Why is nginx running on port 8080 but not 81? - macos

Question

Based on brew info nginx the terminal output is telling me that nginx is running on port 8080 by default:
The default port has been set in /usr/local/etc/nginx/nginx.conf to
8080 so that nginx can run without sudo.
This is the full output:
$ brew info nginx
nginx: stable 1.19.0 (bottled), HEAD
HTTP(S) server and reverse proxy, and IMAP/POP3 proxy server
https://nginx.org/
/usr/local/Cellar/nginx/1.19.0 (25 files, 2.1MB) *
Poured from bottle on 2020-06-16 at 17:55:46
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/blob/master/Formula/nginx.rb
==> Dependencies
Required: openssl#1.1 ✔, pcre ✔
==> Options
--HEAD
Install HEAD version
==> Caveats
Docroot is: /usr/local/var/www
The default port has been set in /usr/local/etc/nginx/nginx.conf to 8080 so that
nginx can run without sudo.
nginx will load all files in /usr/local/etc/nginx/servers/.
To have launchd start nginx now and restart at login:
brew services start nginx
Or, if you don't want/need a background service you can just run:
nginx
==> Analytics
install: 33,973 (30 days), 101,534 (90 days), 407,985 (365 days)
install-on-request: 33,387 (30 days), 99,128 (90 days), 394,576 (365 days)
build-error: 0 (30 days)
My Mac OS is Catalina 10.15
However, when I go to look at the nginx.conf in /usr/local/etc/nginx/nginx.conf I do not see that the nginx port is open on 8080. I see it open on port 81:
server {
listen 81;
server_name localhost;
....
....
When I go to visit http://localhost:8080/ I get the nginx welcome message. However when I go to visit http://localhost:81/ I get a "site can't be reached" ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED error.
How is nginx running on port 8080 without such a specification in the nginx.conf file? And why is nginx not running on port 81 which the conf appears to suggest it should.
Here's the full nginx.conf:
# cat /usr/local/etc/nginx/nginx.conf
#user nobody;
worker_processes 1;
#error_log logs/error.log;
#error_log logs/error.log notice;
#error_log logs/error.log info;
#pid logs/nginx.pid;
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"';
#access_log logs/access.log main;
sendfile on;
#tcp_nopush on;
#keepalive_timeout 0;
keepalive_timeout 65;
#gzip on;
server {
listen 81;
server_name localhost;
#charset koi8-r;
#access_log logs/host.access.log main;
#error_page 404 /404.html;
# redirect server error pages to the static page /50x.html
#
error_page 500 502 503 504 /50x.html;
location = /50x.html {
root html;
}
# proxy the PHP scripts to Apache listening on 127.0.0.1:80
#
#location ~ \.php$ {
# proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1;
#}
# pass the PHP scripts to FastCGI server listening on 127.0.0.1:9000
#
#location ~ \.php$ {
# root html;
# fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
# fastcgi_index index.php;
# fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME /scripts$fastcgi_script_name;
# include fastcgi_params;
#}
# deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
# concurs with nginx's one
#
#location ~ /\.ht {
# deny all;
#}
}
# another virtual host using mix of IP-, name-, and port-based configuration
#
#server {
# listen 8000;
# listen somename:8080;
# server_name somename alias another.alias;
# location / {
# root html;
# index index.html index.htm;
# }
#}
# HTTPS server
#
#server {
# listen 443 ssl;
# server_name localhost;
# ssl_certificate cert.pem;
# ssl_certificate_key cert.key;
# ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:1m;
# ssl_session_timeout 5m;
# ssl_ciphers HIGH:!aNULL:!MD5;
# ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
# location / {
# root html;
# index index.html index.htm;
# }
#}
include servers/*;
}

Answer 1

Have you tried to restart/reload Nginx yet? In order for the configuration change to take effect, you need to reload it.
You can use this command on Mac OSX to reload Nginx: sudo nginx -s reload