Change nginx user in config >> 403 error index.html forbidden

Server NGINX
1

Hi All,

I have just installed NGINX 1.1.2. I made my own configuration and
makefile and installed the nginx server.
When I set the config to:
user root root;
I get the hello world index.html file provided by the nginx installer
(./html/index.html).

When I set the config to:
user nginx nginx;
(which is what I want), I get a 403 message. The error.log says the
index.html is forbidden.

These are the file permissions I have set on the files in the ./html
directory:
total 16
-rw-r–r-- 1 someowner nginx 383 Sep 16 15:27 50x.html
-rw-r–r-- 1 someowner nginx 151 Sep 16 15:27 index.html
-rw-r–r-- 1 someowner nginx 6971 Sep 16 15:27 ngx_core_module.html

The nginx user is a member of the nginx group (which has the required
permission to view the index.html):
$ groups nginx
returns:
nginx : nginx

So, what should I do to give the worker processes of nginx access to
these files? I’m at a loss here.

I would greatly appreciate any help!

Best regards,
Martijn.

ps this is the content of my nginx.conf:

user root root;
worker_processes 4;

#error_log logs/error.log;
#error_log logs/error.log notice;
#error_log logs/error.log info;

#pid logs/nginx.pid;

events {
worker_connections 128;
}

http {
include mime.types;
default_type application/octet-stream;

#log_format  main  '$remote_addr - $remote_user [$time_local]

“$request” ’
# '$status $body_bytes_sent “$http_referer” ’
# ‘“$http_user_agent” “$http_x_forwarded_for”’;

#access_log  logs/access.log  main;

sendfile        on;
#tcp_nopush     on;

#keepalive_timeout  0;
keepalive_timeout  65;

#gzip  on;

server {
    listen       80;
    server_name  localhost;

    #charset koi8-r;

    #access_log  logs/host.access.log  main;

    location / {
        root   html;
        index  index.html index.htm;
    }

    #error_page  404              /404.html;

    # redirect server error pages to the static page /50x.html
    #
    error_page   500 502 503 504  /50x.html;
    location = /50x.html {
        root   html;
    }

    # proxy the PHP scripts to Apache listening on 127.0.0.1:80
    #
    #location ~ \.php$ {
    #    proxy_pass   http://127.0.0.1;
    #}

    # pass the PHP scripts to FastCGI server listening on

127.0.0.1:9000
#
#location ~ .php$ {
# root html;
# fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
# fastcgi_index index.php;
# fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME
/scripts$fastcgi_script_name;
# include fastcgi_params;
#}

    # deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
    # concurs with nginx's one
    #
    #location ~ /\.ht {
    #
    error_page   500 502 503 504  /50x.html;
    location = /50x.html {
        root   html;
    }

    # proxy the PHP scripts to Apache listening on 127.0.0.1:80
    #
    #location ~ \.php$ {
    #    proxy_pass   http://127.0.0.1;
    #}

    # pass the PHP scripts to FastCGI server listening on

127.0.0.1:9000
#
#location ~ .php$ {
# root html;
# fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
# fastcgi_index index.php;
# fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME
/scripts$fastcgi_script_name;
# include fastcgi_params;
#}

    # deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
    # concurs with nginx's one
    #
    #location ~ /\.ht {
    #    deny  all;
    #}
}


# another virtual host using mix of IP-, name-, and port-based

configuration
#
Server {
# listen 8000;
# listen somename:8080;
# server_name somename alias another.alias;

#    location / {
#        root   html;
#        index  index.html index.htm;
#    }
#}


# HTTPS server
#
#server {
#    listen       443;
#    server_name  localhost;

#    ssl                  on;
#    ssl_certificate      cert.pem;
#    ssl_certificate_key  cert.key;

#    ssl_session_timeout  5m;

#    ssl_protocols  SSLv2 SSLv3 TLSv1;
#    ssl_ciphers  HIGH:!aNULL:!MD5;
#    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers   on;

#    location / {
#        root   html;
#        index  index.html index.htm;
#    }
#}

}

Posted at Nginx Forum:

2

Hello!

On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 12:16:56PM -0400, martijnsenden wrote:

user nginx nginx;
The nginx user is a member of the nginx group (which has the required
permission to view the index.html):
$ groups nginx
returns:
nginx : nginx

So, what should I do to give the worker processes of nginx access to
these files? I’m at a loss here.

Make sure nginx use have at least search permissions for all
directories above document root.

Maxim D.

3

Thanks! I guess by search permissions you mean read permission, not
write or execute?

Regards,
Martijn Senden.

4

Some googling told me search permission is often used as an alternate
name for execute permission. Thanks, I’ll try this!

5

Thanks! With this I got it to work! I changed the group of the server
folder and the nginx folder to nginx with the chown command and set the
permissions to (at least) execute, and now I get the welcome page! Thank
you very much! This was starting to give me headaches yesterday. :wink: