems and devices with limited resources.
- As a reverse proxy or load balancer.
- Content delivery networks (CDNs).
- Static file serving.
Configuration
Lighttpd's configuration is managed through a simple and clear configuration file, typically `lighttpd.conf`. The syntax is easy to understand and allows for fine-grained control over server behavior.
An example of a basic `lighttpd.conf` snippet:
server.port = 80 server.document-root = "/var/www/html"
mimetype.assign = ( ".html" => "text/html", ".txt" => "text/plain", ".jpg" => "image/jpeg", ".png" => "image/png" )
index-file.names = ( "index.html", "index.php" )
dir-listing.activate = "enable"
Example for FastCGI with PHP
fastcgi.server = ( ".php" => ( "localhost" => ( "socket" => "/run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock", "broken-log-fd" => "enable" ) ) )
But if you want to see Pulsed Media lighttpd configurations, it is available in Pulsed Media GitHub here:[ https://github.com/MagnaCapax/PMSS/blob/main/etc/seedbox/config/template.lighttpd]
As PMSS is FOSS, it is available for everyone.
Advantages
- High Performance: Efficiently handles a large number of concurrent connections.
- Low Resource Consumption: Ideal for systems with limited CPU and memory.
- Security: Designed with security in mind, offering features like chroot.
- Flexibility: Modular design allows for easy extension and customization.
- Active Development: Continuously maintained and improved by its community.
Disadvantages
- While very capable, it may have a steeper learning curve for users accustomed to more feature-rich (and resource-heavy) servers like Apache or Nginx.
- Community support, while active, might be smaller compared to more widely adopted web servers.
