[Repost] Running MovableType under FastCGI (Apache)

Previously I ran MovableType on my own machine (Windows + Apache). After moving to a new server, FastCGI required some changes. Following a guide, I modified .htaccess
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MovableType 3.34 update (Jan 17):

• Fixed a critical XSS vulnerability.
• Improved FastCGI usability, with performance up to 15× faster.
• MT 3.34 automatically enables FastCGI depending on server environment, requiring only simple mt-config.cgi settings.

Advantages of FastCGI for MT:

• Performance boost: caching in memory reduces page load and DB access.
• Faster comment handling: comments stored in DB for moderation, processed more efficiently.
• Reliability: fewer resources per page, less traffic and DB load.
• Better resilience against spam attacks: comments retained, but processing faster with FastCGI.

How to check FastCGI installation:

Try it and find out
Add the following code to an .htaccess file in your MT directory:

FastCgiIpcDir /tmp/fcgi_ipc/
AddHandler fastcgi-script .fcgi
FastCGIConfig -autoUpdate -idle-timeout 120 -killInterval 3600 -maxClassProcesses 6 -maxProcesses 15

Then create a [HelloWorld.fcgi] file and see if it loads properly. If it does, FastCGI is installed. Any other error and it probably isn’t.

Configuration options:

• If ISP sets .cgi files to run under FastCGI globally, MT works without changes.
• If not, you must configure manually (e.g. DreamHost).

Two methods:

Rename scripts: Change .cgi files to .fcgi or .fpl (except mt-config.cgi). Update mt-config.fcgi accordingly:

AdminScript mt.cgi
CommentScript mt-comments.cgi
TrackbackScript mt-tb.cgi
SearchScript mt-search.cgi
ViewScript mt-view.cgi
to：
AdminScript mt.fcgi
CommentScript mt-comments.fcgi
TrackbackScript mt-tb.fcgi
SearchScript mt-search.fcgi
ViewScript mt-view.fcgi

Force .cgi under FastCGI: Edit .htaccess in the MT directory:

AddHandler fastcgi-script .cgi

Only safe if the directory contains MT scripts exclusively.

Note: Under FastCGI, program changes are not immediately visible. You must reload by forcing recompilation:

touch path/to/mt/mt.fpl