NEWS

Release 3.0.2
-------------

 * [Nginx] Fixed compilation problems
   The Nginx compilation process was broken due to not correctly reverting
   the working directory of the Nginx configure script. This has been fixed:
   issue #595.
 * [Nginx] Fixed crash if passenger_root refers to a nonexistant directory
   Issue #599.
 * Fixed compilation problems on NetBSD
   There was a typo in a NetBSD-specific fcntl() call. It also turns out that
   NetBSD doesn't support some ISO C99 math functions like llroundl(); this
   has been worked around by using other functions. Issue #593.
 * Fixed file descriptor closing issues on FreeBSD
   Phusion Passenger child processes didn't correct close file descriptors
   on FreeBSD because it queries /dev/fd to do that. On FreeBSD /dev/fd
   only returns meaningful results if fdescfs is mounted, which it isn't
   by default. Issue #597.


Release 3.0.1
-------------

 * MUCH faster compilation
   We've applied code aggregation techniques, allowing Phusion Passenger
   to be compiled much quicker now. For example, compiling the Nginx
   component (not Nginx itself) on a MacBook Pro now takes only 29
   seconds instead of 51 seconds, an improvement of 75%! Compiling the
   Apache module on a slower Dell Inspiron now takes 39 seconds instead of
   1 minute 22 seconds, or 110% faster!
 * Fixed malfunction after web server restart
   On Linux systems that have a non-standard filesystem on /tmp, Phusion
   Passenger could malfunction after restarting the web server because of
   a bug that's only triggered on certain filesystems. Issue #569.
 * Boost upgraded to version 1.44.0.
   We were on 1.42.0.
 * Much improved startup error messages
   Phusion Passenger performs many extensive checks during startup to ensure
   integrity. However the error message in some situation could be vague.
   These startup error messages have now been improved dramatically, so that
   if something goes wrong during startup you will now more likely know why.
 * Curl < 7.12.1 is now supported
   The previous version fails to compile with Curl versions earlier than
   7.12.1. Issue #556.
 * passenger-make-enterprisey fixed
   This is the command that people can run after donating. It allows people
   to slightly modify Phusion Passenger's display name as a joke. In 3.0.0 it
   was broken because of a typo. This has been fixed.
 * Removed passenger-stress-test
   This tool was used during the early life of Phusion Passenger for stress
   testing websites. Its performance has never been very good and there are
   much better tools for stress testing, so this tool has now been removed.
 * [Apache] RailsEnv and RackEnv configuration options are now equivalent
   In previous versions, RailsEnv only had effect on Rails 1 and Rails 2 apps
   while RackEnv only had effect on Rack apps. Because Rails 3 apps are
   considered Rack apps, setting RailsEnv had no effect on Rails 3 apps.
   Because this is confusing to users, we've now made RailsEnv and RackEnv
   equivalent. Issue #579.
 * [Nginx] Fixed compilation problems on systems with unpowerful shells
   Most notably Solaris. Its default shell does not support some basic
   constructs that we used in the Nginx configure script.
 * [Nginx] Upgraded default Nginx version to to 0.8.53
   The previous default was 0.8.52.
 * [Nginx] passenger_enabled now only accepts 'on' or 'off' values
   Previously it would recognize any value not equal to 'on' as meaning
   'off'. This caused confusion among users who thought they could also
   specify 'true', so we now throw a proper error if the value is
   unrecognized. Fixes issue #583.


Release 3.0.0
-------------

This is a major release with many changes. Please read our blog for details.


