SWAG: can nginx access other user's directory?

LSIO Discussion Container Support
1

hi there,

I use SWAG inside a docker container. I am user ubuntu and have my stuff at /home/ubuntu/swag/…
Running nginx and accessing normal files under /home/ubuntu/swag/www

I have a friend whom I want to give a subdomain on my server. I set up a new username (say user2) with his home directory at /home/user2

Inside my docker-compose, I set up a volume link to his home directory:

volumes:
  - /home/user2:/user2

I set up a subdomain proxy file for nginx and in the server section, I set:

root /user2/www;

Now, when I try to access the subdomain, I see that nginx doesn’t have access to his directory (error.log):

2024/03/22 11:53:10 [crit] 452#452: *2 stat() “/user2/www/index.html” failed (13: Permission denied)

I have tried to add user ubuntu to the group user2 (as /home/user2/www is owned by user2:user2) but it didn’t work.

How can I fix this permission issue?

Thank you!

2

either run two nginx instances (one under each user)
or put a common group on both users’ nginx folders and run nginx as that group, ensuring the folders/files allow read access to the group

3

Thanks!
So I think I need to change the default group of user2 to ubuntu (as I don’t see how the SWAG container can run 2 instances of nginx).
Are there any security risks with doing that?

4

you would run two containers

are you asking if there are security risks with giving another user’s group access to a different user’s whole home directory? :smiley: