Nginx stable Docker image

devilbox/docker-nginx-stable

This image is based on the official Nginx Docker image and extends it with the ability to have virtual hosts created automatically, as well as adding SSL certificates when creating new directories. For that to work, it integrates two tools that will take care about the whole process: watcherd and vhost-gen.

From a users perspective, you mount your local project directory into the container under /shared/httpd. Any directory then created in your local project directory wil spawn a new virtual host by the same name. Additional settings such as custom server names, PHP-FPM or even different Apache templates per project are supported as well.

HTTP/2 is enabled by default for all SSL connections.

Docker Hub	Upstream Project

Apache 2.2 | Apache 2.4 | Nginx stable | Nginx mainline

Usage

Automated virtual hosts

Automated virtual hosts can be enabled by providing -e MASS_VHOST_ENABLE=1.
You should mount a local project directory into the Docker under /shared/httpd (-v /local/path:/shared/httpd).
You can optionally specify a global server name suffix via e.g.: -e MASS_VHOST_TLD=.loc
You can optionally specify a global subdirectory from which the virtual host will servve the documents via e.g.: -e MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT=www
Allow the Docker to expose its port via -p 80:80.
Have DNS names point to the IP address the container runs on (e.g. via /etc/hosts)

With the above described settings, whenever you create a local directory under your projects dir such as /local/path/mydir, there will be a new virtual host created by the same name http://mydir. You can also specify a global suffix for the vhost names via -e MASS_VHOST_TLD=.loc, afterwards your above created vhost would be reachable via http://mydir.loc.

Just to give you a few examples:

Assumption: /local/path is mounted to /shared/httpd

Directory	`MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT`	`MASS_VHOST_TLD`	Serving from ^(*)	Via
work1/	htdocs/		/local/path/work1/htdocs	http://work1
work1/	www/		/local/path/work1/www	http://work1
work1/	htdocs/	.loc	/local/path/work1/htdocs	http://work1.loc
work1/	www/	.loc	/local/path/work1/www	http://work1.loc

_{(*) This refers to the directory on your host computer}

Assumption: /tmp is mounted to /shared/httpd

Directory	`MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT`	`MASS_VHOST_TLD`	Serving from ^(*)	Via
api/	htdocs/		/tmp/api/htdocs	http://api
api/	www/		/tmp/api/www	http://api
api/	htdocs/	.test.com	/tmp/api/htdocs	http://api.test.com
api/	www/	.test.com	/tmp/api/www	http://api.test.com

_{(*) This refers to the directory on your host computer}

You would start it as follows:

docker run -it \
    -p 80:80 \
    -e MASS_VHOST_ENABLE=1 \
    -e MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT=www \
    -e MASS_VHOST_TLD=.loc \
    -v /local/path:/shared/httpd \
    devilbox/nginx-stable

Customization per virtual host

Each virtual host is generated from templates by vhost-gen. As vhost-gen is really flexible and allows combining multiple templates, you can copy and alter an existing template and then place it in a subdirectory of your project folder. The subdirectory is specified by MASS_VHOST_TPL.

Assumption: /local/path is mounted to /shared/httpd

Directory	`MASS_VHOST_TPL`	Templates are then read from ^(*)
work1/	cfg/	/local/path/work1/cfg/
api/	cfg/	/local/path/api/cfg/
work1/	conf/	/local/path/work1/conf/
api/	conf/	/local/path/api/conf/

_{(*) This refers to the directory on your host computer}

Customizing the default virtual host

The default virtual host can also be overwritten with a custom template. Use MAIN_VHOST_TPL variable in order to set the subdirectory to look for template files.

Enabling PHP-FPM

PHP-FPM is not included inside this Docker container, but can be enabled to contact a remote PHP-FPM server. To do so, you must enable it and at least specify the remote PHP-FPM server address (hostname or IP address). Additionally you must mount the data dir under the same path into the PHP-FPM docker container as it is mounted into the web server.

Note: When PHP-FPM is enabled, it is enabled for the default virtual host as well as for all other automatically created mass virtual hosts.

Disabling the default virtual host

If you only want to server you custom projects and don't need the default virtual host, you can disable it by -e MAIN_VHOST_ENABLE=0.

Options

Environmental variables

This Docker container adds a lot of injectables in order to customize it to your needs. See the table below for a detailed description.

Required environmental variables

PHP_FPM_SERVER_ADDR is required when enabling PHP FPM.