Release 2.2.15
--------------

 * [Apache] Fixed incorrect temp dir cleanup by passenger-status
   On some systems, running passenger-status could print the following
   message:
   
      *** Cleaning stale folder /tmp/passenger.1234
   
   ...after which Phusion Passenger breaks because that directory is
   necessary for it to function properly. The cause of this problem
   has been found and has been fixed.
 * [Apache] Fixed some upload handling problems
   Previous versions of Phusion Passenger check whether the size of
   the received upload data matches the contents of the Content-Length
   header as received by the client. It turns out that there could
   be a mismatch e.g. because of mod_deflate input compression, so
   we can't trust Content-Length anyway and we're being too strict.
   The check has now been removed.
 * [Nginx] Fixed compilation issues with Nginx >= 0.7.66
   Thanks to Potamianos Gregory for reporting this issue. Issue #500.
 * [Nginx] Default Nginx version changed to 0.7.67
   The previous default version was 0.7.65.
 * Fixed more Bundler problems
   Previous versions of Phusion Passenger would preload some popular
   libraries such as mysql and sqlite3 in order to utilize copy-on-write
   optimizations better. However this behavior conflicts with Bundler
   so we've removed it.


Release 2.2.14
--------------

 * Added support for Rubinius
   Patch contributed by Evan Phoenix.
 * Fixed a mistake in the SIGQUIT backtrace message.
   Patch contributed by Christoffer Sawicki.
 * [Nginx] Fix a localtime() crash on FreeBSD
   This was caused by insufficient stack space for threads. Issue #499.


Release 2.2.13
--------------

 * Fixed some Rails 3 compatibility issues that were recently introduced.
 * Fixed a typo that causes config/setup_load_paths.rb not to be loaded
   correctly.


Release 2.2.12
--------------

 * Improved Bundler support.
   Previous versions might not be able to correctly load gems bundled
   by Bundler. We've also documented how our Bundler support works and
   how to override our support if you need special behavior.
   Please refer to the Phusion Passenger Users Guide, section
   "Bundler support".
 * Worked around some user account handling bugs in Ruby. Issue #192.
 * Fixed some Ruby 1.9 tempfile.rb compatibility problems.
 * Fixed some compilation problems on some ARM Linux platforms.
 * [Apache] Suppress bogus mod_xsendfile-related error messages.
   When mod_xsendfile is being used, Phusion Passenger might print
   bogus error messages like "EPIPE" or "Apache stopped forwarding
   the backend's response" to the log file. These messages are
   normal, are harmless and can be safely ignored, but they pollute
   the log file. So in this release we've added code to suppress
   these messages when mod_xsendfile is being used. Issue #474.
 * [Nginx] Fixed "passenger_user_switching off" permission problems
   If Nginx is running as root and passenger_user_switching is turned
   off, then Phusion Passenger would fail to initialize because of
   a permission problem. This has been fixed. Issue #458.
 * [Nginx] Nginx >= 0.8.38 is now supported.
   Thanks to Sergey A. Osokin for reporting the problem.
 * [Nginx] passenger-install-nginx-module upgraded
    It now defaults to installing Nginx 0.7.65 instead of 0.7.64.


Release 2.2.11
--------------

 * This release fixes a regression that appeared in 2.2.10 which only
   affects Apache. When under high load, Apache might freeze and stop
   responding to requests. It is caused by a race condition which is
   why it escaped our last release testing.
   
   This problem does not affect Nginx; you only have to upgrade if
   you're using Apache.
   
   http://groups.google.com/group/phusion-passenger/t/d5bb2f17c8446ea0


Release 2.2.10
--------------

 * Fixed some Bundler compatibility problems.
 * Fixed some file descriptor passing problems, which previously
   could lead to mysterious crashes.
 * Fixed some compilation problems on newer GCC versions. Issue #430.
 * Support #size method in rack.input.



Release 2.2.9
-------------

 * Fixed compatibility with Rails 3.
   Actually, previous Phusion Passenger releases were already compatible
   with Rails 3, depending on the spawn method that would be invoked. Here's
   the story:
   
   Since Phusion Passenger 2.2.8, when the file config.ru exists, Phusion
   Passenger will treat the app as a Rack app, not as a Rails app. This is
   in contrast to earlier versions which gave Rails detection more priority
   than Rack detection. Phusion Passenger loads Rack apps and Rails apps in
   different ways. The Rails loader was not compatible with Rails 3, which
   is what we've fixed in this release.
   
