Continue from the book reading:
Here are some of the Apache tricks from the book:
Enabling mod_rewrite: This is an Apache module that's used for URL rewriting, keeping query-string input safe, and keeping the site search-engine-friendly and used for making URLs friendly and to stop hot linking.
A RewriteRule is a configuration directive that can provide a wide range of rewriting abilities. Rewrites can be for simple redirects to complex multiple-rule pattern matching substitutions.
A RewriteCond helps specify a condition for the rule. Http header values, request variables, server variables, time variables and some special variables can all be used inside the RewriteCond. RewriteLog and RewriteLogLevel are directives that can be used to specify a log file where  a running record of the internal rewrite processing will be sent and for the verbosity of the log.
URL spell checking is accomplished with the mod_speling module. With mod_speling module, Apache server takes care of finding the intent of the user and suggesting the correction. The CheckSpelling is the configuration directive to be used.
Content Compression is achieved with the mod_deflate module. Since HTML and the resource are in an uncompressed state, this feature allows us to transparently compress the page markup, images, stylesheets and content and send it across the internet where it is uncompressed before rendering.
We use the AddOutputFilterByType directive to accomplish this. The DeflateCompressionLevel sets the level of compression used to shrink the files.
For databases, we create security zones using Apache and basic authentication. This is available via mod_auth_MySQL module. The configuration directives in this case are AuthName for naming a security zone, AuthType for Basic, AuthMySQLDB for dbname, AuthMySQLUser for userid, AuthMySQLPassword for password, AuthMySQLEnable to On, and require valid-user.
The communication between client and server can be set to be encrypted using SSL with the mod_ssl, an Apache module that SSL-enables a website that Apache controls.  The configuration directive in this case is the OpenSSL and a certificate is used for the server Then a VirtualHost section is specified in the config file with this certificate.
Apache can also be used as a file repository with the WebDAV. WebDAV stands for Webbased Distributed Authoring and Versioning, enables Apache to allow users to treat an enabled directory as a remote directory or drive on their own computers..