Optional environmental variables (nginx)

Variable	Type	Default	Description
WORKER_CONNECTIONS	int	`1024`	worker_connections
WORKER_PROCESSES	int or `auto`	`auto`	worker_processes

Optional environmental variables (general)

Variable	Type	Default	Description
DEBUG_ENTRYPOINT	int	`0`	Show settings and shell commands executed during startup. Values: `0`: Off `1`: Show settings `2`: Show settings and commands
DEBUG_RUNTIME	bool	`0`	Be verbose during runtime. Value: `0` or `1`
DOCKER_LOGS	bool	`0`	When set to `1` will redirect error and access logs to Docker logs (`stderr` and `stdout`) instead of file inside container. Value: `0` or `1`
TIMEZONE	string	`UTC`	Set docker OS timezone. (Example: `Europe/Berlin`)
NEW_UID	int	`101`	Assign the default Nginx user a new UID. This is useful if you you mount your document root and want to match the file permissions to the one of your local user. Set it to your host users uid (see `id` for your uid).
NEW_GID	int	`101`	This is useful if you you mount your document root and want to match the file permissions to the one of your local user group. Set it to your host user groups gid (see `id` for your gid).
PHP_FPM_ENABLE	bool	`0`	Enable PHP-FPM for the default vhost and the mass virtual hosts.
PHP_FPM_SERVER_ADDR	string	``	IP address or hostname of remote PHP-FPM server. Required when enabling PHP.
PHP_FPM_SERVER_PORT	int	`9000`	Port of remote PHP-FPM server
PHP_FPM_TIMEOUT	int	`180`	Timeout in seconds to upstream PHP-FPM server

Optional environmental variables (default vhost)

Variable	Type	Default	Description
MAIN_VHOST_ENABLE	bool	`1`	By default there is a standard (catch-all) vhost configured to accept requests served from `/var/www/default/htdocs`. If you want to disable it, set the value to `0`. Note:The `htdocs` dir name can be changed with `MAIN_VHOST_DOCROOT`. See below.
MAIN_VHOST_SSL_TYPE	string	`plain`	`plain` - only serve via http `ssl` - only serve via https `both` - serve via http and https `redir` - serve via https and redirect http to https
MAIN_VHOST_SSL_GEN	bool	`0`	`0`: Do not generate an ssl certificate `1`: Generate self-signed certificate automatically
MAIN_VHOST_SSL_CN	string	`localhost`	Comma separated list of CN names for SSL certificate generation (The domain names by which you want to reach the default server)
MAIN_VHOST_DOCROOT	string	`htdocs`	This is the directory name appended to `/var/www/default/` from which the default virtual host will serve its files. Default: `/var/www/default/htdocs` Example: `MAIN_VHOST_DOCROOT=www` Doc root: `/var/www/default/www`
MAIN_VHOST_TPL	string	`cfg`	Directory within th default vhost base path (`/var/www/default`) to look for templates to overwrite virtual host settings. See vhost-gen for available template files. Resulting default path: `/var/www/default/cfg`
MAIN_VHOST_STATUS_ENABLE	bool	`0`	Enable httpd status page.
MAIN_VHOST_STATUS_ALIAS	string	`/httpd-status`	Set the alias under which the httpd server should serve its status page.

Optional environmental variables (mass vhosts)

Variable	Type	Default	Description
MASS_VHOST_ENABLE	bool	`0`	You can enable mass virtual hosts by setting this value to `1`. Mass virtual hosts will be created for each directory present in `/shared/httpd` by the same name including a top-level domain suffix (which could also be a domain+tld). See `MASS_VHOST_TLD` for how to set it.
MASS_VHOST_SSL_TYPE	string	`plain`	`plain` - only serve via http `ssl` - only serve via https `both` - serve via http and https `redir` - serve via https and redirect http to https
MASS_VHOST_SSL_GEN	bool	`0`	`0`: Do not generate an ssl certificate `1`: Generate self-signed certificate automatically
MASS_VHOST_TLD	string	`.loc`	This string will be appended to the server name (which is built by its directory name) for mass virtual hosts and together build the final domain. Default:`<project>.loc` Example: Path: `/shared/httpd/temp` `MASS_VHOST_TLD=.lan` Server name: `temp.lan` Example: Path:`/shared/httpd/api` `MASS_VHOST_TLD=.example.com` Server name: `api.example.com`
MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT	string	`htdocs`	This is a subdirectory within your project dir under each project from which the web server will serve its files. `/shared/httpd/<project>/$MASS_VHOST_DOCROOT/` Default: `/shared/httpd/<project>/htdocs/`
MASS_VHOST_TPL	string	`cfg`	Directory within your new virtual host to look for templates to overwrite virtual host settings. See vhost-gen for available template files. `/shared/httpd/<project>/$MASS_VHOST_TPL/` Resulting default path: `/shared/httpd/<project>/cfg/`

