Have Apache send a response defined in the configuration file

Question

I would like my Apache VirtualHost to respond with the same content, no matter the URL requested. I know it is possible with an additional file containing the static response (https://askubuntu.com/a/485017/600828).

However, my response content is very short and simple, and I would like to know if it is possible to include it in the Apache site config file directly (so that I have only one file to deploy & maintain instead of 2).

nginx can do this very easily with [`return`](https://nginx.org/r/return), i.e.: `return 200 "Hi there";` but I can't find anything relevant for Apache. — Michael Hampton, Feb 25 '19 at 17:18
Indeed @MichaelHampton. The reason I want to do it with Apache is that I am using Apache as a reverse proxy to multiple apps, so if I use anything else it would be behind Apache anyway. — Nathan.Eilisha Shiraini, Feb 25 '19 at 20:32

score 1 · Answer 1 · edited Dec 27 '19 at 01:02

You can define the text for 404 and other error conditions in the main Apache httpd.conf with the ErrorDocument directive https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/custom-error.html

When your documentRoot is empty and you don’t permit directory listings requests for your bare domain should trigger an 403 error and all other URLs will trigger a 404 so with the following (ugly) solution you get what you want

<VirtualHost *:80>
   ServerName www.example.com
   DocumentRoot /path/to/empty/dir 
   ErrorDocument 404 "some text"
   ErrorDocument 403 "some text"
   .,.
 </VirtualHost >

Please note that your some text needs to be long enough to prevent certain browsers from displaying their own friendly error messages

Thank you for your suggestion. It is an interesting workaround, but I'd rather have a success code returned... Upvoted anyway. — Nathan.Eilisha Shiraini, Feb 25 '19 at 20:34

Have Apache send a response defined in the configuration file

1 Answers1