Python + Apache with Mod_wsgi in Windows

I intended to write this technical note for fun and possibly as my reference in the future. I have tested it on my Windows box as my consideration that there has been a lot of similar stuff written for Linux. I often use Windows for my previous small projects as the client required.

Installing python, django and any other stuffs that needed to make it work are beyond the scope of this note since I think that there's no big challenges to make them work perfectly, especially in development environment. Challenges will occur as developers run into production.


My resources:
Windows XP Pro SP3
Apache 2.2.17 (WAMP 2.1)
mod_wsgi
Python 2.7

My apache's document root is located at: c:/wamp/www. I created a directory named 'wsgi', so the full path is: c:/wamp/www/wsgi. I assumed that it would be accessed via http://localhost/wsgi/.

I added a file called dispatcher.py inside the wsgi directory. Here's a piece of code within 'dispatcher.py':

def application(environ, start_response):

status = '200 OK'
output = 'Hello World!'
response_headers = [('Content-type', 'text/plain'), ('Content-Length', str(len(output)))]
start_response(status, response_headers)
return [output]

The next step is to modify apache configuration (httpd.conf) in order to make it recognize python applications. The following lines are appended to httpd.conf and require that mod_wsgi has been installed in c:\wamp\bin\apache\Apache2.2.17\modules\mod_wsgi.so.

LoadModule wsgi_module modules/mod_wsgi.so

WSGIScriptAlias /wsgi "c:/wamp/www/wsgi/dispatcher.py"

<Directory "c:/wamp/www/wsgi">

 Allow Override None

 Options None

 Order deny,allow

 Allow from all
</Directory>

Well, It's just a simple code to print 'Hello World' to make sure that mod_wsgi + apache is working seamlessly and we are ready for the next adventures.