php docker link apache docker

You can separate Apache and PHP with PHP-FPM. It is however that the DocumentRoot must be mounted on both containers.

Apache must be able to access the files locally (inside its container) as well as the PHP-FPM server.

I am currently working on the same, have a look at my docker-compose.yml here

https://github.com/cytopia/devilbox/blob/master/docker-compose.yml

Both volumes (in PHP and apache) are mounted to /shared/httpd

I would say its not possible to run seperate containers for php as apache module. I guess this is what Wolfgang meant.

If you want to seperate apache and php in two different containers you need to run php as fpm.
Have a look here for inspiration: How to correctly link php-fpm and Nginx Docker containers together?

If you need to run apache and php as apache_mod use a combined container like this: https://github.com/docker-library/php/blob/fec7f537f049aafd2102202519c3ca9cb9576707/5.5/apache/Dockerfilefrom: https://hub.docker.com/_/php/

If you don't specifically need to separate Apache from PHP, then you might be good to go with an official php:5.6-apache image which comes with Apache out of the box.

For example, your docker-compose.yml might look something like this:

version: '3'services:  web:    image: php:5.6-apache    ports:      - "8080:80" # Map container port 80 to host machine port 8080    volumes:      - ".:/var/www/html" # Mount current folder as volume to container at /var/www/html

Or, for a more real-life example, if you also need at least one of the following:

• A custom web root (for Laravel, Symfony, etc)
• Other Apache modules installed
• Other PHP extensions installed

You might do something more like this:

version: '3'services:  web:    build:      context: .      dockerfile: Dockerfile    ports:      - "8080:80" # Map container port 80 to host machine port 8080    environment:      APACHE_DOCUMENT_ROOT: "/var/www/yourapp.com/public"    volumes:      - ".:/var/www/yourapp.com" # Mount current folder as volume to container at /var/www/yourapp.com

And then your Dockerfile (which we reference from the docker-compose.yml above):

FROM php:5.6-apache# Declare an environment variable with a default value for changing Apache's document root# We will override this in docker-compose.ymlENV APACHE_DOCUMENT_ROOT /var/www/html# Configure web rootRUN sed -ri -e 's!/var/www/html!${APACHE_DOCUMENT_ROOT}!g' /etc/apache2/sites-available/*.confRUN sed -ri -e 's!/var/www/!${APACHE_DOCUMENT_ROOT}!g' /etc/apache2/apache2.conf /etc/apache2/conf-available/*.conf# Install additional Apache modules# This example: mod_rewrite & mod_headersRUN a2enmod rewrite headers# Install additional PHP extensions# This example: memcached & mysqli# For other extensions see official docs:# https://hub.docker.com/_/php (section: How to install more PHP extensions)RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y libmemcached-dev zlib1g-dev \    && pecl install memcached-2.2.0 \    && docker-php-ext-enable memcached \    && docker-php-ext-install -j$(nproc) mysqli