Configure Apache for PHP in OS X / macOS

Every time I would upgrade OS X it took probably 45 minutes of fiddling with my Apache configuration to get it working properly. I'm writing this article in the hopes of saving myself and others some time.

The Setup

For the following examples, {username} represents your username.

Firstly, if you don't already have a Sites folder, create one in your home directory.

$ mkdir ~/Sites

Create or update /etc/apache2/users/{username}.conf to look as follows:

<Directory "/Users/{username}/Sites/">
    Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks
    Require all granted
    AllowOverride All
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
</Directory>

Add your virtual hosts if you don't already have them to /etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

ala:

<VirtualHost *:80>
  ServerName localhost
  DocumentRoot /Users/{username}/Sites/
</VirtualHost>

Configuration

/etc/apache2/httpd.conf

Search for and uncomment the following lines:

LoadModule deflate_module libexec/apache2/mod_deflate.so
LoadModule userdir_module libexec/apache2/mod_userdir.so
LoadModule rewrite_module libexec/apache2/mod_rewrite.so
LoadModule php5_module libexec/apache2/libphp5.so
Include /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-userdir.conf
Include /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

Then around line 271 add index.php to the DirectoryIndex

<IfModule dir_module>
    DirectoryIndex index.html index.php
</IfModule>

/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-userdir.conf

Uncomment the following line:

Include /private/etc/apache2/users/*.conf

Almost Done

Restart apache

$ sudo apachectl restart

open a browser and test it out.

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