Challenger is written in the Pike programming language and requires Pike to run, so when you install Challenger, Pike will also be installed. By default, Pike will be installed inside Challenger's directory structure. If you want to use Pike for other tasks as well you can install it elsewhere.

Challenger contains its own fairly complex directory structure. It is helpful for administrators to be acquainted with this structure, which is essentially the same as the one stored in the distribution package.

Challenger is started by the shell script server/start. For an automatic restart of Challenger when the system is rebooted, this script should be called during the boot procedure of the operating system.

Challenger consists of two processes, the start script and a Pike process. The start script will be running to ensure a restart of Challenger in case the Pike process is killed or the user chooses to restart Challenger.

This chapter contains examples showing how to configure a Challenger server for some specific purposes. We have chosen to describe the following types.

Standard Server

Generic web server, perhaps for the company home pages, with some useful modules added.

Secure Server

Secure web server, using HTTPS to ensure no one can eavesdrop on the communication.

User's Home-pages

Server for providing the user's home pages, giving each user her own domain using IP-less virtual hosting.

FTP Server

Classic FTP server.

Proxy Server

HTTP, SSL and FTP proxy server.