10.6.2 httpd respawning endlessly.

Question

My server's log is full of this:
Feb 28 00:40:31 atlas com.apple.launchd[1] (org.apache.httpd): Throttling respawn: Will start in 10 seconds
Feb 28 00:40:41 atlas org.apache.httpd[2466]: (48)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address 127.0.0.1:9010
Feb 28 00:40:41 atlas org.apache.httpd[2466]: no listening sockets available, shutting down
Feb 28 00:40:41 atlas org.apache.httpd[2466]: Unable to open logs
Feb 28 00:40:41 atlas com.apple.launchd[1] (org.apache.httpd[2466]): Exited with exit code: 1
Which would of course suggest that something else has that port. It doesn't. The only thing with that port is httpd. So I kill all running instances of httpd, nothing has the port. Start up Web ... and the errors begin churning out again.
When I reboot the server, there's nothing on port 9010 (confirmed by lsof). Start Web, and the errors begin churning out again.
So I edit httpd.conf, and change the listen line to 9011. Start web, now it's complaining it can't bind to :9011! It can't bind, because it itself has just bound!
I comment out the Listen line entirely, and now the error is:
Feb 28 00:43:14 atlas org.apache.httpd[2621]: (48)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address [::]:80
Feb 28 00:43:14 atlas org.apache.httpd[2621]: (48)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address 0.0.0.0:80
This is an absolutely stock install. I haven't touched Web -- all I did was upgrade to 10.6.2. To be sure, I deleted httpd.conf and the sites and restored from their defaults but still this error is haunting me.
It's incredibly frustrating, and I'd very much appreciate any help you can give.

Answer 1

Ah, here we go, that's exactly what it is.
On this system, /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.apache.httpd.plist contains
[lines snipped]
<key>ProgramArguments</key>
<array>
<string>/usr/sbin/httpd</string>
<string>-D</string>
<string></string>
</array>
What it should have (or at least, what 10.6 non-server and what works) is to have:
<key>ProgramArguments</key>
<array>
<string>/usr/sbin/httpd</string>
<string>-D</string>
<string>FOREGROUND</string>
</array>
This stops Apache daemonizing, which is neccessary for launchd to be able to keep track of it.
(It'd be of interest if people could report what their plists look like, to see if this has somehow been corrupted, or if it's a 10.6.2 bug that needs reporting)