   That said, a Rails 3 app would have worked out-of-the-box on Phusion
   Passenger 2.2.8 as well because Rails 3 apps include a config.ru file
   by default, causing Phusion Passenger 2.2.8 to use the Rack loader.
   Earlier versions of Phusion Passenger would just completely bail out
   because they'd use the Rails loader.
   
   That said, with 2.2.9 there are still some caveats:
   - Smart spawning (the mechanism with which REE's 33% memory reduction
     is implemented) is *not* supported for Rack apps. This means that if
     you want to utilize smart spawning with Rails 3, then you should
     remove your config.ru file.
   - Rails 3 depends on Rack 1.1.0. You must have Rack 1.1.0 installed as
     a gem, even if you've bundled it with the gem bundler. This is because
     Phusion Passenger itself depends on Rack.
   
   Both of these caveats are temporary. We have plans to solve both of these
   properly in the future.
 * What's up with the Gem Bundler?
   There has been some reports that Phusion Passenger is not compatible with
   Yehuda Katz's gem bundler (http://github.com/wycats/bundler). This might
   have been true for an earlier version of the gem bundler, but the latest
   version seems to work fine. Please note that you need to insert the
   following snippet in config/preinitializer.rb, as instructed by the gem
   bundler's README:
   
     require "#{RAILS_ROOT}/vendor/gems/environment"
   
   The Rails::Boot monkey patching code as posted at
   http://yehudakatz.com/2009/11/03/using-the-new-gem-bundler-today/
   does not seem to be required anymore.
 * Fixed support for ActiveRecord subclasses that connect to another database.
   ActiveRecord subclasses that connect to a database other than the default
   one did not have their connection correctly cleared after forking.
   This can result in weird errors along the lines of "Lost connection to
   MySQL server during query". Issue #429.
 * [Nginx] Fixed PCRE URL.
   passenger-install-nginx-module downloads PCRE 7.8 if PCRE is not already
   installed. However PCRE 7.8 has been removed from their FTP server,
   so we've updated the URL to point to the latest version, 8.0.


Release 2.2.8
-------------

 * [Nginx] Fixed some signal handling problems.
   Restarting Nginx on OS X with SIGHUP can sometimes take a long time or
   even fail completely. This is because of some signal handling problems,
   which have now been fixed.
 * [Nginx] Added OpenSSL as dependency.
   OpenSSL is required in order to install Nginx, but this was not checked
   by passenger-install-nginx-module. As a result,
   passenger-install-nginx-module fails on e.g. out-of-the-box Ubuntu
   installations until the user manually installs OpenSSL. Issue #422.
 * [Nginx] Fixed support for internal redirects and subrequests.
   It is now possible to, for example, point X-Accel-Redirects to Phusion
   Passenger-served URLs. Patch contributed by W. Andrew Loe III: issue #433.
 * [Apache] Fixed a GnuTLS compatibility issue.
   mod_gnutls can cause Phusion Passenger to crash because of an unchecked
   NULL pointer. This problem has now been fixed: issue #391.
 * Fixed thread creation issue on Intel Itanium platforms.
   This fixes issue #427.
 * Fixed compilation problems on Linux running on the Renesas SH4 CPU.
   Patch contributed by iwamatsu: issue #428.
 * The Rack library has been unvendored.
   The original reason for vendoring was to work around broken Rails
   applications that explicitly specify Rack as a gem dependency. We've
   found a better workaround that does not require vendoring Rack.
   This also fixes a compatibility problem with Rails 3, because Rails
   3 depends on a newer Rack version than the one we had vendored.
   Issue #432.
 * Fixed compatibility with Ruby 1.9.1 patchlevel >= 152
   Ruby 1.9.1 patchlevel >= 152 has a bug in its tempfile library. If you've
   seen an error message along the lines of

      *** Exception IOError in Passenger RequestHandler (closed stream)
   
   then this is a Ruby bug at work. This bug has been fixed in Ruby 1.9.2,
   but Ruby 1.9.1 still contains this bug. We've added a workaround so that
   the bug is not triggered with this Ruby version. Issue #432.


