Docker-letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion: Nginx exited after restart

[synopsisdevs]

Hi,

after first start everything is ok, but after restart containers exited with error:
nginx: [emerg] open() "/etc/nginx/vhost.d/default" failed (2: No such file or directory) in /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf:41.
I used docker-compose.yml from examples for v1: https://github.com/fatk/docker-letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion-examples/blob/master/docker-compose/v1/simple-site/docker-compose.yml

Could you tell me what is wrong?

Thanks

[faultylee]

Hi, actually I'm getting the same error as well recently. I found that default.conf is pointing to another non existing .conf. Deleting it before starting again seems to resolve this issue. I've yet to dig deeper.

[deciare]

The first time the nginx container starts, /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf contains default configuration from the nginx image, and starts up successfully.

/etc/nginx/vhost.d/default is later created by letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion, and if that file exists while docker-gen parses the template to regenerate /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf, the following line gets added to the newly-generated server block:

    include /etc/nginx/vhost.d/default;

When letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion stops, /etc/nginx/vhost.d/default is removed, but the previously-generated /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf is left in place. The next time the nginx container is started, the include directive still exists, but /etc/nginx/vhost.d/default no longer does, so nginx fails to start.

docker-gen does notice when letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion is stopped, so it eventually regenerates a /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf without the include, but when both letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion and docker-gen are stopped in rapid succession, the regeneration doesn't have a chance to take place.

Since nginx starts fine with no /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf at all, and the file will get regenerated anyway within a few seconds of letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion stopping (if only that one container is being stopped), might it be helpful to automatically remove /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf in addition to /etc/nginx/vhost.d/default when letsencrypt-nginx-proxy-companion is stopped?

[elohmeier]

+1

[1beb]

Same issue here. I have to delete nginx, nginx-gen before a restart (up > down > up). Please let me know if I can help with debuging. I can share my docker-compose files (edited)

[mlegenhausen]

+1

[jedwards1211]

@JrCs The fact that the nginx container can start outside of the control of the nginx-gen container seems like asking for errors to me. I'd much rather see nginx (or some plugin) be able to evaluate a script to generate the config each time it runs, much like a lot of JS tools now use JS files for config instead of JSON.

[jedwards1211]

For instance: https://www.nginx.com/blog/launching-nginscript-and-looking-ahead/