Setting the Apache2 service to log on with a network user

I have Apache 2.0.55 with PHP 5.1.2 installed and working fine on my
server. According to
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/platform/windows.html a good practice
is to have the Apache2 service log on with a network id with limited
access instead of using the system account. I followed the directions,
and couldn't get it to work. Finally, after playing with it for a
couple of hours, I found that if I give the ApacheService user read and
execute access from the root folder, it will start up just fine.
Otherwise, it errors with a rather un-informative error code of "1",
nothing in the apache log files, and another error in the system event
log that is not much more help ("The Apache2 service terminated with
service-specific error 1(0x1)"). The only folders on this drive are:
d:\apache (regular apache structure, including the htdocs folder)
d:\php (all of the php files)
d:\phpini (only the php.ini)
I can give each of these directories read and execute access, but it
still doesn't work unless I give the user read and execute from d:\.
These will be the only folders on this drive, so I do not forsee any
major difficulties security-wise, however does anyone know why this
would be?

Thanks,
Chris

Greetings,
I am experiencing the same problem on our test server with the Apache
user and group. I am concerned with giving this user access to the root
folder of the webserver since I plan to use this setup on a public
server.

Have you learned anything else about this configuration?
Lsabug

lsabug wrote:
> Greetings,
> I am experiencing the same problem on our test server with the Apache
> user and group. I am concerned with giving this user access to the root
> folder of the webserver since I plan to use this setup on a public
> server.
>
> Have you learned anything else about this configuration?
> Lsabug


Hey Guys,

I had the same issue. You don't need to set the permissons on the
root, only the Apache 'logs' folder. The service fails to start b/c
the new user does not have permissions to write any Apache logs. I
gave my "apache user" full control over the logs folder (for me -
C:\Program Files\Apache Group\Apache2\logs) and the Apache2 service
started right up.

Hope this helps.

-Stephen