Apache Document Root adds leading default path - apache

Question

This should be a very simple question to answer for people who knows apache.
I have an Ubuntu computer which I use as my server. I have worked with apache several times before, but never experienced this issue.
My owncloud.conf file in the sites-enabled folder looks like this:
1 <VirtualHost *:80>¬
2 ServerName owncloud¬
3 DocumentRoot "~/mybook/ownCloud"¬
4 <Directory ~/mybook/ownCloud/>¬
5 Options None¬
6 Order deny,allow¬
7 Allow from all¬
8 </Directory>¬
9 </VirtualHost>
But after enabling the site and restarting apache, I'm getting this error:
AH00112: Warning: DocumentRoot [/etc/apache2/~/mybook/ownCloud] does not exist
I've been looking, and I cannot seem to find where it's set that "/etc/apache2/" should be leading default path to all set document roots of the site config files.
Does anyone know how I can remove this default setting?

Answer 1

Forget the comment I made regarding Mac, what you have above will not work. If you installed Apache on Ubuntu and accepted the defaults the docroot is /var/www and I am assuming you want your /mybook/ownCloud mapped to docroot. That is how you should do it because the httpd will run with group permissions to the real docroot. That can be done using an alias as I have below. Look at the bottom, but also note that I specified the correct default docroot in the beginning before I mapped anything. You can change the docroot but you will have to make sure the permissions on the new directory structure are set correctly.
I aliased your /mybook/ownCloud/ to ownCloud. Also, I have other directives that I removed from the sites-enabled code below for clarity.
BTW, I have personally never used tildes within an Apache conf file like you have above, it could be confusing during startup.
<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerAdmin webmaster#localhost
DocumentRoot /var/www
<Directory />
Options FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
</Directory>
<Directory /var/www/>
Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
allow from all
</Directory>
Alias /owncloud/ "/mybook/ownCloud"
<Directory "/mybook/ownCloud">
Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0 ::1/128
</Directory>
</VirtualHost>
EDIT:
There are other ways to configure a VHost, but this is basically how it is done. You no longer set a server wide docroot declaration in httpd.conf. The /etc/apache2/ path is the server home and in the absence of a docroot declaration in your sites-enabled it may have defaulted to Server Home when httpd started.