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Jurian Sluiman
Asked: 2014-02-18 00:33:20 +0800 CST

Specify nginx's ssl_certificate in location{} block

  • 772

For a web service we have two certificates: myservice.com and api.myservice.com. Both have the same application (document root) but are serverd over HTTPS with different certificates. Unfortunately, we don't have a two-domain certificate at this moment.

Currently, I have to define two server blocks, one for each pointing to the same root. The only difference is the ssl_certificate directive, but that one can be declared only on http or server level.

Nevertheless, is there a way to avoid the copy/paste in the server blocks? This is an example code:

server {
    listen      443;
    server_name .myservice.com;
    root        /var/www/myservice.com/public;

    include conf.d/common.conf.inc;

    ssl                 on;
    ssl_protocols       TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
    ssl_ciphers         ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:AES256-SHA256:RC4:HIGH:!MD5:!aNULL:!eNULL:!NULL:!DH:!EDH:!AESGCM;
    ssl_session_cache   shared:SSL:5m;
    ssl_session_timeout 10m;
    ssl_certificate     /path/to/myservice.com.bundle.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /path/to//myservice.com.key;

    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
}

server {
    listen      443;
    server_name api.myservice.com;
    root        /var/www/myservice.com/public;

    include conf.d/common.conf.inc;

    ssl                 on;
    ssl_protocols       TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
    ssl_ciphers         ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:AES256-SHA256:RC4:HIGH:!MD5:!aNULL:!eNULL:!NULL:!DH:!EDH:!AESGCM;
    ssl_session_cache   shared:SSL:5m;
    ssl_session_timeout 10m;
    ssl_certificate     /path/to/api.myservice.com.bundle.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /path/to//myservice.com.key;

    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
}

/edit: As requested, here the output of nginx -V:

nginx version: nginx/1.2.7

TLS SNI support enabled configure

arguments: --prefix=/usr/share/nginx --conf-path=/etc/nginx/nginx.conf --error-log-path=/var/log/nginx/error.log --http-client-body-temp-path=/var/lib/nginx/body --http-fastcgi-temp-path=/var/lib/nginx/fastcgi --http-log-path=/var/log/nginx/access.log --http-proxy-temp-path=/var/lib/nginx/proxy --http-scgi-temp-path=/var/lib/nginx/scgi --http-uwsgi-temp-path=/var/lib/nginx/uwsgi --lock-path=/var/lock/nginx.lock --pid-path=/run/nginx.pid --with-pcre-jit --with-debug --with-http_addition_module --with-http_dav_module --with-http_flv_module --with-http_geoip_module --with-http_gzip_static_module --with-http_image_filter_module --with-http_mp4_module --with-http_perl_module --with-http_random_index_module --with-http_realip_module --with-http_secure_link_module --with-http_stub_status_module --with-http_ssl_module --with-http_sub_module --with-http_xslt_module --with-ipv6 --with-sha1=/usr/include/openssl --with-md5=/usr/include/openssl --with-mail --with-mail_ssl_module --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-auth-pam --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/chunkin-nginx-module --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/headers-more-nginx-module --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-development-kit --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-echo --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-http-push --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-lua --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-upload-module --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-upload-progress --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-upstream-fair --add-module=/build/buildd/nginx-1.2.7/debian/modules/nginx-dav-ext-module

nginx

2 Answers

  1. You already know (and are using) the answer! Just include the common parts from a separate file.

    • 3

  2. You can avoid duplicating virtualhost by doing something like this with "if" and define one virtualhost: 

    server {
    listen      443;
    server_name .myservice.com api.myservice.com;
    root        /var/www/myservice.com/public;

    include conf.d/common.conf.inc;

    ssl                 on;
    ssl_protocols       TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
    ssl_ciphers         ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:AES256-SHA256:RC4:HIGH:!MD5:!aNULL:!eNULL:!NULL:!DH:!EDH:!AESGCM;
    ssl_session_cache   shared:SSL:5m;
    ssl_session_timeout 10m;
    ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;

  if ($server_name = .myservice.com) {
    ssl_certificate /path/to/myservice.com.bundle.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /path/to//myservice.com.key;
  }
  if ($server_name = api.myservice.com) {
    ssl_certificate /path/to/api.myservice.com.bundle.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /path/to//myservice.com.key;;
  }
  ...
}
    • 1