Apachectl and its command Line Options

Apachectl:
start : Start the Apache httpd daemon. Gives an error if it is already running.
stop : Stops the Apache httpd daemon.
graceful : Gracefully restarts the Apache httpd daemon. If the daemon
is not running, it is started. This differs from a normal restart in
that currently open connections are not aborted.
restart : Restarts the Apache httpd daemon. If the daemon is not
running, it is started. This command automatically checks the
configuration files as in configtest before initiating the restart to
make sure the daemon doesn't die.
status : Displays a brief status report.
fullstatus : Displays a full status report from mod_status. Requires
mod_status enabled on your server and a text-based browser such as
lynx available on your system. The URL used to access the status
report can be set by editing the STATUSURL variable in the script.
configtest:
-t Run a configuration file syntax test.