Host Multiple HTTPS Websites on One Server

provides a template to easily configure the deployement of multiple websites on a single server. Reverse-proxy, nginx configuration files and SSL certificate are created automatically for each website running in a Docker cntainer.

A detailed explanation is provided at: How To Host Multiple HTTPS Websites on One Server

Prerequisites

Install required tools and create domain names

• Git, docker and docker-compose are installed on your server
• Several websites run inside Docker containers on a single server. (Each one could either be a static files server, or Wordpress running on Apache, etc.
• The domain name for each website is configured to point to the IP of the server. Your host must be publicly reachable on both port 80 and 443.Check your firewall rules to make sure that these ports are open.

Create websites directories

# 0. settings
web_dir=/srv/www
myusername=kassambara
# 1. Create the website directory
sudo mkdir -p $web_dir
# 2. set your user as the owner
sudo chown -R $myusername $web_dir
# 3. set the web server as the group owner
sudo chgrp -R www-data $web_dir
# 4. 755 permissions for everything
sudo chmod -R 755 $web_dir
# 5. New files and folders inherit 
# group ownership from the parent folder
chmod g+s $web_dir

Project structure

Download a template into your website directories www:

web_dir=/srv/www
git clone https://github.com/kassambara/nginx-multiple-https-websites-on-one-server $web_dir

Inside /nginx-proxy, there are four empty directories: conf.d, vhost.d, html and certs. These are used to store the nginx and the Let’s Encrypt configuration files.

Download the latest updated version of nginx.tmpl:

curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jwilder/nginx-proxy/master/nginx.tmpl> $web_dir/nginx-proxy/nginx.tmpl

Run the nginx reverse proxy

# 1. Create the docker network
docker network create nginx-proxy

# 2. Create the reverse proxy with the 
# nginx, nginx-gen and nginx-letsencrypt containers
cd /srv/www/nginx-proxy/
docker-compose up -d

Link a website to the running nginx-proxy

The docker-compose.yml file of the website, you want to link, should include the following instructions provided in the template available in the folder your-website-one.com (not the one from nginx-proxy above). The content of the template looks like this:

version: '3.6'

services:
  my-app:
    image: nginx
    restart: always
    environment:
      # NGINX-PROXY ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES: UPDATE ME
      - VIRTUAL_HOST=your-website-one.com 
      - VIRTUAL_PORT=80
      - LETSENCRYPT_HOST=your-website-one.com 
      - LETSENCRYPT_EMAIL=your.email@domain.com
      # END NGINX-PROXY ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
    expose:
      - 80

networks:
  default:
    external:
      name: nginx-proxy

1. Environment variables:
   • VIRTUAL_HOST: your domain name, used in the nginx configuration.
   • VIRTUAL_PORT: (optional) the port your website is listening to (default to 80).
   • LETSENCRYPT_HOST: your domain name, used in the Let’s Encrypt configuration.
   • LETSENCRYPT_EMAIL: your email, used in the Let’s Encrypt configuration.
2. Ports:
   • the exposed port (here 80) should be the same as the VIRTUAL_PORT above.
3. Network:
   • your website container should be linked to the external docker network named nginx-proxy ```

Once the update of the docker-compose.yml file is done, you can start the website with:

cd /srv/www/your-website-one.com
docker-compose up -d

The website is automatically detected by the reverse proxy, has a HTTPS certificate and is visible at https://your-website-one.com.

You can repeat this last step for any other container you want to proxy

References

• Host multiple websites with HTTPS on a single server
• Automated nginx proxy for Docker containers using docker-gen
• LetsEncrypt companion container for nginx-proxy