microHOWTO: Configure Apache as a reverse proxy

microHOWTO: Configure Apache as a reverse proxy

To configure an Apache HTTP server as a reverse proxy, forwarding requests for a given set of URLs to another server

Background

A proxy server is one which forwards client requests to another server instead of fulfilling them itself. There are two main types:

• A forward proxy forwards to an arbitrary destination, typically on behalf of a particular set of clients.
• A reverse proxy forwards to a fixed destination, typically on behalf of arbitrary clients.

Common uses of a reverse HTTP proxy include:

• incorporating content hosted by one server into a larger website;
• making content hosted on a private network accessible from the public Internet; or
• adding features such as authentication or encryption to an existing web site that would not otherwise be able to support them.

Scenario

Suppose you have a web server attached to a private network which hosts the web site http://internal.example.com/. Most of the content of this site is intended to stay within the private network, but there is one part of it rooted at the URL http://internal.example.com/public which you want to be accessible from the outside world.

To achieve this you are able to make use of the web server that hosts your public web site at http://www.example.com/. It is located in a DMZ with access both to your private network and from the public Internet. You intend to use this public server as a proxy, incorporating content from the private server into the existing public web site. The public URL of the proxied content should be http://www.example.com/internal.

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