How to install Nginx 1.20.2 with Source Code in Centos

In this tutorial, we will be briefed about the how to install Nginx from Source Code on CentOS 7. Nginx is an open-source, high-performance web server that delivers static content by using the system resources. It also hosts several highest-traffic internet sites.

Prerequisites

Before starting with the tutorial, make sure you are logged in as a user with Sudo privileges and EPEL and you don’t have Apache or any other service running on port 80 or 443.

Installing Nginx on CentOS

Follow the steps below to install Nginx on your CentOS server:

Nginx packages are available in the EPEL repositories. If you don’t have EPEL repository already installed you can do it by typing:

sudo yum install epel-release

Now Install some necessary packages:

sudo yum groupinstall " Development Tools"  -y
sudo yum install zlib-devel pcre-devel openssl-devel perl perl-devel perl-ExtUtils-Embed libxslt libxslt-devel libxml2 libxml2-devel gd gd-devel GeoIP GeoIP-devel -y

Download the Nginx source code from Nginx’s official website or just run the below wget command to install Nginx version 1.20.2.

sudo wget http://nginx.org/download/nginx-1.20.2.tar.gz

Extract the downloaded package using tar the command and move into the extracted directory to compile Nginx from the source:

sudo tar xvf nginx-1.20.2.tar.gz
cd nginx-1.20.2/

Now to configure the Nginx installation procedure, run the configuration script command with some options that will be required for installation. To view all the options, simply run the below script command with help options and check the options that should be configured for Nginx installation. Or you can also install the default configuration by running the configure script command without any options followed by it:

./configure --help

Now run the configure script command followed by the required options:

./configure --prefix=/opt/nginx --sbin-path=/opt/nginx/sbin/nginx --modules-path=/opt/nginx/modules --conf-path=/opt/nginx/conf/nginx.conf --error-log-path=/opt/nginx/logs/error.log --http-log-path=/opt/nginx/logs/access.log --pid-path=/opt/nginx/logs/nginx.pid --lock-path=/opt/nginx/logs/nginx.lock --http-client-body-temp-path=/opt/nginx/client_temp --http-proxy-temp-path=/opt/nginx/proxy_temp --http-fastcgi-temp-path=/opt/nginx/fastcgi_temp --http-uwsgi-temp-path=/opt/nginx/uwsgi_temp --http-scgi-temp-path=/opt/nginx/scgi_temp --user=nginx --group=nginx 

Execute the make the command for the configuration process:

sudo make

Now install the Nginx with make install command as follows:

sudo make install

Then Change Ownership and GroupOwnerShip of the Whole directory:

sudo chown nginx:nginx -R /opt/nginx
sudo chmod 755 -R /opt/nginx

Let’s verify the version of Nginx:

cd /opt/nginx/sbin/
sudo ./nginx -t

Output:
nginx: the configuration file /opt/nginx/conf/nginx.conf syntax is ok
nginx: configuration file /opt/nginx/conf/nginx.conf test is successful

Now create a service file for Nginx:

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/nginx.service

Paste the following lines in the file:

[Unit]
Description=The NGINX HTTP and reverse proxy server
After=syslog.target network.target remote-fs.target nss-lookup.target

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStartPre=/opt/nginx/sbin/nginx -t
ExecStart=/opt/nginx/sbin/nginx
ExecReload=/opt/nginx/sbin/nginx -s reload
ExecStop=/bin/kill -s QUIT $MAINPID
PrivateTmp=true

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Now start the service using systemctl command:

sudo systemctl start nginx

Nginx Configuration File’s Structure and Best Practices

• All Nginx configuration files are located in the /opt/nginx directory.
• The main Nginx configuration file is /opt/nginx/conf/nginx.conf.
• To make Nginx configuration easier to maintain it is recommended to create a separate configuration file for each domain.
• New Nginx server block files must end with .conf and be stored in /opt/nginx/conf/ the directory. You can have as many server blocks as you need.
• It is a good idea to follow a standard naming convention, for example, if your domain name is mydomain.com then your configuration file should be named /opt/nginx/conf/mydomain.com.conf
• Nginx log files (access.log and error.log) are located in the /opt/nginx/logs directory. It is recommended to have a different access and error log files for each server block.

Related Article: How to install SSL certificates with OpenSSL for Nginx

Conclusion:

Congratulations! You have successfully installed Nginx by source code!