Release 2.2.7
-------------

 * Removed forgotten debugging code in passenger-install-apache2-module,
   which caused it not to compile anything.


Release 2.2.6
-------------

 * Some /tmp cleaner programs such as tmpwatch try to remove subdirectories
   in /tmp/passenger.xxx after a while because they think those
   subdirectories are unused. This could cause Phusion Passenger to
   malfunction, requiring a web server restart. Measures have now been
   taken to prevent those tmp cleaner programs from removing anything
   in /tmp/passenger.xxx. Issue #365.
 * When autodetecting the application type, Rack is now given more priority
   than Rails. This allows one to drop a config.ru file in a Rails directory
   and have it detected as a Rack application instead of a Rails application.
   Patch contributed by Sam Pohlenz: issue #338.
 * The default socket backlog has been increased from 'SOMAXCONN' (which
   is 128 on most platforms) to 1024. This should fix most
   'helper_server.sock failed: Resource temporarily unavailable'
   errors.
 * Fixed compilation problems on Solaris. Issue #369 and issue #379.
 * Fixed crashes on PowerPC.
 * Some Ruby 1.9 compatibility fixes. Issue #398.
 * The installer now displays correct dependency installation instructions
   for Mandriva Linux.
 * [Apache] The location of the 'apxs' and 'apr-config' commands can now
   also be passed to the installer through the --apxs-path and
   --apr-config-path parameters, in addition to the $APXS2 and $APR_CONFIG
   environment variables. Issue #3.
 * [Nginx] Various problems that only occur on 64-bit platforms have been fixed.
 * [Nginx] The installer now installs Nginx 0.7.64 by default.


Release 2.2.5
-------------

 * [Apache] Small file uploads are now buffered; fixes potential DoS attack
   Phusion Passenger buffers large file uploads to temp files so that it
   doesn't block applications while an upload is in progress, but it sent
   small uploads directly to the application without buffering it. This could
   result in a potential DoS attack: the client can send many small, incomplete
   file uploads to the server, and this would block all application processes
   until a timeout occurs. In order to solve this problem, Phusion Passenger
   now buffers small file uploads in memory. Bug #356.

 * [Apache] Fixed support for mod_rewrite passthrough rules
   Mod_rewrite passthrough rules were not properly supported because of a bug
   fix for supporting encoded slashes (%2f) in URLs. Unfortunately, due to
   bugs/limitations in Apache, we can support either encoded slashes or
   mod_rewrite passthrough rules, but not both; supporting one will break the
   other.

   Support for mod_rewrite passthrough rules is now enabled by default; that
   is, support for encoded slashes is disabled by default. A new configuration
   option, "PassengerAllowEncodedSlashes", has been added. Turning this option
   on will enable support for encoded slashes and disable support for
   mod_rewrite passthrough rules.

   Issue #113 and issue #230.

 * [Apache] Added a configuration option for resolving symlinks in the document root path
   Phusion Passenger 2.2.0 and higher no longer resolves symlinks in
   the document root path in order to properly support Capistrano-style
   directory structures. The exact behavior is documented in the Users Guide,
   section "How Phusion Passenger detects whether a virtual host is a web
   application".

   However, some people relied on the old behavior. A new configuration option,
   PassengerResolveSymlinksInDocumentRoot, has been added to allow reverting
   back to the old behavior.

   Patch contributed by Locaweb (http://www.locaweb.com.br/).

