[aroman]

Good read, but despite being a major proponent of Node.js and many of the ideals it seeks to embrace, I'm not sure I'm comfortable with calling Apache "archaic". It's not like IE6, which has objectively no redeeming value as a modern platform target -- it did back in the day for sure, and is still relevant in some spheres, but overall I don't think anyone (even Microsoft) would argue that IE6 is "archaic".

But to call Apache, one of the most popular and successful actively developed webservers _archaic_? I think that's a bit much. It's not inherently bad just because it's not really targeting the C10K problem... just different.

[A minor nitpick to be sure, but it bothered me nonetheless as I feel like I'm seeing this "Threads bad. Async good." rhetoric passed around as fact all over the place and it's starting to feel a bit like Animal Farm ;)]

[gnw]

You're perfectly correct, and Apache has and continues to serve as one of the most successful and widely deployed web servers to date. That said, in the context of more conveniently architecting for high volumes of traffic, Apache was conceived in a time of fundamentally different problems, and in that respect it can be viewed as a more antiquated option when scoping out the landscape of appropriate web server software.

I did not intend any pejorative connotations by calling it "archaic". I just wanted to emphasise that it has been eclipsed by newer software following different design paradigms better suited to this kind of problem.

[jiggy2011]

Precisely , I've used Apache for yeeeeeears and see exactly 0 ROI in switching to something else.

[d0m]

An apache expert would probably prove me wrong, but I've found it quite simpler to use nginx to dispatch multiple domains to different backend types. For instance, I have a couple nodes, one wordpress blog and lots of small django websites.

[jiggy2011]

Apache reverse proxies are very easy to setup once you have done it once. I've reverse proxied Tomcat,PHP and ASP.Net apps just by copy-pasting a few lines in the config.

The main strength of Apache though is the ability to separate apps run on the same system by different users without reverse proxy via .htaccess files and stuff like mod_php.

Apache also has an excellent security track record considering it's vast numbers of deployments and years of service.

Perhaps though if you are a green field developer with no Apache experience and deploy with stuff like EC2 you may as well just skip apache and go straight to nginx.

What nginx's security record will look like in 10 years if it becomes as popular as Apache though remains to be seen.

[lucian1900]

Also, now apache has an event worker and can even use two types of workers at the same time.