How can I forward-proxy https requests with Nginx?
Oct 29
I am running a local web app on my dev machine. And I want to reach my local web app from a test machine (a phone).
I set up Nginx to listen on port 8888. My test machine can reach my dev machine at this port.
Requests that should go the local web application are reverse-proxied from port 8888 to the local web app port 3000. These requests work fine.
Requests that should go to the internet are forward-proxied and resolved by 8.8.8.8. But these requests can only be HTTP. Nginx does not seem to be able to handle forward-proxy HTTPS requests.
This setup for HTTP works:
server {
listen 8888;
listen [::]:8888;
server_name local.myapp.be myapp.com;
access_log /var/log/nginx/myapp/access.log;
error_log /var/log/nginx/myapp/error.log;
location / {
proxy_pass http://local.myapp.be:3000;
proxy_redirect http://local.myapp.be:3000 $scheme://$host:8888;
proxy_set_header Host $host;
}
}
server {
listen 8888 default_server;
listen [::]:8888 default_server;
access_log /var/log/nginx/default/access.log;
error_log /var/log/nginx/default/error.log;
location / {
resolver 8.8.8.8;
proxy_pass http://$http_host$uri$is_args$args;
}
}
I then tried removing the second server block and adding this to nginx.conf at http block level:
stream {
resolver 8.8.8.8;
server {
listen 8888;
ssl_preread on;
proxy_connect_timeout 5s;
proxy_pass $ssl_preread_server_name:$server_port;
}
}
But that does not seem to work.
How can I setup an Nginx proxy to handle both reverse-proxy and forward-proxy (http & https) requests correctly?
nginx1 answer
Accepted answer · original discussion
Nov 5
Nginx is not well-suited for forward-proxying https requests.
I was able to setup a reverse & forward proxy with Apache HTTPD:
httpd.confFind Apache httpd's main configuration file httpd.conf and open the file.
Load the following proxy modules by uncommenting them, e.g.
LoadModule proxy_module lib/httpd/modules/mod_proxy.so
LoadModule proxy_connect_module lib/httpd/modules/mod_proxy_connect.so
LoadModule proxy_http_module lib/httpd/modules/mod_proxy_http.so
Include the proxy configuration by adding a reference to that config file, e.g.
Include /opt/homebrew/etc/httpd/extra/proxy.conf
Place a config file proxy.conf at the path specified in the Include directive.
Add a listen directive.
Listen 8888
Add a vhost config for reverse-proxied requests to your local resource, e.g. the web app on your dev machine.
<VirtualHost *:8888>
ServerName reverse.io
ServerAlias local.myapp.com myapp.com
ProxyRequests Off
<Proxy *>
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from all
</Proxy>
ProxyPass / "http://local.myapp.com:3000/"
ProxyPassReverse / "http://local.myapp.com:3000/""
ProxyTimeout 300
ErrorLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-reverse-error_log"
CustomLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-reverse-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>
Add a vhost config for forward-proxied requests to remote resources, e.g. domains, APIs, websites on the internet.
<VirtualHost *:8888>
ServerName forward.io
ServerAlias *
ProxyRequests On
ProxyVia On
<Proxy *>
Require ip 192.168.0
</Proxy>
ErrorLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-forward-error_log"
CustomLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-forward-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>
Combining the listen directive and both vhosts, your configuration file should look something like:
Listen 8888
<VirtualHost *:8888>
ServerName reverse.io
ServerAlias local.myapp.com myapp.com
ProxyRequests Off
<Proxy *>
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from all
</Proxy>
ProxyPass / "http://local.myapp.com:3000/"
ProxyPassReverse / "http://local.myapp.com:3000/"
ProxyTimeout 300
ErrorLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-reverse-error_log"
CustomLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-reverse-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost *:8888>
ServerName forward.io
ServerAlias *
ProxyRequests On
ProxyVia On
<Proxy *>
Require ip 192.168.0
</Proxy>
ErrorLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-forward-error_log"
CustomLog "/opt/homebrew/var/log/httpd/myapp-forward-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>
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