TLDR : docker-compose.example.yaml

Docker Debian Apache PHP

DDAP is a docker image based on Debian, with Apache 2.4, and PHP (from 7.2 to 8.4).

Available on Docker Hub

Latest push is 15th April 2025 ( 7.2 / 7.3 / 7.4 / 8.0 / 8.1 / 8.2 / 8.3 / 8.4 ) Please note that obsolete PHP versions 7.X are not pushed frequently but can be built locally on your project.

This image is built for linux/amd64 (x86_64) and linux/arm64 (aarch64 / Apple Silicon) Feel free to extend this image and adapt it to your needs or use it directly for your web projects.

New : this image is now from debian-slim, and not from PHP:X-apache anymore. It's way slimmer and faster to build. See ./v1 for previous source code.

This image is missing MySQL or any Database on purpose. Compose with a Mysql or Maria image to add this feature.

Installed extensions

APT Modules

• all modules installed by default with Debian 11 slim
• gnupg2
• curl
• git
• sendmail
• zip / unzip

Other utilities

• composer ( v2 )

PHP extensions

• opcache / apcu / memcached
• mysqli / mysql / pdo / pdo-mysql / pdo-sqlite
• zip / bz2
• gd / intl / tokenizer / mcrypt / mbstring
• dom / zimplexml / xml
• curl

mcrypt is only installed prior to 8.2, this package being deprecated now.

PHP

PHP is working in FPM mode which means that a PHP service is running.

Apache multi threading

sleep.php is available in example to check that blocking scripts now works with other requests.

Usage

Common usage is to use an already built image from Docker Hub :

Specify PHP version

services:
  ddap :
    # Example, we need the legacy PHP 7.4 for a rusty project
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php7.4
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'

Available versions are v2-php7.2 / v2-php7.3 / v2-php7.4 / v2-php8.0 / v2-php8.1 / v2-php8.2 / v2-php8.3

Web root is in /var/www/html by default and can be changed with DDAP_PUBLIC_PATH

Map volumes

• /var/www is user's root and current directory. Can be used to run processes outside /html directory ( ex composer install )
• /var/www/html is root published directory by Apache ( http requests starts here ).

services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    volumes:
      - './:/var/www'
      - './public:/var/www/html'

Change webroot path

services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/public'
    environment:
      DDAP_PUBLIC_PATH: '/var/www/public'

Change base

Default base is /, and can be changed to a sub-directory. It means that all request will have to be from the base to go to the webroot. This can be handy in some case when Apache is running behind a reverse-proxy under a specific path.

services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'
    environment:
      DDAP_BASE: '/backend'

http://localhost/backend/test.html will target /var/www/html/test.html

All requests that are not in /backend will be refused

Enable apache login / password for public directory

This HTTP password will be required on all /var/www/html directory.

version: "3.7"
services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    environment:
      DDAP_LOGIN: admin
      DDAP_PASSWORD: secret
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'

Dev tools

Some devtools can be installed. http://docker-host/devtools folder will be available if enabled. See /devtools directory.

Available devtools :

• apcu cache monitor
• phpinfo

version: "3.7"
services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    environment:
      DDAP_DEVTOOLS: 'true'
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'

You can change the /devtools URL with the DDAP_DEVTOOLS_URL env.

Add your own tools by mapping the /devtools directory

Use dot env file

A dotenv file can also be used for convenience.

version: "3.7"
services:
  ddap :
    build:
      context: deploy/docker-debian-apache-php
      args:
        IMAGE_PHP_VERSION: ${PHP_VERSION:-}
    environment:
      DDAP_LOGIN: ${DDAP_LOGIN:-}
      DDAP_PASSWORD: ${DDAP_PASSWORD:-}
      DDAP_DEVTOOLS: ${DDAP_DEVTOOLS:-}
      DDAP_DEVTOOLS_URL: ${DDAP_DEVTOOLS_URL:-}
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'

.env file :

PHP_VERSION=8.2
DDAP_LOGIN=admin
DDAP_PASSWORD=secret
DDAP_DEVTOOLS=true
DDAP_DEVTOOLS_URL=/admin/devtools

Customize PHP config

You can override some PHP config with envs. Here is an override example with default values :

services:
  ddap :
    environment:
      DDAP_PHP_DISPLAY_ERRORS: "false"
      DDAP_PHP_TIMEZONE: "UTC"
      DDAP_PHP_MEMORY_LIMIT: "256M"
      DDAP_PHP_MAX_EXECUTION_TIME: "30"
      DDAP_PHP_UPLOAD_SIZE: "128M"

Custom PHP config file

To use custom config files for apache or php, Simply create your config/php.ini for ex, and map specific config file with volumes. Default configs are available here.

version: "3.7"
services:
  ddap:
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    environment:
      DDAP_LOGIN: ${DDAP_LOGIN:-}
      DDAP_PASSWORD: ${DDAP_PASSWORD:-}
      DDAP_DEVTOOLS: ${DDAP_DEVTOOLS:-}
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'
      - './config/php.ini:/config/php.ini'

DDAP_PHP_* envs will not work anymore with a custom php.ini file.

Compose with MySQL

This image is missing MySQL image on purpose. To add a MySQL server to your stack :

version: "3.7"
services:

  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'

  maria:
    image: mariadb
    restart: unless-stopped
    container_name: maria
    hostname: maria
    ports:
      - '3306:3306'
    environment:
      MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: "${MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD:-}"
    volumes :
      - './data/mysql:/var/lib/mysql:delegated'

  phpmyadmin:
    image: phpmyadmin
    restart: unless-stopped
    container_name: phpmyadmin
    environment:
      PMA_HOST: "maria"

Crontab

Trigger crontabs with env DDAP_CRON_TASK

services:
  ddap :
    image: zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php:v2-php8.3
    volumes:
      - './public:/var/www/html'
    environment:
      DDAP_PORT: 7000
      DDAP_CRON_TASK: "* * * * * curl http://localhost:7000/cron.php"

This will trigger cron.php every minute. Please note the used port for internal querying.

<?php
error_log("Cron curl tab received ".time());
echo "ok";

---

Advanced usage

Test this image or work on it

• git clone https://github.com/zouloux/docker-debian-apache-php.git
• cd docker-debian-apache-php/test
• docker-compose build
• docker-compose up
• Then go to localhost:8080

Build it locally

If you need to customize this image locally, you still can specify the PHP version. Use args to specify current php version. Non tested PHP version may work. Docker image needs to be rebuilt if args are changed, with docker-compose build.

version: "3.7"
services:
  ddap :
    build:
      context: path/to/docker-debian-apache-php/trunk
      args:
        IMAGE_PHP_VERSION: 8.2
    volumes:
      - './:/root'