 * [Apache] mod_env variables are now also passed through CGI environment headers
   Prior to version 2.2.3, environment variables set by mod_env are passed to
   the application as CGI environment headers, not through Ruby's ENV variable.
   In the last release we introduced support for setting ENV environment
   variables with mod_env, and got rid of the code for setting CGI environment
   headers. It turns out that some people relied on the old behavior, we so now
   environment variables set with mod_env are set in both ENV and in the CGI
   environment.
   
   Fixes bug #335.

 * [Apache] Fixed compilation problems on some Linux systems with older versions of Apache
   If you used to see compilation errors like this:

       ext/apache2/Configuration.cpp:554: error: expected primary-expression before '.' token

   then this version should compile properly.

 * [Apache] Fixed I/O timeouts for communication with backend processes
   Got rid of the code for enforcing I/O timeouts when reading from or writing to
   a backend process. This caused more problems than it solved.

 * [Nginx] Support for streaming responses (e.g. Comet or HTTP push)
   Buffering of backend responses is now disabled. This fixes support for
   streaming responses, something which the Apache version has supported
   for a while now. One can generate streaming responses in Ruby on Rails
   like this:

       render :text => lambda { |response, output|
           10_000.times do |i|
               output.write("hello #{i}!\n")
           end
       }

 * [Nginx] Installer now installs Nginx 0.7.61 by default
   Previously it installed 0.6.37 by default.

 * [Nginx] Fixed the installer's --extra-configure-flags flag when combined with --auto-download
   Arguments passed to --extra-configure-flags were not being passed to the
   Nginx configure script when --auto-download is given. This has been
   fixed: bug #349.

 * [Nginx] Fixed unnecessary download of PCRE
   The installer now checks whether PCRE is installed in /opt/local (e.g.
   MacPorts) as well before concluding that it isn't installed and going ahead
   with downloading PCRE.

 * Fixed STDERR capturing
   While spawning an application, Phusion Passenger captures any output written
   to STDERR so that it can show them later if the application failed to start.
   This turns out to be much more difficult than expected, with all kinds of
   corner cases that can mess up this feature.

   For example, if the Rails log file is not writable, then this can cause
   Rails to crash with a bizarre and unhelpful error message whenever it tries
   to write to STDERR:

       /!\ FAILSAFE /!\  Thu Aug 20 14:58:39 +1000 2009
       Status: 500 Internal Server Error
       undefined method `[]' for nil:NilClass

   Some applications reopen STDERR to a log file. This didn't work.

   Of all of these problems have been fixed now. (Bug #332)

 * Fixed some bugs in application sources preloading
   Rails >= 2.2 already preloads the application sources, in which case Phusion
   Passenger wasn't supposed to perform it's own preloading, but the Rails
   >= 2.2 detection code was bugged. This has been fixed.

   Rails < 2.2 doesn't preload the application sources by itself, but there
   should be a certain order with which the sources are preloaded, otherwise
   preloading could fail in some applications. We now enforce a specific load
   order: first models, then controllers, then helpers.

   Bug #359.
 
 * Fixed a few bugs in WSGI compliance
   PATH_INFO is supposed to be set to the request URI, but without the query
   string and without the base URI. This has been fixed: bug #360.

 * Fixed some Ruby 1.9-specific crashes caused by encoding issues. Bug #354.
 * Fixed loading of config/environment.rb on Ruby 1.9.2, because Ruby 1.9.2
   no longer has "." in the default load path. Patch by metaljastix, issue #368.
 * The Users Guide for Apache now mentions something about correct permissions
   for application directories.
 * Fixed compilation problems on IA-64 (bug #118). We also reduced the stack
   sizes for the threads by half, so Phusion Passenger should use even less
   virtual memory now.
 * Fixed compilation problems on Linux systems with ARM CPU.
 * Fixed a few compatibility problems with 64-bit OpenBSD.
 * Fixed a few typos and minor bugs.


Older releases
--------------
Please consult the blog posts on http://blog.phusion.nl/ for the information about older releases.