As I mentioned earlier, the Apache HTTP Server has a small disadvantage compared to the competition (NGINX) in terms of performance. If you run websites that really have a lot of visitors, NGINX might be the better alternative.
On the other hand, the Apache HTTP Server is open source and free. Further functionalities can be activated via modules. The documentation is really excellent.
We use it for every linux service we need to have running. It really works great and is easily manageable with the SUSE Manager, which helps a lot with the updating process. Although it is not stressfull on the CMD itself, it really does simplify things. Besides that, we are really happy with working with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server.
Street Cred: Apache Web Server is the Founder for all of Apache Foundation's other projects. Without the Web Server, Apache Foundation would look very different. That being said, they have done a good job of maintaining the code base, and keeping a lot of what makes Apache so special
Stability: Apache is rock-solid. While no software is perfect, Apache can parse your web sources quickly and cleanly.
Flexibility: Need to startup your own Webpage? Done. Wordpress? Yup. REST Endpoint? Check. Honeypot? Absolutely.
The default configurations which comes with Apache server needs to get optimized for performance and security with every new installation as these defaults are not recommended to push on the production environment directly.
Security options and advanced configurations are not easy to set up and require an additional level of expertise.
Admin frontend GUI could be improved to a great extent to match with other enterprise tools available to serve similar requirements.
The support window for service packs after a new SP is released is too short.
Community engagement is low.
There are times when supported packages fall too far behind and create compatibility issues with applications. The Open Build Service usually provides a way around this, though.
We've been using this OS for about 8 years in a productive environment. During this time, we have never run into any problems that stopped or impacted our production environment. We have been able to solve any problem we ran into using either common sense, suse documentation or suse support.
I give this rating because there is so much Apache documentation and information on the web that you can literally do anything. This has to do with the fact that there is a huge Open Source community that is beyond mature and perhaps one of the most helpful to be found. The only thing that should hold anyone back from anything is that they can not read. RTFM, my friend. And I must say that the manual is excellent.
Support personnel are helpful and fairly fast to bring resolution to non-emergency issues. Patches are created and posted in a timely fashion. We so far have not had any major problems that needed support
I has a lot more features, except that IIS is more integrated in a Windows environment. But now with .net core also possible from Apache it would work anywhere really. Only in a full Windows environment where full integration is needed I would chose to go for IIS. Otherwise Apache it is.
We went straight to SLES when we initially started migrating oracle to hana since at that time, HANA came on a pre-installed server that had to be purchased from an official vendor, and SLES was the only allowed OS. We stuck with SLES after we became certified to do our own installations because so far, SLES was a good fit for us.
