Question Is it correct to have many records of "Apache (internal dummy connection)" ?

[Sistelia CLoudworks]

Is it correct to have many records of "OPTIONS * HTTP / 1.0" 200 136 "-" "Apache (internal dummy connection)"?

Version OS: Debian 6.0
Version Plesk Core: 11.0.9-debian6.0.build110120608.16

Hello, in my Apache registry ("access.log") I have a lot of "OPTIONS * HTTP / 1.0" 200 136 "-" "Apache (internal dummy connection)", more or less, on average I have about 22 entries per minute. Apache is supposed to use these requests to control secondary processes to reactivate the processes that are listening for new connections. Correct me if I'm wrong. Is it right to have so many requests of this kind? Can the amount of vhost influence the amount of these requests?

One last question, if I have configured so that each vhost has its own access record, because in the general Apache log every now and then I get some GET or POST from some vhost?

Thanks for your time.

 

[IgorG]

From the Apache documentation:

When the Apache HTTP Server manages its child processes, it needs a way to wake up processes that are listening for new connections. To do this, it sends a simple HTTP request back to itself. This request will appear in the access_log file with the remote address set to the loop-back interface (typically 127.0.0.1 or ::1 if IPv6 is configured). If you log the User-Agent string (as in the combined log format), you will see the server signature followed by "(internal dummy connection)" on non-SSL servers. During certain periods you may see up to one such request for each httpd child process.

These requests are perfectly normal and you do not, in general, need to worry about them. They can simply be ignored.

You can solve the problem by using .htaccess by redirecting requests from the "internal dummy connection" to an empty file. For example:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} ^.*internal dummy connection.*$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^/$ /blank.html [L]