Apache and NGINX Together

Apache and NGINX Together

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1. Apache behind Nginx
2. PHP Considerations

Apache behind Nginx

Using Nginx as the primary frontend webserver can increase performance regardless if you choose to keep Apache running on the system. One of Nginx’s greatest advantage is how well it serves static content. It does so much more efficiently than Apache, and with very little cost to memory or processing. So placing Nginx in front will remove that burdern off Apache, leaving it to concentrate on dynamic request or special scenarios.

This method is also popular for those who don’t want to use PHP via fastcgi, or install a separate php-fpm process.

First thing that needs to be done is to change the interface apache listens on:

Listen 127.0.0.1:8080

Above we bind Apache to the localhost on an alternate port, since only Nginx on the same machine will be communicating with Apache.

Note: Since Nginx needs to access the same files that Apache serves, you need to make sure that Nginx is setup to run as the same user as apache, or to make sure that the Nginx’s selected user:group has permission to read the web documents. Often times the webroot is owned by nobody or www-data and Nginx likewise can be setup to run as those users

Then in Nginx listening on port 80 (either on all interfaces such as 0.0.0.0 or to specific IPs, your choice) we would need to configure Nginx to serve the same content. Take for example this virtual host in an apache configuration:

<VirtualHost>
      DocumentRoot "/usr/local/www/mydomain.com"
      ServerName mydomain.com
      ServerAlias www.mydomain.com
      CustomLog /var/log/httpd/mydomain_access.log common
      ErrorLog /var/log/httpd/mydomain_error.log
      ...
</VirtualHost>

In Nginx the equivalent server configuration would be:

server {
      root /usr/local/www/mydomain.com;
      server_name mydomain.com www.mydomain.com;
 
      # by default logs are stored in nginx's log folder
      # it can be changed to a full path such as /var/log/...
      access_log logs/mydomain_access.log;
      error_log logs/mydomain_error.log;
      ...
}

The above would serve all static content from the same location, however PHP will simply come back as PHP source. For this we need to send any PHP requests back to Apache.

server {
      root /usr/local/www/mydomain.com;
      server_name mydomain.com www.mydomain.com;
 
      access_log logs/mydomain_access.log;
      error_log logs/mydomain_error.log;
 
      location / { 
            # this is the location block for the document root of this vhost
      } 
 
      location ~ \.php {
            # this block will catch any requests with a .php extension
            # normally in this block data would be passed to a FastCGI process
 
            # these two lines tell Apache the actual IP of the client being forwarded
            # Apache requires mod_proxy (http://bit.ly/mod_proxy) for these to work
            # Most Apache 2.0+ servers have mod_proxy configured already
 
            proxy_set_header X-Real-IP  $remote_addr;
            proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $remote_addr;
 
            # this next line adds the Host header so that apache knows which vHost to serve
            # the $host variable is automatically set to the hostname Nginx is responding to
 
            proxy_set_header Host $host;
 
            # And now we pass back to apache
            # if you're using a side-by-side configuration the IP can be changed to
            # apache's bound IP at port 80 such as http://192.170.2.1:80
 
            proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080;
      }
 
       # if you don't like seeing all the errors for missing favicon.ico in root
       location = /favicon.ico { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
 
       # if you don't like seeing errors for a missing robots.txt in root
       location = /robots.txt { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
 
       # this will prevent files like .htaccess .htpassword .secret etc from being served
       # You can remove the log directives if you wish to
       # log any attempts at a client trying to access a hidden file
       location ~ /\. { deny all; access_log off; log_not_found off; }
}

PHP Considerations

If you are not familiar with Nginx, then it should be noted that Nginx does not have a PHP module like Apache’s mod_php, instead you either need to build PHP with FPM (ie: php-fpm/fastcgi), or you need to pass the request to something that can handle PHP.

In the case of using Nginx with Apache you essentially have two choices (can be set through CWP):

1) Compile and Install PHP-FPM, thus running a separate PHP process to be used by Nginx. This option is usually good if you want to keep the two webserver configurations separated from each other, that way any changes to one won’t affect the other. But of course it adds additional memory usage to the system.

2) Utilize Apache’s mod_php. This option is ideal when you will be passing data to Apache as a backend. Even in a side-by-side scenario, you can utilize mod_php by proxying any php request to Apache’s IP. But in the side-by-side scenario you have to make sure that Apache is also configured to serve the same virtualhost that Nginx is requesting.

Speed-wise both methods are about the same when PHP is configured with the same set of options on both. Which option you choose depends solely on your needs. Another article that may be of interest in relations to this one would be Nginx as a Proxy to your Blog, which can be just as easily utilized on a single server (especially if you get multiple IP ranges like I do).