I’ve deployed a NodeJS app in CentOS 7 with Apache as reverse proxy and it is currently accessible by the serverIP and its port. But sadly I can’t reach it with domain.
The domain is from GoDaddy where I put the nameservers of CF and here in CF, I put the server ip for the A record. So now after configuring Apache web server, I checked its status and there’s an error which goes something like this:
[core:error] [pid 17169] (EAI 2)Name or service not known: AH00549: Failed to resolve server name for 104.xx.41.204 (check DNS) -- or specify an explicit ServerName
and which is the CF ip. But the issue is if I resolve my domain’s dns, I can see the same IP.
So why is it saying that it can’t resolve the server name? What am I doing wrong here?
Here’s how Apache config looks like:
<VirtualHost example.com:80>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} ^80$
RewriteRule ^.*$ https://%{SERVER_NAME}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost *:443>
Header always set Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000"
ServerName example.com
SetOutputFilter DEFLATE
SetEnvIfNoCase Request_URI "\.(?:gif|jpe?g|png)$"no-gzip
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/css text/javascript application/javascript
ExpiresActive On
ProxyRequests off
RequestHeader add original-protocol-ssl 1
<Proxy *>
Order deny,allow
Allow from all
</Proxy>
<Location />
ProxyPass http://xxx.138.xxx.xxx:3000/
ProxyPassReverse http://xxx.138.xxx.xxx:3000/
ProxyPreserveHost On
</Location>
# SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/cert.pem
# SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/privkey.pem
# Include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf
# SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/chain.pem
</VirtualHost>
Apache is looking for the fully-qualified domain name of your server and can’t determine it from the IP address (no reverse DNS?).
Specify the name using the ServerName directive in every VirtualHost block, and at the top level of the config using the server’s actual name. In your example you don’t have it in the :80 block.
So I added “ServerName example.com” in the first VirtualHost block. Or did you mean I should add my hostname in Vhost as “<VirtualHost hostname:80” ? But now I’m not getting that httpd error anymore or may be I am but it’s not shown in httpd status.
Also, my server name is the domain right? My server’s hostname is different and its another domain. So in Vhost I’m using the domain where I’m deploying my app to.
You got it right. In the VirtualHost your ServerName is your domain that you want the site available on. If you want it also to answer to www.example.com then add a ServerAlias with that name as well. You don’t need to also put the server name in the actual <VirtualHost foo:80> part; just <VirtualHost *:80> is fine nowadays.
At the top level of the config you can and probably should set ServerName to the actual, physical name of the server. If you continue to get an error referencing ServerName then that is what you should do, but if you’re not answering any requests for that name then it may never cause a problem.
Hey I didn’t understand the last part about the top level of the config. Can you provide an example? Let’s assume my domain is example.com and server hostname is server1.boomboom.com
Normally, you would specify a ServerName directive outside any virtual host blocks using the server’s actual name. Just ServerName server1.boomboom.com. But if you’re not getting any errors any more you probably don’t need to.
I understood what you’re saying but I’m not too experienced to implement it. I contacted my hosting provider and they did something and now I’m no longer getting that error in httpd logs. Also, previously when I visited the domain, I was seeing ‘Forbidden’ message. But now it turned to ‘Apache is functioning normally’ but dont see my app.
They told me to edit this file: /usr/local/directadmin/data/users/<username>/httpd.conf.
And this is how the file looks like now after reverse proxying to my NodeJS app:
# Auto generated apache config file by DirectAdmin version 1.641
# Modifying this file is not recommended as any changes you make will be
# overwritten when the user makes any changes to their website
# For global config changes that affect all Users, see this guide:
# http://help.directadmin.com/item.php?id=2
# For local config changes that only affect one User, see this guide:
# http://help.directadmin.com/item.php?id=3
<Directory "/home/<username>/public_html">
<IfModule mod_fcgid.c>
SuexecUserGroup <username> <username>
</IfModule>
php_admin_flag engine ON
php_admin_value sendmail_path '/usr/sbin/sendmail -t -i -f [email protected]'
php_admin_value mail.log /home/<username>/.php/php-mail.log
php_admin_value open_basedir /home/<username>/:/tmp:/var/tmp:/opt/alt/php74/usr/share/pear/:/dev/urandom:/usr/local/lib/php/:/usr/local/$
</Directory>
<VirtualHost example.com:80>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} ^80$
RewriteRule ^.*$ https://%{SERVER_NAME}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost *:443>
Header always set Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000"
ServerName example.com
SetOutputFilter DEFLATE
SetEnvIfNoCase Request_URI "\.(?:gif|jpe?g|png)$"no-gzip
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/css text/javascript application/javascript
ExpiresActive On
ProxyRequests off
RequestHeader add original-protocol-ssl 1
<Proxy *>
Order deny,allow
Allow from all
</Proxy>
<Location />
ProxyPass http://xxx.138.xxx.xxx:3000/
ProxyPassReverse http://xxx.138.xxx.xxx:3000/
ProxyPreserveHost On
</Location>
# SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/cert.pem
# SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/privkey.pem
# Include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf
# SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/xxx.example.com/chain.pem
</VirtualHost>
Do you know why I’m getting ‘Apache is functioning normally’ instead of my Nodejs app that is running in port 3000?
Also to let you know, ‘Apache is functioning normally’ is coming from a file which is in /var/www/html. This file is mentioned in /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf file as DocumentRoot /var/www/html. Now I am even more confused.
Status 304 means your browser has the page cached and did not load it again from the server because the server indicated that nothing has changed.
The problem with trying to help here is that you are using some kind of managed hosting that is generating Apache configs, and there’s not much anyone other than your hosting provider can do to tell what’s going on beyond guessing. The comments in the config you included indicate that the file shouldn’t even be edited because changes will be lost, so they are doing some kind of management of the config and we can’t possibly know what all is going on behind the scenes there. I don’t even know if changes you make will be picked up without doing a reload of Apache.
I guess they are using something called Direct Admin? You probably need to go to your hosting provider for detailed help here.
