Wed, 10 Dec 2014
Apache Reload Bug
Yesterday I discovered something that I suspect to be a bug in Apache: we
use the same config file for many of our systems, and put the specific parts inside the <IfDefine> blocks.
When the Apache started, it worked as expected. However, after a graceful reload, it seems that some instances of Apache started interpreting some <IfDefine> blocks, even though the particular <IfDefine> string was not present in their command line.
I have even verified this by creating a dummy <IfDefine> block with a non-existent directive - the Apache server has started correctly, but died on a syntax error in the config file after a graceful reload.
Long story short, I have upgraded to the latest-greatest version of Apache, and the problem has disappeared. Has anybody seen something similar?