What is nginx?

nginx (pronounced "engine-x") is an open source reverse proxy server for HTTP, HTTPS, SMTP, POP3 and IMAP protocols, as well as a load balancer, HTTP cache, and a web server (origin server).

http://nginx.org/

TLDR

docker run --name nginx bitnami/nginx:latest

Docker Compose

version: '2'

services:
  nginx:
    image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'

Get this image

The recommended way to get the Bitnami nginx Docker Image is to pull the prebuilt image from the Docker Hub Registry.

docker pull bitnami/nginx:latest

To use a specific version, you can pull a versioned tag. You can view the list of available versions in the Docker Hub Registry.

docker pull bitnami/nginx:[TAG]

If you wish, you can also build the image yourself.

docker build -t bitnami/nginx:latest https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-nginx.git

Hosting a static website

This nginx image exposes a volume at /app. Content mounted here is served by the default catch-all virtual host.

docker run -v /path/to/app:/app bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

services:
  nginx:
    image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'
    volumes:
      - /path/to/app:/app

Accessing your server from the host

To access your web server from your host machine you can ask Docker to map a random port on your host to ports 80 and 443 exposed in the container.

docker run --name nginx -P bitnami/nginx:latest

Run docker port to determine the random ports Docker assigned.

$ docker port nginx
443/tcp -> 0.0.0.0:32768
80/tcp -> 0.0.0.0:32769

You can also manually specify the ports you want forwarded from your host to the container.

docker run -p 8080:80 -p 8443:443 bitnami/nginx:latest

Access your web server in the browser by navigating to http://localhost:8080.

Configuration

Adding custom virtual hosts

The default nginx.conf includes virtual hosts placed in /bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts/*.conf. You can mount a directory at /bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts from your host containing your custom virtual hosts.

docker run -v /path/to/nginx-persistence/vhosts:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

services:
  nginx:
    image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'
    volumes:
      - /path/to/nginx-persistence/vhosts:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts

Using custom SSL certificates

NOTE: The steps below assume that you are using a custom domain name and that you have already configured the custom domain name to point to your server.

This container comes with SSL support already pre-configured and with a dummy certificate in place (server.crt and server.key files in /bitnami/nginx/conf/bitnami/certs). If you want to use your own certificate (.crt) and certificate key (.key) files, follow the steps below:

Step 1: Prepare your certificate files

In your local computer, create a folder called certs and put your certificates files. Make sure you rename both files to server.crt and server.key respectively:

mkdir /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/certs -p
cp /path/to/certfile.crt /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/certs/server.crt
cp /path/to/keyfile.key  /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/certs/server.key

Step 2: Run the Nginx image

Run the Nginx image, mounting the certificates directory from your host.

docker run --name nginx \
-v /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/certs:/bitnami/nginx/conf/bitnami/certs \
bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

services:
nginx:
image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
ports:
- '80:80'
- '443:443'
volumes:
- /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/certs:/bitnami/nginx/conf/bitnami/certs

Full configuration

This container looks for configuration in /bitnami/nginx/conf. You can mount a directory at /bitnami/nginx/ with your own configuration, or the default configuration will be copied to your directory at conf/ if it's empty.

Step 1: Run the nginx image

Run the nginx image, mounting a directory from your host.

docker run --name nginx -v /path/to/nginx-persistence:/bitnami/nginx bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

services:
  nginx:
    image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'
    volumes:
      - /path/to/nginx-persistence:/bitnami/nginx

Step 2: Edit the configuration

Edit the configuration on your host using your favorite editor.

vi /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/nginx.conf

Step 4: Restart nginx

After changing the configuration, restart your nginx container for changes to take effect.

docker restart nginx

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose restart nginx

Enabling Pagespeed module

This image includes the Pagespeed module for nginx.

