Score:1

nginx 403 Forbidden error, no error log. New installation on existing ubuntu 20.04 system

ru flag

Trying to understand why this new installation of nginx is not serving any files at all. I have a minimal website configuration. (rtmp was working last I checked but that has not been needed in a while. Just added the port 80 configuration. I mention only because you'll see it in the config.)

When I try to access this host (by IP or by hostname), I get a "403 (forbidden)" error"displayed on the web page, and nothing at all in the /var/log/nginx/error.log file. (That file has zero bytes, even after reboot and retry.)

All the other questions I've found like this on serverfault, have help in the error.log file. Since error.log is empty, I've created this new question.

This happens when I try to use the default index facility, and when I try specific files, such as these examples:

    http://hpmicro1
    http://hpmicro1.innerdomain.com
    http://hpmicro1.innerdomain.com/index.html
    http://192.168.1.5
    http://192.168.1.5/index.html
    http://192.168.1.5/index.php

and so on. As you can see, those files exist, and are owned by www-data:

    # ls -l /www/htdocs
    total 60
    -rw-rw-rw- 1 www-data www-data 35752 Jul 17 14:09 dbg-wizard.php
    drwxrwxr-x 2 www-data www-data  4096 Jul 16 08:15 functions
    drwxrwxr-x 2 www-data www-data  4096 Jul 17 12:38 GetChats
    -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 10918 Jul 18 16:16 index.html
    -rw-rw-rw- 1 www-data www-data    20 Jul 17 14:18 index.php

    # ls -ld /www/htdocs
    drwxrwxr-x 5 www-data dennis 4096 Jul 18 16:22 /www/htdocs

Here is the /etc/nginx/nginx.conf file content:

    # grep -v '^\s*#' /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
    user www-data;
    worker_processes auto;
    pid /run/nginx.pid;
    include /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/*.conf;
    
    events {
            worker_connections 768;
    }
    
    http {
    
    
            sendfile on;
            tcp_nopush on;
            tcp_nodelay on;
            keepalive_timeout 65;
            types_hash_max_size 2048;
    
    
            include /etc/nginx/mime.types;
            default_type application/octet-stream;
    
    
            ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2 TLSv1.3; # Dropping SSLv3, ref: POODLE
            ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
    
    
            access_log /var/log/nginx/access.log;
            error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
    
    
            gzip on;
    
    
    
            include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf;
            include /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/*;
    }
    
    
    
    
    
    rtmp {
        server {
            listen 1935;
            chunk_size 4096;
            notify_method get;
            
            application WendellLive {
                on_publish http://localhost/auth;
                live on;
                record off;
                record_path /svr/rtmp-recordings;
                record_unique on;
    
                push rtmp://localhost/Wendell_YT;
                }
    
            application Wendell_YT {
                live on;
                record off;
    
                allow publish 127.0.0.1;
                deny publish all;
                push rtmp://a.rtmp.youtube.com/live2/<wendell_yt_stream_key>;
                }
            }
        }
    

And the /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default configuration

    # grep -v '^\s*#' default
    
    server {
            listen 80 default_server;
            listen [::]:80 default_server;
    
    
            root /www/htdocs;    # Added - Lovelady - 18-Jul-2021
    
            index index.php index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;
    
            server_name home.lovelady.com;
    
            location / {
                    try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
            }
            location /auth {
                if ($arg_pwd = 'my_secret_not_yours') {
                    return 200;
                    }
                return 401; # Not authorized
                }
    
    
    }

Version information:

    nginx version: nginx/1.18.0 (Ubuntu)
    
    >>> cat /etc/os-release
    NAME="Ubuntu"
    VERSION="20.04.2 LTS (Focal Fossa)"
    ID=ubuntu
    ID_LIKE=debian
    PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu 20.04.2 LTS"
    VERSION_ID="20.04"
    HOME_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/"
    SUPPORT_URL="https://help.ubuntu.com/"
    BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/"
    PRIVACY_POLICY_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/legal/terms-and-policies/privacy-policy"
    VERSION_CODENAME=focal
    UBUNTU_CODENAME=focal

The content of /var/log/nginx is:

