Newbie running Zope(?)

[Paul Everitt]

shape wrote:
> the past few days I've figured out why I got so frustrated using
> Microsoft products. The whole world seems to think that the stuff MS
> sells works just fine - while you get the feeling it never works
> (there's always some incredibly stupid thing you should know and do in
> order to make it do what it was intended for).
> 
> It's the main reason I lately started using Linux.
> 
> Trying to get Zope (1.10something) to talk with Apache (1.3.3) has all
> the holemarks of the same frustrating Microsoft setup (even the failure
> message looks the same).

Getting Apache and Zope talking is hard, due to mysteries on both ends. 
In this case I think it's Apache's fault.  But improving the error
reporting is something we're striving for in Zope 1.11 and beyond:

  http://www.egroups.com/group/zope/4482.html

> Can anyone help me solve this mystery:
> 
> Python 1.5.1 (#1, Sep  3 1998, 22:51:17)  [GCC 2.7.2.3]
> Apache/1.3.3 (Unix)  (Red Hat/Linux)

PCGI uses mod_rewrite to get around Apache's decision not to pass
authentication headers to CGI scripts.  In your case, RedHat shipped a
broken build of Apache.  It won't load the mod_rewrite module, according
to reports on the Zope list:

  http://www.egroups.com/group/zope/929.html

The main reason it is so frustrating to get Apache and Zope working
together is our long-ago decision to mimic FastCGI and have the web
server be responsible for launching to process.

We are quickly getting rid of that and moving to a more classic daemon
model.  Many of the really unfathomable things during about Zope will
become, IMO, a lot clearer.  If you have any experience in
cross-platform daemon management, please pitch in with suggestions!

--Paul