In order to activate it, mount the configuration volume following the steps in Full Configuration section above and edit the file located at /path/to/nginx-persistence/conf/bitnami/bitnami.conf adding the following snippet inside the server directive:

    pagespeed on;
    # needs to exist and be writable by nginx
    pagespeed FileCachePath /installdir/nginx/var/ngx_pagespeed_cache;
    location ~ "\.pagespeed\.([a-z]\.)?[a-z]{2}\.[^.]{10}\.[^.]+" { add_header "" ""; }
    location ~ "^/ngx_pagespeed_static/" { }
    location ~ "^/ngx_pagespeed_beacon$" { }
    location /ngx_pagespeed_statistics { allow 127.0.0.1; deny all; }
    location /ngx_pagespeed_message { allow 127.0.0.1; deny all; }

Then, restart nginx or reload its configuration following the steps in the Restart nginx section.

Reverse proxy to other containers

nginx can be used to reverse proxy to other containers using Docker's linking system. This is particularly useful if you want to serve dynamic content through an nginx frontend. Bitnami provides example virtual hosts for all of our runtime containers in /bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts/.

Further Reading:

• nginx reverse proxy

Logging

The Bitnami nginx Docker image sends the container logs to the stdout. To view the logs:

docker logs nginx

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose logs nginx

You can configure the containers logging driver using the --log-driver option if you wish to consume the container logs differently. In the default configuration docker uses the json-file driver.

Maintenance

Backing up your container

To backup your nginx configurations, follow these simple steps:

Step 1: Stop the currently running container

docker stop nginx

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose stop nginx

Step 2: Run the backup command

We need to mount two volumes in a container we will use to create the backup: a directory on your host to store the backup in, and the volumes from the container we just stopped so we can access the data.

docker run --rm -v /path/to/nginx-backups:/backups \
  --volumes-from nginx busybox:latest \
    cp -a /bitnami/nginx /backups/latest

or using Docker Compose:

docker run --rm -v /path/to/nginx-backups:/backups \
  --volumes-from `docker-compose ps -q nginx` busybox:latest \
    cp -a /bitnami/nginx /backups/latest

Restoring a backup

Restoring a backup is as simple as mounting the backup as volumes in the container.

docker run -v /path/to/nginx-backups/latest:/bitnami/nginx bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

services:
  nginx:
    image: 'bitnami/nginx:latest'
    ports:
      - '80:80'
      - '443:443'

    volumes:
      - /path/to/nginx-backups/latest:/bitnami/nginx

Upgrade this image

Bitnami provides up-to-date versions of nginx, including security patches, soon after they are made upstream. We recommend that you follow these steps to upgrade your container.

Step 1: Get the updated image

docker pull bitnami/nginx:latest

or if you're using Docker Compose, update the value of the image property to bitnami/nginx:latest.

Step 2: Stop and backup the currently running container

Before continuing, you should backup your container's configuration and logs.

Follow the steps on creating a backup.

Step 3: Remove the currently running container

docker rm -v nginx

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose rm -v nginx

Step 4: Run the new image

Re-create your container from the new image, restoring your backup if necessary.

docker run --name nginx bitnami/nginx:latest

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose start nginx

Notable Changes

1.10.0-r0

• The configuration volume has been moved to /bitnami/nginx. Now you only need to mount a single volume at /bitnami/nginx for persisting configuration. /app is still used for serving content by the default virtual host.
• The logs are always sent to the stdout and are no longer collected in the volume.

1.8.0-4-r01 (2015-10-05)

• /app directory is no longer exported as a volume. This caused problems when building on top of the image, since changes in the volume are not persisted between Dockerfile RUN instructions. To keep the previous behavior (so that you can mount the volume in another container), create the container with the -v /app option.

Contributing

We'd love for you to contribute to this container. You can request new features by creating an issue, or submit a pull request with your contribution.

Issues

If you encountered a problem running this container, you can file an issue. For us to provide better support, be sure to include the following information in your issue:

• Host OS and version
• Docker version (docker version)
• Output of docker info
• Version of this container (echo $BITNAMI_IMAGE_VERSION inside the container)
• The command you used to run the container, and any relevant output you saw (masking any sensitive information)

License

Copyright (c) 2015-2016 Bitnami

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.