    # ls -ltr /var/log/nginx/
    total 72
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 480 Apr  5 23:19 error.log.3.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 464 May 20 23:46 access.log.14.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 469 May 21 23:46 access.log.13.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 468 May 22 23:46 access.log.12.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 464 May 23 23:47 access.log.11.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 472 May 24 23:47 access.log.10.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 472 May 25 23:47 access.log.9.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 464 May 26 23:47 access.log.8.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 196 May 27 01:17 access.log.7.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm  97 May 28 06:10 error.log.2.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 248 Jun 21 22:31 access.log.6.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 110 Jun 24 12:37 access.log.5.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 153 Jun 25 11:22 access.log.4.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 102 Jun 26 08:22 access.log.3.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 140 Jun 28 21:09 error.log.1
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm   0 Jun 29 00:00 error.log
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 275 Jul 16 08:41 access.log.2.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 216 Jul 17 12:50 access.log.1
    -rw-r----- 1 www-data adm 193 Jul 18 16:07 access.log

access.log has this one line:

    # cat /var/log/nginx/access.log
    192.168.1.203 - - [18/Jul/2021:16:07:37 -0400] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 20 "-" "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/91.0.4472.124 Safari/537.36"

Output of nginx -T upon request:

    nginx: the configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf syntax is ok
    nginx: configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf test is successful
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf:
    #
    # HUGE help from this site:
    #      https://www.scaleway.com/en/docs/setup-rtmp-streaming-server/
    #
    user www-data;
    worker_processes auto;
    pid /run/nginx.pid;
    include /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/*.conf;
    
    events {
            worker_connections 768;
            # multi_accept on;
    }
    
    http {
    
            ##
            # Basic Settings
            ##
    
            sendfile on;
            tcp_nopush on;
            tcp_nodelay on;
            keepalive_timeout 65;
            types_hash_max_size 2048;
            # server_tokens off;
    
            # server_names_hash_bucket_size 64;
            # server_name_in_redirect off;
    
            include /etc/nginx/mime.types;
            default_type application/octet-stream;
    
            ##
            # SSL Settings
            ##
    
            ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2 TLSv1.3; # Dropping SSLv3, ref: POODLE
            ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
    
            ##
            # Logging Settings
            ##
    
            access_log /var/log/nginx/access.log;
            error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
    
            ##
            # Gzip Settings
            ##
    
            gzip on;
    
            # gzip_vary on;
            # gzip_proxied any;
            # gzip_comp_level 6;
            # gzip_buffers 16 8k;
            # gzip_http_version 1.1;
            # gzip_types text/plain text/css application/json application/javascript text/xml application/xml application/xml+rss text/javascript;
    
            ##
            # Virtual Host Configs
            ##
    
            include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf;
            include /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/*;
    }
    
    
    #mail {
    #       # See sample authentication script at:
    #       # http://wiki.nginx.org/ImapAuthenticateWithApachePhpScript
    #
    #       # auth_http localhost/auth.php;
    #       # pop3_capabilities "TOP" "USER";
    #       # imap_capabilities "IMAP4rev1" "UIDPLUS";
    #
    #       server {
    #               listen     localhost:110;
    #               protocol   pop3;
    #               proxy      on;
    #       }
    #
    #       server {
    #               listen     localhost:143;
    #               protocol   imap;
    #               proxy      on;
    #       }
    #}
    
    
    
    rtmp {
        server {
            listen 1935;
            chunk_size 4096;
            notify_method get;
    
            application love-uav {
                on_publish http://localhost/auth;
                live on;
                #Set this to "record off" if you don't want to save a copy of your broadcast:
                #record all;
                record off;
                # The directory in which the recordings will be stored
                record_path /svr/rtmp-recordings;
                record_unique on;
    
                # Restreaming stuff follows
                push rtmp://localhost/love-uav_YT;
                #push rtmp://localhost/love-uav_Twitch;
                #push rtmp://localhost/love-uav_Facebook;
                }
    
            # YouTube application
            application love-uav_YT {
                live on;
                record off;
    
                #only allow localhost to publish
                allow publish 127.0.0.1;
                deny publish all;
                # push URL with the youtube stream key
                push rtmp://a.rtmp.youtube.com/live2/jsqu-54jv-uw68-39tf-xxxx;
                }
    
