Configuring Nginx as a proxy for a Vapor API - macos

Question

'm pretty stuck after a few days of trying to get this working and I could use some help.
I have a vapor API that works fine. I created a route and can access it from http://localhost:8080/backend/returnA in a browser on the server. It returns some JSON.
Where I'm stuck is in trying to configure Nginx to server as a proxy. Can anyone help me understand how the http://localhost:8080/backend/returnA URL translates into a working URL accessible from the LAN?
I'm pretty confused as the Nginx.conf asks for a root URL but I don't know what to put in. If I leave it blank it defaults to /usr/local/Cellar/nginx/1.15.6/html/backend/returnA/index.html which obviously won't work. If I set it to the public folder in the Vapor app directory this also doesn't work. In both instances I get a "No such file or directory".
I've gone through countless Nginx conf settings found online, tried adding a proxy location, nothing works. Trying http://172.16.1.25/backend/returnA/ always returns a 404 from the Nginx server.
How do I point Nginx to my Vapor route when it's not serving a static file like index.html, and instead retuning JSON?
Any help is much appreciated.
Here's the config, edited to include Thanh's code, old location commented out:
#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 {
server_name 172.16.1.25;
listen 80 default_server;
root /Users/localadmin/Developer/server/MedicapAPI/Public/;
# location #proxy {
# proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080;
# proxy_pass_header Server;
# proxy_set_header Host $host;
# proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
# proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
# proxy_pass_header Server;
# proxy_connect_timeout 3s;
# proxy_read_timeout 10s;
# }
location / {
proxy_ignore_client_abort on;
proxy_pass http://localhost:8080/;
proxy_redirect off;
}
}
include servers/*;
}

Answer 1

Using this :
listen 80 default_server;
server_name 172.16.1.25; #ip address of server
it will catch all server blokck and:
location / {
proxy_ignore_client_abort on;
proxy_pass http://localhost:8080/;
proxy_redirect off;
}
It will be proxy_pass to application which is running in port 8080

Answer 2

server {
#server_name mysite.com;
listen 80;
error_log /var/log/mysite.com_error.log warn;
access_log /var/log/mysite.com.ru_access.log;
large_client_header_buffers 8 32k;
client_max_body_size 10M;
location / {
# redirect all traffic to localhost:8080;
proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
proxy_set_header X-NginX-Proxy true;
proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080/;
proxy_redirect off;
proxy_read_timeout 86400;
# enables WS support
proxy_http_version 1.1;
proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
# prevents 502 bad gateway error
proxy_buffers 8 32k;
proxy_buffer_size 64k;
reset_timedout_connection on;
tcp_nodelay on;
}
# Give direct access to Public files of your app instead of using FileMiddleware
location ~* ^.+.(jpg|jpeg|gif|css|png|js|ico|xml|html|mp4|pdf)$ {
access_log off;
expires 30d;
root /path/to/your/app/Public;
}
}
This is my working example.
For production I suggest you to use SSL certificate e.g. from LetsEncrypt, replace listen port to 443 and add the following configuration lines after listen line:
ssl on;
ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:10m;
ssl_session_timeout 10m;
ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/mysite.com/fullchain.pem;
ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/mysite.com/privkey.pem;
ssl_ciphers 'HIGH:!aNULL:!MD5:!kEDH';
add_header Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000; includeSubdomains;";
ssl_stapling on;
ssl_stapling_verify on;
That's it, now you're ready for production!