Available mount points

Docker	Description
/etc/httpd-custom.d	Mount this directory to add outside configuration files (`*.conf`) to Nginx
/var/www/default	Nginx default virtual host base path (contains by default `htdocs/` and `cfg/`
/shared/httpd	Nginx mass virtual host root directory
/etc/vhost-gen.d	vhost-gen directory for custom templates. Copy and customize nginx.yml into this mounted directory for global vhost customizations

Default ports

Docker	Description
80	HTTP listening Port
443	HTTPS listening Port

Examples

1. Serve static files

Mount your local directort ~/my-host-www into the docker and server those files.

Note: Files will be server from ~/my-host-www/htdocs.

$ docker run -d -p 80:80 -v ~/my-host-www:/var/www/default -t devilbox/nginx-stable

2. Serve PHP files with PHP-FPM

Note, for this to work, the ~/my-host-www dir must be mounted into the Nginx Docker as well as into the php-fpm docker.

You can also attach other PHP-FPM version: PHP-FPM 5.4, PHP-FPM 5.5, PHP-FPM 5.6, PHP-FPM 7.0, PHP-FPM 7.1, PHP-FPM 7.2 or HHVM.

Each PHP-FPM docker also has the option to enable Xdebug and more, see their respective Readme files for futher settings.

# Start the PHP-FPM docker, mounting the same diectory
$ docker run -d -p 9000 -v ~/my-host-www:/var/www/default --name php cytopia/php-fpm-5.6

# Start the Nginx Docker, linking it to the PHP-FPM docker
$ docker run -d \
    -p 80:80 \
    -v ~/my-host-www:/var/www/default \
    -e PHP_FPM_ENABLE=1 \
    -e PHP_FPM_SERVER_ADDR=php \
    -e PHP_FPM_SERVER_PORT=9000 \
    --link php \
    -t devilbox/nginx-stable

3. Fully functional LEMP stack

Same as above, but also add a MySQL docker and link it into Nginx.

# Start the MySQL docker
$ docker run -d \
    -p 3306:3306 \
    -e MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=my-secret-pw \
    --name mysql \
    -t cytopia/mysql-5.5

# Start the PHP-FPM docker, mounting the same diectory.
# Also make sure to
#   forward the remote MySQL port 3306 to 127.0.0.1:3306 within the
#   PHP-FPM docker in order to be able to use `127.0.0.1` for mysql
#   connections from within the php docker.
$ docker run -d \
    -p 9000:9000 \
    -v ~/my-host-www:/var/www/default \
    -e FORWARD_PORTS_TO_LOCALHOST=3306:mysql:3306 \
    --name php \
    cytopia/php-fpm-5.6

# Start the Nginx Docker, linking it to the PHP-FPM docker
$ docker run -d \
    -p 80:80 \
    -v ~/my-host-www:/var/www/default \
    -e PHP_FPM_ENABLE=1 \
    -e PHP_FPM_SERVER_ADDR=php \
    -e PHP_FPM_SERVER_PORT=9000 \
    --link php \
    --link mysql \
    -t devilbox/nginx-stable

4. Ultimate pre-configured docker-compose setup

Have a look at the Devilbox for a fully-customizable docker-compose variant.

It offers pre-configured mass virtual hosts and an intranet.

It allows any of the following combinations:

PHP 5.2, PHP 5.3, PHP 5.4, PHP 5.5, PHP 5.6, PHP 7.0, PHP 7.1, PHP 7.2, PHP 7.3, PHP 7.4 and PHP 8.0
MySQL 5.5, MySQL 5.6, MySQL 5.7, MariaDB 5 and MariaDB 10
Apache 2.2, Apache 2.4, Nginx stable and Nginx mainline
And more to come...

Version

nginx version: nginx/1.14.2

alzen8work/docker-nginx-stable

Nginx stable Docker image

Usage

Automated virtual hosts

Customization per virtual host

Customizing the default virtual host

Enabling PHP-FPM

Disabling the default virtual host

Options

Environmental variables

Required environmental variables

Optional environmental variables (nginx)

Optional environmental variables (general)

Optional environmental variables (default vhost)

Optional environmental variables (mass vhosts)

Available mount points

Default ports

Examples

1. Serve static files

2. Serve PHP files with PHP-FPM

3. Fully functional LEMP stack

4. Ultimate pre-configured docker-compose setup

Version