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

Docker Compose

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx

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.

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

Hosting a static website

This nginx image exposes a volume at /app. Content mounted here is served by the default catch-all virtual host. Mounting an empty directory here will copy the default content to your volume.

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

or using Docker Compose:

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  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

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 8443:443 bitnami/nginx

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/vhosts:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts bitnami/nginx

or using Docker Compose:

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  volumes:
    - /path/to/nginx/vhosts:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts

Full configuration

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

or using Docker Compose:

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  volumes:
    - /path/to/nginx/conf:/bitnami/nginx/conf

Step 2: Edit the configuration

Edit the configuration on your host using your favorite editor.

vi /path/to/nginx/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

Note!

You can also reload the nginx configuration by sending the HUP signal to the container using the docker kill command.

docker kill -s HUP nginx

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 supports two different logging modes: logging to stdout, and logging to a file.

Logging to stdout

The default behavior is to log to stdout, as Docker expects. These will be collected by Docker, converted to JSON and stored in the host, to be accessible via the docker logs command.

docker logs nginx

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose logs nginx

This method of logging has the downside of not being easy to manage. Without an easy way to rotate logs, they could grow exponentially and take up large amounts of disk space on your host.

Logging to file

To log to file, run the nginx image, mounting a directory from your host at /bitnami/nginx/logs. This will instruct the container to send logs to your directory.

docker run --name nginx -v /path/to/nginx/logs:/bitnami/nginx/logs bitnami/nginx

or using Docker Compose:

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  volumes:
    - /path/to/nginx/logs:/bitnami/nginx/logs

To perform operations (e.g. logrotate) on the logs, mount the same directory in a container designed to operate on log files, such as logstash.

Maintenance

Backing up your container

To backup your configuration and logs, 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/backups:/backups --volumes-from nginx busybox \
  cp -a /bitnami/nginx /backups/latest

or using Docker Compose:

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

Note! If you only need to backup configuration, you can change the first argument to cp to /bitnami/nginx/conf.

Restoring a backup

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

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

or using Docker Compose:

nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  volumes:
    - /path/to/backups/latest/conf:/bitnami/nginx/conf
    - /path/to/backups/latest/logs:/bitnami/nginx/logs

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

Testing

This image is tested for expected runtime behavior, using the Bats testing framework. You can run the tests on your machine using the bats command.

bats test.sh

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_APP_VERSION inside the container)
• The command you used to run the container, and any relevant output you saw (masking any sensitive information)

License

Copyright 2015 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.