4-basic-nginx-configuration.md

Basic nginx Configuration

Rename original configuration file

mv /etc/nginx/nginx.conf /etc/nginx/nginx.conf.ORIG

Create a new nginx configuration file using nano, with:

nano /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

Paste (Ctrl-Shift-v in Gnome terminal, right-click in PuTTy) the following data into the file:

user www-data;
worker_processes auto;
pid /run/nginx.pid;
error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
include /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/*.conf;

events {
    worker_connections  1024;
}

http {
    include       mime.types;
    default_type  application/octet-stream;

    #log_format  main  '$remote_addr - $remote_user [$time_local] "$request" '
    #                  '$status $body_bytes_sent "$http_referer" '
    #                  '"$http_user_agent" "$http_x_forwarded_for"';
    error_log  /var/log/nginx_error.log error;
    #access_log  logs/access.log  main;

    sendfile        on;
    #tcp_nopush     on;

    keepalive_timeout  65;

    # SSL
    ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2; # no sslv3 (poodle etc.)
    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;

    # Gzip Settings
    gzip on;
    gzip_disable "msie6";
    gzip_vary on;
    gzip_min_length 512;
    gzip_types text/plain text/html application/x-javascript text/javascript application/javascript text/xml text/css application/font-sfnt;

    fastcgi_cache_path /usr/share/nginx/cache/fcgi levels=1:2 keys_zone=microcache:10m max_size=1024m inactive=1h;

    include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf;
    include /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/*;
}

Now create the cache directory:

mkdir -p /usr/share/nginx/cache/fcgi

Check for configuration errors

Test the nginx configuration (or attempt to reload nginx) to make sure you don't have any errors:

Test the configuration without restarting/reloading the nginx service:

nginx -t

Or reload nginx, if it's running and you want to apply the new configuration right away:

systemctl reload nginx

Important: When testing an nginx config, [warn]s are okay -- [err] or [emerg] means there's a problem that you need to troubleshoot and fix, and will prevent the nginx service from starting successfully.