How Do You Troubleshoot Nginx Not Being Removed from Ubuntu Linux Like It Should?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You want to remove Nginx from an Ubuntu server.  You run this: sudo apt-get remove nginx

But you receive this error:
“
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
You might want to run ‘apt-get -f install’ to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 nginx-dbg : Depends: nginx (= 1.12.1-1~xenial)
E: Unmet dependencies.

…

Continue reading “How Do You Troubleshoot Nginx Not Being Removed from Ubuntu Linux Like It Should?”

How Do You Deploy Nginx to a Docker Container on an AWS Linux Server?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You installed Docker (on either Ubuntu or RedHat, see the links if you actually need help with that).  You do not want to create a Docker network on your server. How do you create a simple Docker container with Nginx without creating a user-defined network?

Solution
#1  Run these two commands:
docker pull nginx
docker run –name docker-nginx -p 80:80 nginx

# If the command hangs,

…

Continue reading “How Do You Deploy Nginx to a Docker Container on an AWS Linux Server?”

How Do You Generate a Load for Your Nginx or Apache Web Server?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You set up a load balancing mechanism for your Nginx or Apache web server.  You want to test it and set up an artificial load of traffic.  You want to generate a significant amount of traffic to test the HTTP load balancing mechanism.  How do you do this?

Solution
Here are three scripts that can, by themselves, download a web page 100 times when they execute. 

…

Continue reading “How Do You Generate a Load for Your Nginx or Apache Web Server?”

How Do You Edit Text inside a Docker Container?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
The server you have is a RHEL (RedHat Enterprise Linux) or Ubuntu instance.  You are in a Docker container that you pulled from the internet for Nginx.  Inside this Docker container you cannot use vi because it is not a recognized command.  What do you do to install a text editor in the Docker container?

Solution for non-SUSE Linux
#1  Inside the Docker container,

…

Continue reading “How Do You Edit Text inside a Docker Container?”

How Do You Get Nginx in a Docker Container to Log Web Server Activity to a Regular File inside the Container?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
Normally the Nginx web service logs operations (e.g., a user going to a website with a web browser).  By default Nginx Docker containers do not have good logging for web server usage.  You want regular Nginx logging inside the Docker container.  What do you do?

Solution
1.  Go inside the Docker container (e.g., docker exec -it <containerName> bash).  Go to /etc/nginx/

2. 

…

Continue reading “How Do You Get Nginx in a Docker Container to Log Web Server Activity to a Regular File inside the Container?”

How Do You Configure Nginx in a Docker Container to Be an HTTP Load Balancer?

0 Comments

Updated on 11/7/17

Problem scenario
You want a computer server (e.g., an AWS instance) to be a reverse proxy (a type of landing page users do not see that acts as a portal).  You want it to relay traffic to other IP addresses.  How do you get a server with Docker to distribute traffic to other IP endpoints?

Solution
Prerequisites
This assumes that Docker has already been installed. 

…

Continue reading “How Do You Configure Nginx in a Docker Container to Be an HTTP Load Balancer?”

How Do You Optimize a Website’s Performance That Is Running Nginx as a Load Balancer in a Docker Container?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You want web page refreshes to happen more quickly for your website when a user clicks “Reload” in her web browser.  The website you manage is powered by Nginx configured as an HTTP load balancer (aka a reverse proxy).  This Nginx configuration is in a Docker container too. The rule you want is that clients’ inbound connection requests from a specific IP address should be relayed to the same Nginx server every time that client reloads the web page in the web browser.

…

Continue reading “How Do You Optimize a Website’s Performance That Is Running Nginx as a Load Balancer in a Docker Container?”

How Do You Use the ip_hash Directive in Nginx Running in Docker and Be Able to Stop and Start the Docker Container Again?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You are using Nginx as a reverse proxy (a server that is essentially a landing page that is invisible to users and passes connection requests to other web servers like a router).  You noticed that when you added the “ip_hash;” directive in the “upstream server {}” section (also known as a block) of the /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf file, you lose the Docker container.  That is if you stop the Docker container once the Nginx default.conf file has this “ip_hash;” directive,

…

Continue reading “How Do You Use the ip_hash Directive in Nginx Running in Docker and Be Able to Stop and Start the Docker Container Again?”

How Do You Set up Nginx as an HTTP Load Balancer So Client Requests (from Web Browsers) Do Not Go to Nginx Servers That Have Failed Several Times in Recent Attempts?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
To improve performance of your HTTP load balancing mechanism, you want to configure how failed members of the load balancer are dealt with. Some Nginx instances may fail in your environment. You do not want attempts to send web traffic to these instances immediately after several failures.  How do you granularly keep track of failed attempts and remove the instance from the distribution algorithm after a certain limit has been reach to improve performance by attempting only more reliable instances?

…

Continue reading “How Do You Set up Nginx as an HTTP Load Balancer So Client Requests (from Web Browsers) Do Not Go to Nginx Servers That Have Failed Several Times in Recent Attempts?”

How Do You Deploy Several Docker Containers with Nginx and Have Each of Them Work Simultaneously on a Single RedHat Server?

0 Comments

Problem scenario
You want to create several Docker containers each supporting Nginx.  You want to be able to browse to the different instances of Nginx from a web browser.  How do you have multiple Docker containers support Nginx on one RedHat Enterprise Linux host server?

Solution
These directions are geared toward a RHEL host server instance in AWS.

#1 Install Docker.

…

Continue reading “How Do You Deploy Several Docker Containers with Nginx and Have Each of Them Work Simultaneously on a Single RedHat Server?”