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How to use a reverse proxy

When having multiple webservers or other applications running, that also use port 80 and 443, you probably want to use a reverse proxy to serve HedgeDoc.

We'll assume the domain you use for the instance is https://md.example.com, so please substitute your actual domain anywhere you encounter https://md.example.com.

Configuring the reverse proxy

We have collected some example configurations for popular reverse proxies below. At the end is also a list of generic things the reverse proxy must do, if you prefer to write your own config or use a reverse proxy not mentioned here.

Traefik

As traefik has direct access to your running Docker containers, there is no need to configure extra ports. Instead, you'll only have to add the following labels to the services in your docker-compose.yml:

docker-compose.yml 
backend:
  image: ghcr.io/hedgedoc/hedgedoc/backend:2.0.0-alpha.3
  volumes:
    - $PWD/.env:/usr/src/app/backend/.env
    - hedgedoc_uploads:/usr/src/app/backend/uploads
  labels:
    traefik.enable: "true"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_backend.rule: "Host(`md.example.com`) && (PathPrefix(`/realtime`) || PathPrefix(`/api`) || PathPrefix(`/public`) || PathPrefix(`/uploads`) || PathPrefix(`/media`))"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_backend.tls: "true"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_backend.tls.certresolver: "letsencrypt"
    traefik.http.services.hedgedoc_2_backend.loadbalancer.server.port: "3000"
    traefik.http.services.hedgedoc_2_backend.loadbalancer.server.scheme: "http"
frontend:
  image: ghcr.io/hedgedoc/hedgedoc/frontend:2.0.0-alpha.3
  environment:
    HD_BASE_URL: "${HD_BASE_URL}"
  labels:
    traefik.enable: "true"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_frontend.rule: "Host(`md.example.com`)"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_frontend.tls: "true"
    traefik.http.routers.hedgedoc_2_frontend.tls.certresolver: "letsencrypt"
    traefik.http.services.hedgedoc_2_frontend.loadbalancer.server.port: "3001"
    traefik.http.services.hedgedoc_2_frontend.loadbalancer.server.scheme: "http"

We added Let's Encrypt as a certificate resolver, as it enables you to quickly use HTTPS. If you don't want to use that feel free to change the .certresolver variables accordingly.

If you used the docker-compose.yml file from the tutorial, please remove the service proxy and the volume caddy_data as caddy is no longer needed when using traefik.

Other reverse proxies

In the following we'll also assume that you run a HedgeDoc backend on port 3000, a HedgeDoc frontend on port 3001.
Furthermore, we assume that you have TLS certificates located at /etc/letsencrypt/live/md.example.com/fullchain.pem and /etc/letsencrypt/live/md.example.com/privkey.pem respectively and are using Let's Encrypt for your certificates. Replace these paths with the actual paths to your certificates.

Preparations when using the default docker-compose.yml:

If your starting with the docker-compose.yml file from the tutorial, you need to add the ports entry for both backend and frontend as following.

docker-compose.yml 
backend:
  image: ghcr.io/hedgedoc/hedgedoc/backend:2.0.0-alpha.3
  volumes:
    - $PWD/.env:/usr/src/app/backend/.env
    - hedgedoc_uploads:/usr/src/app/backend/uploads
  ports:
    - "3000:3000"
frontend:
  image: ghcr.io/hedgedoc/hedgedoc/frontend:2.0.0-alpha.3
  environment:
    HD_BASE_URL: "${HD_BASE_URL}"
  ports:
    - "3001:3001"

Also, you want to remove the service proxy and the volume caddy_data to avoid port conflicts with your reverse-proxy software.

nginx

Here is an example configuration for nginx.

nginx config 
map $http_upgrade $connection_upgrade {
        default upgrade;
        ''      close;
}
server {
        server_name md.example.com;

        location ~ ^/(api|public|uploads|media)/ {
                proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3000;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $host;
                proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
        }

        location /realtime {
                proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3000;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $host;
                proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
                proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
                proxy_set_header Connection $connection_upgrade;
        }

        location / {
                proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3001;
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $host; 
                proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr; 
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for; 
                proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
        }

    listen [::]:443 ssl http2;
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    ssl_certificate fullchain.pem;
    ssl_certificate_key privkey.pem;
    include options-ssl-nginx.conf;
    ssl_dhparam ssl-dhparams.pem;
}

Apache

You will need these modules enabled: proxy, proxy_http and proxy_wstunnel.
Here is an example config snippet for Apache:

Apache config 
<VirtualHost *:443>
  ServerName md.example.com

  RewriteEngine on
  RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/realtime             [NC]
  RewriteCond %{HTTP:Upgrade} =websocket             [NC]
  RewriteRule /(.*)  ws://127.0.0.1:3000/$1          [P,L]

  ProxyPass /api http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPass /public http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPass /realtime http://127.0.0.1:3000/

  ProxyPassReverse /api http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPassReverse /public http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPassReverse /uploads http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPassReverse /media http://127.0.0.1:3000/
  ProxyPassReverse /realtime http://127.0.0.1:3000/

  ProxyPass / http://127.0.0.1:3001/
  ProxyPassReverse / http://127.0.0.1:3001/

  RequestHeader set "X-Forwarded-Proto" expr=%{REQUEST_SCHEME}

  ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
  CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

  SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/md.example.com/fullchain.pem
  SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/md.example.com/privkey.pem
  Include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf
</VirtualHost>

Generic

Here is a list of things your reverse proxy needs to do to let HedgeDoc work:

In essence there are a few special urls that need to be handled by the HedgeDoc backend and everything else is handled by the frontend.