# Setting up NGINX Webserver

NGINX is a popular open-source light-weight webserver, which is now extensively used for reverse proxy and load balancing. Because of it light weight and easily configurable options, its use has been increased over the years. In this tutorial, I will cover how to set up a website in NGINX.

Before we start I'm assuming that you have:

1. A domain
    
2. Basic knowledge of linux and its commands (I will cover tutorial for Ubuntu)
    
3. And a virtual server
    

# Running a NGINX Webserver

## Step 1: Point your domain to your virtual server

In your domain's DNS, create an `A` record and add the IP address of your VM in the value field. Let's assume the domain to be [`example.com`](http://example.com). Use your domain and IP address of your VM when you come across these fields.

## Step 2: Create a public directory

Create a public directory for your website by running `mkdir -p /var/www/example.com`

To test our configuration we will create a test file in it by using `nano index.html`. Insert few lines of text in it and exit by pressing `ctrl+x`.

## Step 3: Install NGINX

`ssh` into your VM. If you're using Ubuntu, run

`sudo apt updatesudo apt install nginx`

If you are using another distribution of Linux, use its package manager to install NGINX. This will install the latest version of NGINX on your VM. You can check the version of NGINX installed by using `nginx --version`.

## Step 4: Configure NGINX

First of all, change to directory where NGINX configuration files are located. Run `cd /etc/nginx/sites-available`. We will create a configuration file in `sites-available` and create a symbolic link of that file in `sites-enabled` to actually run that configuration.

Create a file named [`example.com`](http://example.com)`.conf` and add the following text to it:

* `server` block tells the NGINX that this is a separate webserver. Same configuration file can have multiple `server` blocks.
    
* `server_name` defines the name of the virtual host that will be served by this configuration.
    
* `root` gives the document root of the website.
    
* `access_log` tell NGINX where to store the logs.
    
* `location` block is located within a server block and defines how requests are processed for different URIs and resources. The URI space can be separated in pretty much any location block. In our case when any URI is entered, Nginx will first look for the file with the same filename, then it will go for the directory of the same name, else it will go to the `index.html` page.
    

Save the file and exit. Now that the configuration is ready, we can add the file to the `sites-enabled` directory to enable the virtual host. We can do that by:

`sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/example.com`

Test the configuration by using `sudo nginx -t`

If you get a successful result, restart NGINX and put your website live.

`sudo service nginx restart`

Go to [`example.com`](http://example.com). You should see the same lines that you entered in Step 2.

# Setting up SSL

[LetsEncrypt](https://letsencrypt.org/) allows you to get a free SSL certificate for your domain, there is no reason you should not take this advantage. This is not just important from the security point of view, but it also helps in SEO.

To get a free certificate for ourselves, we will first install the LetsEncrypt certbot:

Now we will obtain a certificate for our domain.

`sudo certbot --nginx -d` [`example.com`](http://example.com)

While obtaining a certificate it will ask for an email id where reminders of certificate expiry and other information will be sent. Once a certificate is obtained, it will ask whether or not to redirect HTTP traffic to HTTPS. Type 2 and press Enter.

Now all the traffic coming to [`http://example.com`](http://example.com) will be redirected to [`https://example.com`](https://example.com)

NGINX is huge and there are many more options available to configure. While for most cases the default values should work for simple static websites, you can always read NGINX [documentation](https://docs.nginx.com/nginx/) for more information. If you have any comments, suggestions, or feedback let me know in the comments below. Anything and everything is appreciated.