            # Twitch application
            application love-uav_Twitch {
                live on;
                record off;
    
                #only allow localhost to publish
                allow publish 127.0.0.1;
                deny publish all;
                # push URL with the Twitch stream key
                push rtmp://live-cdg.twitch.tv/app/<love-uav__twitch_stream_key>;
                }
    
            application love-uav_Facebook {
                live on;
                record off;
    
                #only allow localhost to publish
                allow publish 127.0.0.1;
                deny publish all;
                # push URL with the Facebook stream key
                # push rtmps://live-api-s.facebook.com:443/rtmp/<love-uav__facebook_stream_key>;
                }
    
            application WendellLive {
                on_publish http://localhost/auth;
                live on;
                #Set this to "record off" if you don't want to save a copy of your broadcast:
                #record all;
                record off;
                # The directory in which the recordings will be stored
                record_path /svr/rtmp-recordings;
                record_unique on;
    
                # Restreaming stuff follows
                push rtmp://localhost/Wendell_YT;
                #push rtmp://localhost/Wendell_twitch;
                #push rtmp://localhost/Wendell_facebook;
                }
    
            # YouTube application
            application Wendell_YT {
                live on;
                record off;
    
                #only allow localhost to publish
                allow publish 127.0.0.1;
                deny publish all;
                # push URL with the youtube stream key
                push rtmp://a.rtmp.youtube.com/live2/<wendell_yt_stream_key>;
                }
            }
        }
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/50-mod-http-image-filter.conf:
    load_module modules/ngx_http_image_filter_module.so;
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/50-mod-http-xslt-filter.conf:
    load_module modules/ngx_http_xslt_filter_module.so;
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/50-mod-mail.conf:
    load_module modules/ngx_mail_module.so;
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/50-mod-rtmp.conf:
    load_module modules/ngx_rtmp_module.so;
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/50-mod-stream.conf:
    load_module modules/ngx_stream_module.so;
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/mime.types:
    
    types {
        text/html                             html htm shtml;
        text/css                              css;
        text/xml                              xml;
        image/gif                             gif;
        image/jpeg                            jpeg jpg;
        application/javascript                js;
        application/atom+xml                  atom;
        application/rss+xml                   rss;
    
        text/mathml                           mml;
        text/plain                            txt;
        text/vnd.sun.j2me.app-descriptor      jad;
        text/vnd.wap.wml                      wml;
        text/x-component                      htc;
    
        image/png                             png;
        image/tiff                            tif tiff;
        image/vnd.wap.wbmp                    wbmp;
        image/x-icon                          ico;
        image/x-jng                           jng;
        image/x-ms-bmp                        bmp;
        image/svg+xml                         svg svgz;
        image/webp                            webp;
    
        application/font-woff                 woff;
        application/java-archive              jar war ear;
        application/json                      json;
        application/mac-binhex40              hqx;
        application/msword                    doc;
        application/pdf                       pdf;
        application/postscript                ps eps ai;
        application/rtf                       rtf;
        application/vnd.apple.mpegurl         m3u8;
        application/vnd.ms-excel              xls;
        application/vnd.ms-fontobject         eot;
        application/vnd.ms-powerpoint         ppt;
        application/vnd.wap.wmlc              wmlc;
        application/vnd.google-earth.kml+xml  kml;
        application/vnd.google-earth.kmz      kmz;
        application/x-7z-compressed           7z;
        application/x-cocoa                   cco;
        application/x-java-archive-diff       jardiff;
        application/x-java-jnlp-file          jnlp;
        application/x-makeself                run;
        application/x-perl                    pl pm;
        application/x-pilot                   prc pdb;
        application/x-rar-compressed          rar;
        application/x-redhat-package-manager  rpm;
        application/x-sea                     sea;
        application/x-shockwave-flash         swf;
        application/x-stuffit                 sit;
        application/x-tcl                     tcl tk;
        application/x-x509-ca-cert            der pem crt;
        application/x-xpinstall               xpi;
        application/xhtml+xml                 xhtml;
        application/xspf+xml                  xspf;
        application/zip                       zip;
    
