Create Virtual Hosts on MAMP

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MAMP is a great GUI tool for creating server on localhost. But the free virsion of it only has very basic configurations. For example, creating a virtual host is not included. So I have to write the configurations on my own.

This article is based on Windows OS. Setup on Mac OS should be similar.

Why Virtual Hosts

Question: Why do we need to virtual hosts anyway? Answer: it simplifies your testing and developing. When developing a website, I want to visit it via something like http://test.local, rather than http://localhost/test/. The benefit of the former option is not just that it looks more like a real URL, or it is shorter. By creating test.local as the local domain, the root directory for your site is configured to any location your would like it to be, so there is no more hazard of nested path.

Modify Hosts

First, add the desired domain to the system’s host file. It is located at C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts.

Add this line:

127.0.0.1		test.local

You can replace test.local with almost anything of your choice.

Modify Apache Configuration

Modify C:\MAMP\conf\apache\httpd.conf.

Find this line:

# Virtual Hosts
# Include /Applications/MAMP/conf/apache/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

Change it to

# Virtual Hosts
Include C:\MAMP\conf\apache\httpd-vhosts.conf

Create Virtual Host Configuration

Now create the configuration file httpd-vhosts.conf.

NameVirtualHost *:80

<VirtualHost *:80>
    DocumentRoot 'C:\MAMP\htdocs'
    ServerName localhost
</VirtualHost>
 
<VirtualHost *:80>
    DocumentRoot 'C:\MAMP\htdocs\test'
    ServerName test.local
</VirtualHost>

Start MAMP, your site should be available at http://test.local.

Apache