Cherokee Basics
Getting started

Why Cherokee?Feature overview.
RequirementsHardware and software requirements.
DownloadWhere and how to download Cherokee.
InstallationInstallation instructions.
Upgrading CherokeeUpgrading from a previous release?
Running CherokeeBasic steps to run Cherokee.

Configuration
Set up process explained

WalkthroughOverview and walkthrough.
HomeMain section.
StatusServer status information.
GeneralGeneral settings.
Virtual serversServer definition.
Information SourcesDefining information sources.
AdvancedAdvanced tweaking. Not for the faint of heart.
WizardsConfiguration assistants for many known scenarios.

Cookbook
Recipes for specific tasks

AuthenticationHow to set up authenticated resources.
Cross compilationHow to cross compile Cherokee.
DBSlayerHow to set up DBSlayer MySQL balancing.
Embedding CherokeeCherokee on embedded devices.
MaintenanceSeamlessly switching to maintenance mode.
Managing logsSeamless log rotation.
Optimizing CherokeeRecommendations and tweaks.
RedirectionsCommon redirection examples.
SSL/TLS, certsSecure connection tips.
HTTPS acceleratorSSL Offloading with Cherokee.
StreamingHow to stream Audio and Video with Cherokee.
PHPHow to run PHP apps with Cherokee.
Ruby on RailsHow to run Ruby on Rails apps with Cherokee.
DjangoHow to run Django apps with Cherokee.
ColdFusionHow to run ColdFusion apps with Cherokee.
DrupalHow to run Drupal on Cherokee.
WordpressHow to run Wordpress on Cherokee.
AlfrescoHow to run Alfresco on Cherokee.
ASP.NETHow to run ASP.NET apps with Mono and Cherokee.
GlassFishHow to run Java apps with Cherokee.
JoomlaHow to run Joomla on Cherokee.
KumbiaHow to run Kumbia apps with Cherokee.
LiferayHow to run Liferay on Cherokee.
MailmanHow to run Mailman on Cherokee.
MoodleHow to run Moodle on Cherokee.
NagiosHow to run Nagios with Cheroke.
phpBBHow to run phpBB on Cherokee.
phpMyAdminHow to run phpMyAdmin on Cherokee.
SugarCRMHow to run SugarCRM on Cherokee.
Concrete5How to run Concrete5 on Cherokee.
SymfonyHow to run Symfony apps with Cherokee.
TracHow to run Trac on Cherokee.
ZendHow to run Zend apps with Cherokee.
uWSGISetting up Cherokee for uWSGI.
HTTP to HTTPSHow to redirect all traffic from HTTP to HTTPS.
Restricting traffic by IPHow to restrict traffic based on incoming IP.
Domain matchingMatching domains and subdomains with Cherokee.

Modules
Information about the standard modules

HandlersConnection handling modules.
ValidatorsAuthentication mechanisms.
EncodersCompression and filtering.
LoggersLogging mechanisms.
BalancersLoad balancing strategies.

Other information
Miscellaneous

FAQList of Frequently Asked Questions.
Front-line CacheSpecifics of the Caching subsystem.
System TuningTweaking the OS for maximum performance.
Cherokee GoodiesInteresting Cherokee features.
Usage graphsInformation on the several graphs available.
SignalsSignals supported by Cherokee.
CommunityMore information sources.
Common errorsSome typical production errors and their cause.
Man pagesDetails about each program bundled with Cherokee.

Development info
Things of interest to developers

QuickstartWhere to start?
DebuggingResources available to debug Cherokee.
cherokee.confInternal configuration specs.
Quality AssuranceSome info about QA in Cherokee.
CTKDive into the Cherokee Toolkit.

Cherokee’s Distribution
Web Apps distribution on Cherokee

Introduction to DevelopmentHow to build a package.

Cherokee Basics

Index → Getting started

Requirements

Hardware

Cherokee is very light, completely modular and it can be tailored to your specific needs. As such, disk requirements will vary depending on the options selected for the building process. A static build for embedded devices can occupy as little as 200KB, give or take.

In terms of processing power, it has been known to work with as little as 133Mhz ARM processors. It could very well work on something smaller, but we haven’t really had the chance to try it out.

Software

Cherokee has no dependencies besides a standard libc. Everything else is optional. Obviously anything beyond serving mere static content must be available for Cherokee to correctly execute the task. This means you will need PHP if you want Cherokee to serve PHP dynamic content, the rrdtool package if you intend to collect statistics to render usage graphs, MySQL or LDAP development libraries if you want built-in support for these as authentication mechanisms for protected content, ffmpeg development libraries to build the streaming module, and so on.

If you intend to build Cherokee from source however, you will need several tools and libraries.

Building tools: Cherokee is built on top of the autoconf and automake tools, hence your system has to have some basic system programs like an sh shell, make and an ANSI C compiler. We have compiled Cherokee in various platforms with different compilers, so it shouldn’t be a problem.
Python: Cherokee has an administration web interface written in Python, so if you intend to use cherokee-admin you will need this. For disk space constrained environments this won’t be an issue since you would probably want to make a minimal install in your destination host, preconfigured elsewhere. This programming language is also used to generate the documentation, and Cherokee includes a number of Quality Assurance tests written in it as well. If you are planning to contribute code into the project, or you just want to test everything is working in the server, you will need a Python interpreter installed on your system. The main Python releases targeted by our developers are 2.4, 2.5 and 2.6. Anything other than that is not guaranteed to work at the moment.
If you are building Cherokee in a non-POSIX compliant platform such as Windows, you will need a POSIX threads implementation. Although you can disable the usage at compilation time and do without this, it will have a dramatic impact in scalability.
If you want to make a build that serves secure content, you will need TLS libraries. Cherokee ships with support for the OpenSSL backend, but the architecture is completely modular and any other backend can be implemented. You need to have the development files of the chosen backend libraries in order to build a package that suits your needs.