Automate nginx installation via passenger - ruby

Question

Every time we reinstall nginx using passenger, we have to provide to it a bunch of options to define the paths, modules and options we'd like to activate, which can be a bit of pain.
Does anybody know of a way to automate this using some kind of answer file?

Answer 1

Yes you can use a provisioning tool like Chef or Puppet but in some cases those can be overkill. I just have a Bash script with some variables at the top that get changed as necessary, I then just transfer the script to the target server and execute it.
The actual packages for nginx & passenger I keep in my own S3 bucket.
#!/bin/sh
# setup download location
DOWNLOAD_DIR=/tmp
NGINX="nginx-1.4.1"
NGINX_DIR=${DOWNLOAD_DIR}/${NGINX}
PASSENGER_VERSION="4.0.3"
S3HOST="your-s3-host"
# download nginx source
curl http://${S3HOST}.s3.amazonaws.com/software/${NGINX}.tar.gz -o $DOWNLOAD_DIR/${NGINX}.tar.gz
tar xzf $DOWNLOAD_DIR/${NGINX}.tar.gz --directory $DOWNLOAD_DIR
# download headers module
curl http://${S3HOST}.s3.amazonaws.com/software/headers-more-nginx-module-v0.16.zip -o $DOWNLOAD_DIR/headers-more-nginx-module-v0.16.zip
unzip $DOWNLOAD_DIR/headers-more-nginx-module-v0.16.zip -d $DOWNLOAD_DIR
# install passenger
apt-get install -y gcc g++ build-essential bison openssl libreadline6 lsof
apt-get install -y libreadline6-dev curl git-core zlib1g zlib1g-dev libssl-dev libpcre3-dev
apt-get install -y libyaml-dev libxml2-dev libxslt-dev autoconf libc6-dev ncurses-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev
apt-get install -y default-jre python-software-properties imagemagick
apt-get install -y ruby1.9.3 ruby1.9.1-dev libruby1.9.1 rubygems1.9.1 irb1.9.1 ri1.9.1 rdoc1.9.1 s3cmd
ln -nfs /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/bin/* /usr/bin/
gem install passenger -v ${PASSENGER_VERSION} --no-ri --no-rdoc
gem install bundler sass --no-ri --no-rdoc
# postgres client libraries
aptitude install software-properties-common -y
add-apt-repository -y ppa:pitti/postgresql
apt-get update
apt-get install -y postgresql-client-9.2 postgresql-server-dev-9.2
wget http://${S3HOST}.s3.amazonaws.com/software/passenger-enterprise-server-${PASSENGER_VERSION}.gem
gem install ./passenger-enterprise-server-${PASSENGER_VERSION}.gem --no-ri --no-rdoc
/var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-enterprise-server-${PASSENGER_VERSION}/bin/passenger-install-nginx-module \
--auto --prefix=/usr --nginx-source-dir=${NGINX_DIR} \
--extra-configure-flags="--conf-path=/etc/nginx/nginx.conf --http-log-path=/var/log/nginx/access.log --error-log-path=/var/log/nginx/error.log --pid-path=/var/run/nginx.pid --http-client-body-temp-path=/var/tmp/nginx/client --http-proxy-temp-path=/var/tmp/nginx/proxy --http-fastcgi-temp-path=/var/tmp/nginx/fastcgi --with-md5-asm --with-md5=/usr/include --with-sha1-asm --with-sha1=/usr/include --without-http_fastcgi_module --with-http_stub_status_module --with-http_ssl_module --add-module=${DOWNLOAD_DIR}/headers-more-nginx-module-v0.16"
# make proper folders
mkdir -p /etc/nginx/sites-enabled
mkdir -p /etc/nginx/conf.d
mkdir -p /var/tmp/nginx
mkdir -p /etc/nginx/ssl/rapidssl
mkdir -p /var/www/shared/log/old_logs
chown -R vino:vino /var/www
# cleanup the stupid files
rm /etc/nginx/*.default
# start from init script
update-rc.d nginx defaults
# cleanup
rm -rf $DOWNLOAD_DIR/nginx*

Answer 2

passenger-install-apache2-module supports non-interactive, automatic, headless installs or upgrades through command line options. You can use those options to automate answers. This is documented in the manual: http://www.modrails.com/documentation/Users%20guide%20Nginx.html#_non_interactive_automatic_headless_installs_or_upgrades
Alternatively, you can install Phusion Passenger as if it's a normal Nginx module, and use the normal Nginx installation automation scripts: http://www.modrails.com/documentation/Users%20guide%20Nginx.html#_installing_as_a_normal_nginx_module_without_using_the_installer

Answer 3

You could use a provisioning tool such as chef or puppet. It may be overkill to use it for this case on its own, but you could use it to prepare entire servers or workstations from the ground up.