Introduction
Earlier, when we looked at HTTP in Chapter 2, we discussed how HTTP connects the client (typically a web browser) to a server, a specialized program running on a computer connected to the internet that serves web pages (and other files) in response to a HTTP request. This server is what makes your webpages available on the World Wide Web.
Somewhat confusingly, web developers and IT professionals commonly refer to both the program serving HTTP requests and the hardware it runs on as a server. To help avoid this confusion in this chapter, we’ll refer to the computer running the server as the server hardware and the software program serving HTTP requests as the server program.
In this chapter, we will look at exactly what a server (both hardware and program) is, and how it is made accessible on the web. Then we’ll examine some of the most widely used of the server programs: Apache, Nginx, and IIS. We’ll also discuss setting up domain names and security certificates - all the steps necessary for hosting your own websites.
We will look at setting up these servers to serve static content - the kinds of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files you’ve been writing in this class. However, it is important to understand that a web server can also dynamically create files to send as a response - as you see every time you use a search engine or an online store. In these cases, the HTML they send is created by the server in response to the requests made by you, the user. This kind of dynamic web content creation is the subject of the follow-on courses, CC 515 - Full Stack Web Development and CIS 526 - Web Application Development.