specify server root as a parameter when launching nginx - nginx

I've put nginx into /d/webservers/nginx on Windows and added it to the PATH. Now I try to run nginx from different folder but get the following error:
nginx: [alert] could not open error log file: CreateFile() "logs/error.log" failed (3: The system cannot find the path specified)
2015/03/22 10:09:25 [emerg] 5516#3056: CreateFile() "C:\Users\username/conf/nginx.conf" failed (3: The system cannot find the path specified)
It seems that nginx can't find it's server root folder /d/webservers/nginx where config and logs folder exists. Is there any way to pass as an argument the pass to the server root folder? Something like it's done for Apache: httpd -d /d/Webservers/Apache24'

nginx -c d:/webservers/nginx/conf/nginx.conf

Related

Run nginx.exe on Windows as another user

I'm working on a project for deploying pentest lab with terraform & ansible. All is working good except that last problem.
In my lab I have a nginx server running on a Windows server. Nginx with php works when I start them as Administrator with ansible but i need them to run with a non admin local account.
For the php i've made a wrapper using this tools : https://github.com/antonioCoco/RunasCs
But it doesn't work with nginx cause of a working directory problem :
Here is the error :
PS C:\Users\Administrator> .\RunAsCs.exe nginx ***** C:\Web\nginx-1.19.6\nginx.exe
[*] Warning: GetUserProfileDirectory failed with error code: 2
[*] Warning: Unable to obtain environment for user 'nginx'.
[*] Warning: Environment of created process might be incorrect.
nginx: [alert] could not open error log file: CreateFile() "logs/error.log" failed (3: The system cannot find the path specified)
2021/03/06 10:18:33 [emerg] 5556#6124: CreateFile() "C:\Windows\system32/conf/nginx.conf" failed (3: The system cannot find the path specified)
And that's normal because as you can see my wrapper start in Windows/System32
I would like to know if there is a solution either with nginx.conf or with ansible to start this exe as the "nginx" user.
This is a working code for starting nginx as Administrator
- name: Starting web server
win_shell: .\nginx.exe
args:
chdir: C:\Web\nginx-1.19.6
async: 180
poll: 0
I know that there is a psexec module in ansible but psexec will work only for Local Admin account and the goal of that is that my nginx don't run as Local Admin.
Thanks for the help !

nginx: [emerg] getgrnam("nobody") failed

while installing letsencrypt certificate the output error is:
nginx: the configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf syntax is ok
nginx: [emerg] getgrnam(“nobody”) failed
nginx: configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf test failed
but if I run:
nginx -t
to see if there are configuration errors in the nginx.conf file,
nginx -t return the output:
nginx: the configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf syntax is ok
nginx: configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf test is successful
Every now and then on WordPress I also get the error:
internal server 500 error
and I don’t know if this is related to the problem I described above
My web server is (include version):
The operating system my web server runs on is (include version):
Linux lemp7-optimized-g2-1-vm 4.9.0-8-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.9.110-3+deb9u4 (2018-08-21) x86_64
jeware lemp7 stack profile
jetware
I managed to install the certificates by inserting a line with the “user nobody nogroup;” in the nginx.conf file
After the installation I removed the line with the “user nobody nogroup;” in the nginx.conf file
sudo wget https://dl.eff.org/certbot-auto
sudo mv certbot-auto /jet/etc/letsencrypt/certbot-auto
sudo chown root /jet/etc/letsencrypt/certbot-auto
sudo chmod 0755 /jet/etc/letsencrypt/certbot-auto
sudo chmod a+x /jet/etc/letsencrypt/certbot-auto
sudo /jet/etc/letsencrypt/certbot-auto --nginx --nginx-ctl /jet/bin/nginx --nginx-server-root /jet/etc/nginx --config-dir /jet/etc/letsencrypt
this produce this output:
nginx: the configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf syntax is ok
nginx: [emerg] getgrnam(“nobody”) failed
nginx: configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf test failed
but if I run:
nginx -t
to see if there are configuration errors in the nginx.conf file,
nginx -t return the output:
nginx: the configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf syntax is ok
nginx: configuration file /jet/etc/nginx/nginx.conf test is successful
every now and then on WordPress I also get the error: internal server 500 error
and I don’t know if this is related to the problem I described above
I will probably also have problems with automatic certificate renewal if I do not resolve this situation
Well I have solved the problem. Fortunately I managed to find the error in the log and I understood what happened.
“certbot-auto” installs the certificates using the user: nobody. In my system there already existed by default a user “nobody” of the group “nogroup” but has no access to nginx. user nobody
So to be able to install the certificates I had to insert a line with the directive: user nobody nogroup; inside nginx.conf.
This allowed the installation of certificates. However, this procedure has changed the permissions in the directory: /jet/tmp/nginx/
where instead of: my_ssh_user:my_ssh_group I found: nobody:my_ssh_group and with this modified setting I received the internal server 500 error on the WordPress admin panel. So the problem is not related to WordPress but to the certificate installation procedure.
After installing the certificates I removed the user nobody nogroup directive; because during the restart of nginx, a warning came up saying that this directive is not supported and therefore will be ignored.
Restoring the permissions with chmod on the directory: /jet/tmp/nginx I fixed the problem and the internal server 500 error disappeared.
Here the link of the same discussion on letsencrypt. I still doubt that the error could recur when I have to renew the certificates.
A possible solution could be to assign the ssh user of the virtual instance that does not have root permissions, root permissions by adding it to the root group.
On virtual hosts, when an instance is launched, a user ssh is created.
This user, for security reasons, does not have root permissions.
Letsencrypt by default installs the certificates on the / etc / letsencrypt folder, which has root permissions (user: root group: root).
I had to install the certificates in the folder where the ssh user can have access (user: myssh_user group: myssh_group), ie su / jet / etc / letsencrypt
Could it be that the error was caused by this?

