Using Nginx Proxy Manager to Access My Services

Nginx

Proxy Manager

In this blog I will go over how I setup Nginx Proxy Manager to be able to access my services outside of my local network. I use this to access my password manager (Vaultwarden), my personal wiki (Bookstack), and my remote desktop gateway (Apache Guacamole), and much more.

Server Configuration

Initial Setup

				
					sudo apt-get update && sudo apt upgrade -y

apt-get update – updates the package lists for upgrades and new package installations.
apt upgrade – will upgrade all currently installed packages.
-y – will automatically answer ‘yes’ to any prompts.

				
					sudo apt-get install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl software-properties-common -y

apt-transport-https – allows the package management utility to handle HTTPS sources.
ca-certificates – is used to verify the authenticity of HTTPS connections.
curl – is used to be able to download files from the internet.
software-properties-common – adds useful scripts for managing software repositories.

				
					sudo adduser nesto

				
					sudo usermod -aG sudo nesto

				
					sudo apt install openssh-server

				
					sudo systemctl start ssh

Installing Docker

				
					curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo apt-key add -

-fsSL – Is a combination of flags:
-f – tell ‘curl’ to not output anything if the HTTP status code indicates an error..
-s – tells ‘curl’ to hide the progress meter and error messages.
-S – tells ‘curl’ to show error messages if it fails.
-L – tells ‘curl’ to handle redirects.

				
					sudo add-apt-repository "deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu $(lsb_release -cs) stable"

deb – indicates that the repository is for binary packages.
[arch=amd64] – means the repository is for 64-bit software.
$(lsb_release -cs) – returns the codename for the Ubuntu server we installed and currently running commands on
stable tells the repository to use the latest stable version for Docker.

				
					sudo apt-get update

				
					sudo apt-get install docker-ce -y

				
					sudo docker run hello-world

				
					sudo systemctl start docker

				
					sudo systemctl enable docker

				
					sudo usermod -aG docker ${USER}

Installing Docker-Compose

				
					sudo curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/v2.7.0/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

-L – Tells ‘curl’ to follow any redirects.
$(uname -s) and $(uname -m) – are used to automatically fill in the system’s kernel name and machine hardware name (e.g. ‘Linux’ and ‘x86_64).

				
					sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

				
					docker-compose --version

Nginx Proxy Manager Installation

Configuring YAML File

				
					mkdir nginx && cd nginx

				
					nano docker-compose.yml

				
					version: '3.8'
services:
  app:
    image: 'jc21/nginx-proxy-manager:latest'
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      # These ports are in format <host-port>:<container-port>
      - '80:80' # Public HTTP Port
      - '443:443' # Public HTTPS Port
      - '81:81' # Admin Web Port
      # Add any other Stream port you want to expose
      # - '21:21' # FTP

    # Uncomment the next line if you uncomment anything in the section
    # environment:
      # Uncomment this if you want to change the location of
      # the SQLite DB file within the container
      # DB_SQLITE_FILE: "/data/database.sqlite"

      # Uncomment this if IPv6 is not enabled on your host
      # DISABLE_IPV6: 'true'

    volumes:
      - ./data:/data
      - ./letsencrypt:/etc/letsencrypt

ports: 80:80 – Maps port 80 on the host to port 80 on the container

I changed port 80 on mine.

To save it you press ‘CTRL+X’, press ‘y‘, and then hit ‘Enter‘.