Deployment Overview of Nginx on Server¶

Prerequisites and Basic Requirements¶

To ensure a successful deployment, the following requirements must be met:

Operating System: Debian or Ubuntu.
Privileges: Root or sudo access is required for directory creation and Docker management.
Docker: Docker and Docker Compose must be installed on the host system.
Ports: The following ports must be open in the firewall to allow traffic:
80/TCP (HTTP)
443/TCP (HTTPS)

The application uses a dynamic Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) based on the server ID. The template for the domain is as follows:

The application configuration and data are stored in the following locations:

/data/: Base directory for application data.
/data/nginx/: Main application directory containing Docker Compose files and environment settings.
/data/nginx/user_conf.d/: Contains custom Nginx configuration files.
/etc/hosts: Modified to include the local loopback entry for the FQDN.

The installation is performed via a deployment script that executes the following steps:

Environment Preparation: Creates necessary directories (/data, /data/nginx, and /data/nginx/user_conf.d) with specific permissions (0640).
Host Configuration: Updates the /etc/hosts file to map the local FQDN to 127.0.0.1.
Configuration Generation:
Generates a docker-compose.yml file in /data/nginx/.
Generates a specific Nginx configuration file in /data/nginx/user_conf.d/ based on the server's FQDN.
Environment Setup: Creates an environment file nginx-certbot.env located in /data/nginx/.
Volume Creation: Initializes a Docker volume named nginx_secrets to manage SSL certificates securely.
Service Deployment: Executes docker compose up -d from the /data/nginx/ directory to start the containers.

Directory Permissions: Data directories are owned by root:root with mode 0640.
SSL/TLS: The setup is configured to use Let's Encrypt certificates via Certbot for secure HTTPS communication.
Docker Volumes: Sensitive certificate data is stored in a dedicated Docker volume named nginx_secrets.

The deployment utilizes the following container:

Service	Image	Ports	Volumes	Environment Variables	Restart Policy
nginx	`jonasal/nginx-certbot:latest`	`80:80`, `443:443`	`- nginx_secrets:/etc/letsencrypt` `- ./user_conf.d:/etc/nginx/user_conf.d`	`[email protected]` (via `.env` file)	`unless-stopped`

To update the Nginx application, navigate to the installation directory and run the following command:

cd /data/nginx/ && docker compose pull && docker compose up -d