Creating Virtual Hosts in Apache

I am sure most of what I am writing is available on the Apache Documentation but posting this so that it will be helpful for Users to configure Simple Virtual Hosts easily and faster. 

To start with "What is a VIRTUAL HOST"??

It is a method of Hosting multiple domain names on a server using a Single IP address. This allows sharing of resources of one server such as memory, processor cycles etc which lead to efficient utilization of the resources increasing the efficiency.

Now all of us know Apache is the HTTP Web Server which stores and maintains large number of Websites, It is designed to achieve a very high performance. To configure Virtual Host in Apache is very simple. It involves performing a few steps:


1.Firstly, Install the new Apache Web Server from the http://httpd.apache.org/ site. The downloads for all the OS are available.

2.After installation the Apache will be present in the following directory by default in case of Windows:  "C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.X" or "C:\Program Files (x86)\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.X" in case if 64-bit machines.The httpd.conf file is present under the "conf" folder.
To create Virtual hosts define the following entries in the httpd.conf file which is present under "C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.X\conf" directory.

3.Open the file.In the beginning of the file there will be an entry to Listen on a particular port. By default the port is 80.
To create Virtual Hosts which run on port 81 and 82, include the lines after the Listen 80 line ie:            
    Listen 80 
    Listen 81                
    Listen 82
   .  
 
4.Now go to the bottom of the file and search for the entry:
         # Virtual hosts
         #Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf
       
5.Add the following under the entry:
          NameVirtualHost *:81
          NameVirtualHost *:82


         <VirtualHost *:81>
         DocumentRoot "C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.2\htdocs1"
         ServerName www.example1.com


         # Other directives here


         </VirtualHost>


         <VirtualHost *:82>
        DocumentRoot "C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.2\htdocs2"
        ServerName www.example2.org


        # Other directives here


       </VirtualHost>
    Note: The directory htdocs1 and htdocs2 should be created.
 6.Edit the hosts file located under the System32/drivers/etc/ directory. Add the two entries:
           <ip_address of the machine> www.example1.com         
           <ip_address of the machine> www.example2.com

 7.Save the file and close it. restart the Apache Web server either from Services or console.
 Access the link : http://www.example1.com:81/. It should redirect the control to the htdocs1 directory.Place few files in this directory. It must be served.
 Similary, accessing http://www.example2.com:82/ should be redirected to htdocs2 directory. To access the htdocs folder http://localhost:80/ will do.

Thus, We have setup a dedicated Virtual Host setup in Apache.