Ruby on Rails
FastCGI on OS X (Version #9)

Here’s a step-by-step guide for making Rails work with \FastCGI?.

If your system doesn’t have it already (OS X doesn’t), download and install \FastCGI Development Kit (http://www.fastcgi.com/dist/fcgi.tar.gz)


$ curl fastcgi.com/dist/fcgi-2.4.0.tar.gz | tar xfz -
$ cd fcgi-2.4.0
$ ./configure
$ make
$ sudo make install

Install FCGI bindings for Ruby:


$ sudo gem install fcgi

If the installation fails with message “checking for fcgiapp.h… no”, you probably don’t have the \FastCGI Dev Kit installed (and you skipped steps 1 and 2 :p).

Question: At this point, I get “checking for fcgiapp.h…yes”, followed by

checking for FCGX_Accept() in -lfcgi... no</pre>What am I missing?

LB: To the best of my knowledge, on OS X, the mkmf mechanism in extconf.rb is causing some trouble. It attempts to pass the -arch i386 flag durings its compiler tests (resulting in a successful search for the header file, but a failed link against libfcgi). I disabled those tests and just proceeded anyway. I could not find a way to force extconf.rb to use ppc.

Note: as of 3/22/05 there is a memory leak you may want to patch

Download mod_fastcgi compiled for Mac OS X Panther’s Apache (this is also compatible with Tiger’s version) (http://andreas-s.net/download/mod_fastcgi-panther-2.4.2.tar.gz)


$ curl andreas-s.net/download/mod_fastcgi-panther-2.4.2.tar.gz | tar xfz -
$ cd mod_fastcgi-panther-2.4.2
$ sudo cp mod_fastcgi.so /usr/libexec/httpd/
$ sudo chmod 755 /usr/libexec/httpd/mod_fastcgi.so

if you’re running the Serverlogistics Complete Apache2 package, you can download the fcgi module from versiontracker as a dmg/pkg (these work in Tiger). Just skip the “AddModule mod_fastcgi.c” line below (you’ll find your conf file in /Library/Apache2/conf/httpd.conf)

Add the following lines to your httpd.conf file (/etc/httpd/httpd.conf on Panther):


LoadModule fastcgi_module libexec/httpd/mod_fastcgi.so

<IfModule mod_fastcgi.c>
    FastCgiIpcDir /tmp/fcgi_ipc/
    AddHandler fastcgi-script .fcgi
</IfModule>

<VirtualHost *:80>
   ServerName rails
   DocumentRoot /path/to/application/public/
   ErrorLog /path/to/application/log/apache.log

   <Directory /path/to/application/public/>
      Options ExecCGI FollowSymLinks
      
      # Change this line for the one under
      # AddHandler cgi-script .cgi
      AddHandler fastcgi-script .fcgi

      AllowOverride all
      Order allow,deny
      Allow from all
   </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

Edit the .htaccess file in your_rails_app/public. Change the row


\RewriteBase /dispatch.cgi


\RewriteBase /dispatch.fcgi

If you are running rails .10.x I believe the following should work (instead of \RewriteBase) in public/.htaccess change:


RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /dispatch.cgi?$1 [QSA,L]


RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /dispatch.fcgi?$1 [QSA,L]

and maybe you have to change in your public/dispatch.fcgi the line


require 'fcgi'


require 'rubygems'
require_gem 'fcgi'

Restart apache:
```
$ sudo apachectl restart
```

Done! Your Rails app should now be using FastCGI?.

Question?

- How do I know my application is using FCGI. is it just forced to or can I look at something and see it is loaded correcty.

A: check your server logs. or just move the dispatch.cgi to another directory to make sure the web server is reading the dispatch.fcgi

CAUTION: If you use blanks in your directory path fastCGI will not work.