Mod_cfml isn't triggering on the first request

Zackster · April 28, 2021, 11:45am

I’m running apache 2.4.46, and rather than yet another commandbox instance, I’m now just running lucee docs via a virtualhost with mod_cfml.

If i restart Lucee and open http://docs.localhost/ I get the default welcome to lucee page, coz mod_cfml hasn’t kicked in and told tomcat how to handle this host.

If I then open http://docs.localhost/index.cfm, then mod_cfml kicks in and tomcat gets educated by mod_cfml and then everything subsequently works, including just good old http://docs.localhost/

the docs localserver all runs thru application.cfc onRequestStart and everything, is served via lucee (js,images,css)

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName  docs.localhost
    DocumentRoot  "C:/work/lucee-docs/server"
	ErrorLog "logs/docs-error.log"
	CustomLog "logs/docs-access.log" common
    DirectoryIndex index.cfm
    RewriteEngine on
    RewriteRule ^(.*)(/.*)?$ ajp://{http_host}:8009$1$2 [P]
</VirtualHost>

any suggestions?

Terry_Whitney · April 28, 2021, 1:07pm

edit the /winroot/system32/drivers/etc/hosts

typically c:\windows\system32\drives\etc\hosts

add
127.0.0.1 docs.localhost

save the file and reboot

Zackster · April 28, 2021, 1:25pm

thanks, but I’m pretty sure that’s not my problem?

pretty sure the problem is mod_cfml only kicking in when it encounters a request with a file extension of .cfm or .cfc

Terry_Whitney · April 28, 2021, 1:42pm

in your main configuration or vhost add

LoadModule modcfml_module modules/mod_cfml.so
CFMLHandlers “.cfm .cfc .cfml”
LogHeaders false
LogHandlers false
LogAliases false
VDirHeader false

Zackster · April 28, 2021, 1:50pm

thanks, but I think I made it pretty clear in my original post, that it’s all configured and working

andreas · April 28, 2021, 1:50pm

I’d have guessed that you haven’t added any DirectoryIndex index.cfm in your virtual host configuration, but that’s not the case. I’ll also take a look at this and take the chance installing apache on Windows. Never did that. As soon as I get home I’ll check it.

Terry_Whitney · April 28, 2021, 1:58pm

I made it as unclear as can be that Windows 10 name resolution is absolutely crap.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/microsoft-tcp-ip-host-name-resolution-order-dae00cc9-7e9c-c0cc-8360-477b99cb978a

Having DNS servers configured in a client’s TCP/IP configuration, but the server is not available to the client usually causes this. Because the TCP/IP protocol assumes an unreliable network, a client will repeatedly attempt to connect to a DNS server before abandoning the attempted query. The client will then attempt to query a second DNS server if one is configured and take the same time to fail. Only then will the client step through to NetBIOS name resolution as described above.

There are three ways to approach this issue.

If the host name is correctly entered in a host file, it will be resolved before the client attempts to query DNS. This solution works well if DNS servers are temporarily unreachable and there is a small number of host names that need to be resolved . Manually configuring Hosts files for numerous clients may be prohibitive.

Zackster · April 28, 2021, 4:49pm

yeah, it totally sucks that browsers support *.localhost and windows doesn’t OOTB

but it’s working nicely for me

Zackster · May 3, 2021, 11:26am

I think the problem is that mod_cfml is triggering on the uri, as opposed to the filename? @paul_f

github.com

viviotech/mod_cfml/blob/master/C/mod_cfml.c#L385


      
          	// security: check if there already is a DocRoot header coming in,
          	// and if so, remove the header
          	if (apr_table_get(r->headers_in, "X-Tomcat-DocRoot") != NULL) {
          		ap_log_error(APLOG_MARK, APLOG_ERR, 0, r->server,
          			"Incoming X-Tomcat-DocRoot header found, while we have not set it yet! Header value => %s",
          			apr_table_get(r->headers_in, "X-Tomcat-DocRoot"));
          		apr_table_unset(r->headers_in, "X-Tomcat-DocRoot");
          	}
          
          
	// get the file extension
          	ext = strrchr(r->uri, '.');
          
          
	// if no file extension, get outta here
          	if (!ext) {
          		return DECLINED;
          	}
          
          
	// does the extension contain path_info at the end?
          	if (strstr(ext, slash))
          	{
          		if (config.AJPPathInfoHeader == 1) {

github.com/viviotech/mod_cfml

mod_cfml checks uri rather than filename

opened 11:26AM - 05 May 21 UTC

zspitzer

mod_cfml doesn't trigger when a `directoryIndex index.cfm` directive is used, on… a first request to just /, which ends up with the default welcome to lucee page on port 8888 the reason is it's checking the `r->uri`, as opposed to the actual file which is handling the request? i.e. `r->filename` it works after any other request has triggered mod_cfml and tomcat knows about the context https://github.com/viviotech/mod_cfml/blob/master/C/mod_cfml.c#L385 https://dev.lucee.org/t/mod-cfml-isnt-triggering-on-the-first-request/8263 It looks like we are almost doing more processing, to avoid adding the extra headers, than just adding the headers involves?

thefalken · May 11, 2021, 8:45am

The exact same thing happens with mod_cfml and Taffy - our production instances all had mod_cfml removed and a health check made to poll ‘/index.cfm’ to work around this.

For our dev Docker images, it’s just something we live with; the browser remembers the URL so it’s not much extra effort.

Zackster · May 11, 2021, 10:55am

I’m kinda wondering if all the checks to avoid adding a few headers in mod_cfml is more expensive than just adding the headers…

checking the filename extension is cheaper that checking the uri with SES urls

it’s all c, so honestly, the performance difference will be a rounding error

thefalken · May 11, 2021, 3:27pm

“browsers support *.localhost”

In what way ? We’re still banging lines into hosts files to support local development …

bdw429s · May 11, 2021, 3:33pm

@thefalken Browsers will basically resolve any foobar.localhost domain to 127.0.01. I put some changes in the last version of CommandBox to “support” this. basically by detecting any time a user uses an xxx.localhost domain that isn’t in the hosts file and I swap it out for just localhost in the background. browsers will resolve the domain, but the rest of your PC’s networking stack will refuse to recognize it (including java) without a hosts file. (which is why I just swap it out for you so the server actually binds on localhost but we still open the browser URLs to your subdomain.

That being said, I still use the hostupdater module just so I can bind the same port to more than one local server.

thefalken · May 11, 2021, 3:35pm

I had no idea this was a thing ! When did this happen ?

Our dev tooling bundles Lucee (etc) inside Docker, and set’s it up so (local Docker mapping)/foo is available as https://foo.localdomain

Sounds like I just need to add the same thing for foo.localhost and our hosts file editing days are over !

Zackster · May 11, 2021, 4:05pm

I think it might have always been that way, I’ve always found it a bit quirky, finally bothered to investigate

(i meant the mod_cfml being triggered on uri rather than resolved filename)