NGINX cannot create it's own .conf file on Windows 10

When I cd into the nginx folder as an admin in CMD, and run nginx.exe, it fails to create its config file. I have tried a local vs a online account and different versions of nginx.
The error message is:
nginx: [emerg] CreateFile() "c:\nginx\conf\nginx.conf" failed (2: FormatMessage() error:(15100))

Nginx service not starting on Windows 10 - nginx: [alert] could not open error log file: CreateFile()

I have an Nginx service that's configured to start automatically on my Windows 10; however, this morning, the service wouldn't start.
The error log says: nginx: [alert] could not open error log file: CreateFile() "C:\someForlderName\build\distribution\.\nginx/logs/error.log" failed (3: The system cannot find the path specified)
Looking at the path in the error log above, I do NOT have the /logs/ folder on my local system so it looks like Nginx doesn't have the proper permissions to create that folder?
I'm setup as an admin user and my service is set to Log On As - Local System Account
This only happens on Windows 10; but the service starts and works on
older Windows i.e 8.1
So does anyone know how to grant administrator's permissions to Nginx so that Nginx can create folders and files on Windows 10 ?
You need:
To install nginx/Windows, download the latest mainline version distribution (1.13.8), since the mainline branch of nginx contains all known fixes. Then unpack the distribution, go to the nginx-1.13.8 directory, and run nginx. Here is an example for the drive C: root directory: (Run cmd as administrator)
cd c:\
unzip nginx-1.13.8.zip
cd nginx-1.13.8
start nginx
Go to: http://localhost:80 -> test install
Goback to console cmd: "nginx -s stop"
Run for next time:
Config with file: "C:\nginx-1.13.8\conf\nginx.conf"
Open cmd as administrator
Run bash: "cd C:\nginx-1.13.8"
Run nginx with bash: "start nginx" . If you run with bash: "nginx", will get trouble for exit nginx.
And
nginx -s stop #fast shutdown
nginx -s quit #graceful shutdown
nginx -s reload #changing configuration, starting new worker processes with a new configuration, graceful shutdown of old worker processes
nginx -s reopen #re-opening log files
Under the directory that you run nginx.exe, try to create a directory named logs, and a file named error.log under log.
It should pass this error.
After downloading zip file, you have unzip.
Make sure that you dont have nested folder names. You have to copy your folder which has nginx.exe file in it, and paste it into C:/ folder.
While running commands, like nginx -s stop, make sure that current your working directory is same as the nginx.exe file.
enter image description here
Nginx start on default port 80, not 8080. Try localhost:80 on browser.
If you want to change port, open C:\nginx-1.16.1\conf\nginx.conf with text editor.
change port number what you want use default port.
server {
listen 80;
server_name localhost;
to:
server {
listen 8080;
server_name localhost;
I had a similar issue with starting the nginx server, but after looking at it closely and trying to run the command in different consoles, I realized it just a simple issue of a missing path.
How I solved it was to cd into the containing folder for the nginx.exe file (which actually contains error logs and all the necessary files) and then run the nginx command which started the server and fixed it for me.

Nginx trying to log to /var/logs instead of /var/log?

I noticed when I test my nginx config using nginx -t, it gives me a warning:
nginx: [alert] could not open error log file: open() "/var/logs/nginx/error.log" failed (2: No such file or directory)
Which makes sense, since the log path for nginx is actually set up to be /var/log/nginx/ not /var/logs/nginx.
I scanned the entire nginx config directory and there is nothing there referencing /var/logs. I'm at a loss as to where this log location could be written?
Run this command in a terminal (note: capital V):
nginx -V
Do you find /var/logs there? Your nginx might be compiled with that default file location.
[EDIT]
I guess that some of your server blocks don't have the "error_log" directive. So nginx tries the default one for them. Note that by default the error_log is always on.
To fix this issue, you can add this line on the main block (the top level) such that all child blocks can inherit the setting:
error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
You can create these missed files:
cd /var/log/nginx/
sudo touch error.log
sudo touch access.log
sudo chmod 750 *.log
Then trigger nginx service:
sudo systemctl daemon-relod
sudo service nginx restart
[NOTE]:
You can also disable nginx logging:
disable nginx logging (1)
disable nginx logging (2)
You have a bad compiled default. Anything nginx notices before loading the config goes to the path for the error log defined at compile time. Recompile nginx with sane path or symlink log to logs if you can't.

Resources