Discourse socketed: Nginx in front of discourse: no IP adresses

Installation
1

Hello,

My problem is that ever since i placed an nginx webserver in front of the discourse container (following this guide), i don’t see the IP addresses of my visitors.

Before my nginx in front of discourse:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Top 30 IPs by Server Load

IP Address      Duration Reqs
----------      -------- ----
192.168.87.1      158.06  436 
66.249.93.40        1.56    1 
138.201.140.150     1.41    2 
95.213.130.90       0.92    1 
64.71.168.196       0.64    6 
66.249.93.36        0.04    1 
---------------------------------

After my nginx in front of discourse:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Top 30 IPs by Server Load

IP Address Duration Reqs
---------- -------- ----
unix:        184.38 4886 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hope i followed the guide correctly, but in case not, here’s what i suppose are the relevant nginx configs:

  • the discourse server file
server {
    server_name chat.tbp.land;
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    listen [::]:443 ssl http2;

    ssl_certificate         /etc/letsencrypt/live/tbp.land/fullchain.pem;
    ssl_certificate_key     /etc/letsencrypt/live/tbp.land/privkey.pem;

##################################################
    http2_idle_timeout 5m;          # up from 3m default

    # ssl_protocols TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;        # this is already the default in nginx.conf
    ssl_ciphers ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA;
    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
    ###### ssl_ecdh_curve secp384r1:prime256v1; # this throws some error

    ###### ssl_session_tickets off;      # this also gives me an SSL error
    ssl_session_timeout 1d;
    ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:10m;
    ssl_stapling on;
    ssl_stapling_verify on;

    gzip on;

    add_header Strict-Transport-Security 'max-age=31536000'; # remember the certificate for a year and automatically connect to HTTPS for this domain
##################################################

    # maximum file upload size (keep up to date when changing the corresponding site setting)
    client_max_body_size 10m;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://unix:/var/discourse/shared/web/nginx.http.sock:;
        proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https;

        error_page 502 =200 /errorpages/discourse_offline.html;     # normally its "=502" but cloudflare free account intercepts 502.
        proxy_intercept_errors on;
    }

    location /errorpages/ {
        alias /var/www/errorpages/;
    }

}
  • and the default server file
# this default is used so that when someone uses an address like https://aaa.tbp.land
# and aaa subdomain is enabled in cloudflare (although it doesn't exist on any server),
# nothing is shown. (if default_server doesn't exist, then a random site is chosen as a response)
# see https://serverfault.com/questions/850119/how-to-get-nginx-to-return-404-unless-a-specific-domain-name-is-requested

server {
    server_name _;
    listen 443 ssl http2 default_server;
    listen [::]:443 ssl http2 default_server;

    ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/tbp.land/fullchain.pem;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/tbp.land/privkey.pem;

    return 444;
}

server {
    server_name _;
    listen 80 default_server;
    listen [::]:80 default_server;

    return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
}

#=================================================
#               Rate limit EVERYTHING!!!!!!!

# rate limiting zones
limit_req_zone $binary_remote_addr zone=flood:10m rate=15r/s;
limit_req_status 429;

limit_conn_zone $binary_remote_addr zone=connperip:10m;
limit_conn_status 429;

# rate limiting zones are applied for all servers!
limit_conn connperip 20;
limit_req zone=flood burst=20 nodelay;

#=================================================

# see: https://meta.discourse.org/t/x/74060
proxy_buffer_size 8k;

Possibly offtopic:

in the guide above i i see 2 different headers, depending on http vs https:

  • http:
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
  • https:
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https;

I am using the second version with https instead of $scheme.

2

Looks like that guide is missing configuration for set_real_ip_from. Plenty of discussion about how to set that up in other topics, though.

3 Likes
3

you mean adding the cloudflare template? (that doesn’t make sense for me as the IP is not cloudflare one – i think it’s the unix socket?)

4

From

i tried to add proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr; to my config, (after proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https;) but that doesn’t help either.

About set_real_ip_from: i see that in the socketed template the unix template is already handled (https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-do-i-make-the-top-30-ips-report-work-with-socketed-container/33924/):

so that means that i am not passing the IPs correctly?

5

HA!
I stand corrected: proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr; is correct!

My problem was that i only refreshed my discourse tab instead of closing and opening a new one, and the connection was somehow kept by outer nginx.

After restarting nginx service: systemctl restart nginx, i can see the correct ips being passed to discourse.

@mpalmer can you confirm that what i did is ok, and if it is should i edit the guide/wiki and add this new header?

4 Likes
6

Seems like i got @codinghorror’s blessing so i’ve edited the wiki.

Thanks for the help!

3 Likes
7

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