If you run an Apache server then you have no doubt seen the following error message a thousand times in your error.log file.
File does not exist: /var/www/favicon.ico
The reason? You have not created a favicon, also known as a website icon, for your website. It’s the icon that displays in the address bar of your web browser when you connect to a website. A web browser will request this icon file from every website.
You have two choices. You can create a website icon for each of your websites, or you tell Apache not to log that event as an error message.
If you choose to create one. Use a program such as Gimp and create a 16×16 pixel image and save it as a .ico filetype. Then upload that file to the DocumentRoot of your website. You will need one for each VirtualHost. If you don’t have Gimp, there are online resources such as favicon.cc where you can create a .ico file and download it for your own use.
As you know by now, not having a favicon.ico file, won’t stop web browsers from requesting it each time. But you can tell Apache not to log the event as an error message. You will still see the request in the access.log, but at least you will have a cleaner error.log file.
Add the following block of code to each VirtualHost, or at least the ones which don’t have a favicon file.
Redirect 404 /favicon.ico <Location /favicon.ico> ErrorDocument 404 "No favicon" </Location>
Don’t forget to restart apache after making the change. If you want make a “global” change, which would apply to any and all VirtualHosts, you can create a file in Apache’s conf.d folder with a name such as nofavicon.conf and then add that block of code to the file. That would disable favicon across the board and save you from having to edit each VirtualHost.
