Run python cgi script in browser w/o errors

Question

I'm trying to run it on localhost. A short introduction. Some links I've read before post: How to run Python CGI script How can I run Python CGI scripts on my web server? most precise: Need Help to Configure apache Server to run CGI Script written in Python And also official http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/misc/FAQ.html#CGIoutsideScriptAlias http://www.editrocket.com/articles/python_apache_windows.html and other...

All steps they suggest to configure Apache for .cgi and .py scripts: 1)

install libapache2-mod-wsgi

[done] 2) check the script is executable and available for apache ~$ ls -lah /var/www/cgi-bin/cgi101.py

-rwxrwxr-x 1 user user 318 2012-11-27 03:03 /var/www/cgi-bin/cgi101.py

3) edit /etc/apache2/sites-available/default[updated to actual]:

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost

    DocumentRoot /var/www
    <Directory />
        Options FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride None
    </Directory>
#   <Directory /var/www>
    <Directory /var/www/cgi-bin>
        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews ExecCGI
        AllowOverride None
        Order allow,deny
        allow from all
        AddHandler cgi-script .cgi .py
#       AddHandler wsgi-script .wsgi
    </Directory>

    ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/
    <Directory "/usr/lib/cgi-bin">
        AllowOverride None
        Options +ExecCGI -MultiViews +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>

    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log

    # Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit,
    # alert, emerg.
    LogLevel warn

    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

    Alias /doc/ "/usr/share/doc/"
    <Directory "/usr/share/doc/">
        Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride None
        Order deny,allow
        Deny from all
        Allow from 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0 ::1/128
    </Directory>

</VirtualHost>

or with

<Directory /var/www/cgi-bin>

then restart Apache

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

and finally, try the script. Something like[updated to actual]:

#!/usr/bin/python3

import cgi
form = cgi.FieldStorage()
# parse form data
print('Content-type: text/html\n')
# hdr plus blank line
print('<title>Reply Page</title>')
# html reply page
if not 'user' in form:
  print('<h1>Who are you?</h1>')
else:
  print('<h1>Hello <i>%s</i>!</h1>' % cgi.escape(form['user'].value))

On the output i get

404 Not found

error. WTH? I've tried both and /var/www. And my python path to python3:

~$ ls -lah /usr/bin/python*
...
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    9 2011-10-05 23:53 /usr/bin/python3 -> python3.2
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   11 2012-10-20 06:17 /usr/bin/python3.2 -> python3.2mu
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 2.8M 2012-10-20 06:17 /usr/bin/python3.2mu
...

that's why i use

#!/usr/bin/python3

Thanks in advance!

[updated] /var/log/apache2/error.log

[Tue Nov 27 13:47:56 2012] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] script not found or unable to stat: /usr/lib/cgi-bin/script.py, referer: http://localhost/cgi1$

Why it looks for script.py in /usr/lib/ ??

[updated] I closed my eyes while reading the lines

 ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/
<Directory "/usr/lib/cgi-bin">

It must be path to executable .cgi or .py in /var/www/cgi-bin. Thanks Evert and everyone!

404: what URL are you accessing? And perhaps other parts of your config are incomplete? Assuming there's a default index.html , do you get to see that one at least when visiting 127.0.0.1 ? — user707650
i open /localhost/cgi-bin/script.py - the actual path where the script is and where apache has access. There is no index.html/index.php/index.else — boldnik
Surely you mean http://localhost/cgi-bin/script.py? My apache configuration is a bit rusty, but possibly, you can leave off the .py extension there as well. But for your (and our) sanity, it'd be good to put an (empty) index.html file in /var/www/ and see if you can at least find that. — user707650
Yes! localhost/index.html and localhost/index.php can be found! Even <?php phpinfo() ?> testpage works fine. But it is about php, not python... — boldnik
No, it's about an executable, whether that be shell, python, perl or php (the php you're seeing goes through modphp, not modcgi). You could try a perl script instead, but that will probably also fail. But that's beside the point. — user707650

Unknown Unknown · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-27T13:55:15

At a guess, you have your script in /var/www/cgi-bin/cgi101.py.

But your Apache configuration has this:

ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/
    <Directory "/usr/lib/cgi-bin">
        AllowOverride None
        Options +ExecCGI -MultiViews +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>

and add the AddHandler directive in there as well:

ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/
    <Directory "/usr/lib/cgi-bin">
        AllowOverride None
        Options +ExecCGI -MultiViews +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
        AddHandler cgi-script .cgi .py
    </Directory>

(and perhaps remove the section above this one, for the /var/www directory.)

I would then put your script at /usr/lib/cgi-bin/cgi101.py, and try again.

The Apache tutorial seems actually pretty clear on this.

Run python cgi script in browser w/o errors

2 Answers