Error 403 Access forbidden! for Apache Virtual Host on Windows Server 2008

Question

I have installed xampp I could access it successfully on port 85.

Then I created a virtual host and pointed to a custom dir (not under xampp)

<VirtualHost *:85>
    ServerAdmin postmaster@dummy-host.localhost
    DocumentRoot "C:/MyCustomDir/xampp"
    ServerName mydomain.com
    ##ServerAlias www.dummy-host.localhost
    ##ErrorLog "logs/dummy-host.localhost-error.log"
    ##CustomLog "logs/dummy-host.localhost-access.log" combined
</VirtualHost>

When trying to access it from Internet I get:

Access forbidden!

You don't have permission to access the requested directory. There is either no index document or the directory is read-protected.

If you think this is a server error, please contact the webmaster.

Error 403

Why ?

Answer 1

Whatever account Apache is running under needs read permission to that directory. The minimum permissions that will be needed for that account are:

• c:\MyCustomDir - Traverse Directory
• c:\MyCustomDir\xampp - Read