        application/octet-stream              bin exe dll;
        application/octet-stream              deb;
        application/octet-stream              dmg;
        application/octet-stream              iso img;
        application/octet-stream              msi msp msm;
    
        application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document    docx;
        application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet          xlsx;
        application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.presentationml.presentation  pptx;
    
        audio/midi                            mid midi kar;
        audio/mpeg                            mp3;
        audio/ogg                             ogg;
        audio/x-m4a                           m4a;
        audio/x-realaudio                     ra;
    
        video/3gpp                            3gpp 3gp;
        video/mp2t                            ts;
        video/mp4                             mp4;
        video/mpeg                            mpeg mpg;
        video/quicktime                       mov;
        video/webm                            webm;
        video/x-flv                           flv;
        video/x-m4v                           m4v;
        video/x-mng                           mng;
        video/x-ms-asf                        asx asf;
        video/x-ms-wmv                        wmv;
        video/x-msvideo                       avi;
    }
    
    # configuration file /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default:
    ##
    # You should look at the following URL's in order to grasp a solid understanding
    # of Nginx configuration files in order to fully unleash the power of Nginx.
    # https://www.nginx.com/resources/wiki/start/
    # https://www.nginx.com/resources/wiki/start/topics/tutorials/config_pitfalls/
    # https://wiki.debian.org/Nginx/DirectoryStructure
    #
    # In most cases, administrators will remove this file from sites-enabled/ and
    # leave it as reference inside of sites-available where it will continue to be
    # updated by the nginx packaging team.
    #
    # This file will automatically load configuration files provided by other
    # applications, such as Drupal or Wordpress. These applications will be made
    # available underneath a path with that package name, such as /drupal8.
    #
    # Please see /usr/share/doc/nginx-doc/examples/ for more detailed examples.
    ##
    
    # Default server configuration
    #
    server {
            listen 80 default_server;
            listen [::]:80 default_server;
    
            # SSL configuration
            #
            # listen 443 ssl default_server;
            # listen [::]:443 ssl default_server;
            #
            # Note: You should disable gzip for SSL traffic.
            # See: https://bugs.debian.org/773332
            #
            # Read up on ssl_ciphers to ensure a secure configuration.
            # See: https://bugs.debian.org/765782
            #
            # Self signed certs generated by the ssl-cert package
            # Don't use them in a production server!
            #
            # include snippets/snakeoil.conf;
    
            #root /var/www/html; # Commented - Lovelady - 18-Jul-2021
            root /www/htdocs;    # Added - Lovelady - 18-Jul-2021
    
            # Add index.php to the list if you are using PHP
            index index.php index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;
    
            server_name home.lovelady.com;
    
            location / {
                    # First attempt to serve request as file, then
                    # as directory, then fall back to displaying a 404.
                    try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
            }
            location /auth {
                if ($arg_pwd = 'my_secret_not_yours') {
                    return 200;
                    }
                return 401; # Not authorized
                }
    
            # pass PHP scripts to FastCGI server
            #
            #location ~ \.php$ {
            #       include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
            #
            #       # With php-fpm (or other unix sockets):
            #       fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock;
            #       # With php-cgi (or other tcp sockets):
            #       fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
            #}
    
            # deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
            # concurs with nginx's one
            #
            #location ~ /\.ht {
            #       deny all;
            #}
    }
    
    
    # Virtual Host configuration for example.com
    #
    # You can move that to a different file under sites-available/ and symlink that
    # to sites-enabled/ to enable it.
    #
    #server {
    #       listen 80;
    #       listen [::]:80;
    #
    #       server_name example.com;
    #
    #       root /var/www/example.com;
    #       index index.html;
    #
    #       location / {
    #               try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
    #       }
    #}

Failure: enter image description here

Gerard H. Pille avatar
in flag
What does index.php contain? Are you sure nginx is running with this configuration?
ru flag
@GerardH.Pille - thanks. index.php is a minimal file: <?php phpinfo() ; ?> I would replace that with a real index when installation works.
Gerard H. Pille avatar
in flag
"ls -ld /www" and test with curl to eliminate browser cache
Gerard H. Pille avatar
in flag
"openresty" is a bit more than a "minimal website configuration". You're not hitting the config shown.
mangohost

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