Is it possible to use modify nginx config file and use X-Accel-Redirect on Heroku?

Question

Reading this article on nginx website, I'm interested in using X-Accel-Redirect header in the way that Apache or Lighttpd users might use the X-Sendfile header to help with the serving of large files.

Most tutorials I've found require you to modify the nginx config file.

• Can I modify the nginx config file on Heroku and if so, how?

Secondly,

• I found this X-Accel-Redirect plugin on github which looks like it removes the need to manually alter the nginx config file - it seems to let you add the redirect location in your controller code - does anyone know if this works on heroku? I can't test it out until tonight.

NB - I have emailed both Heroku support and goncalossilva to ask them the same questions but I have no idea when they will get back to me. I will post back with whatever it is they tell me though.

Answer 1

Although Heroku seem to be using Nginx for their reverse-proxy component, the thing about a platform-as-a-service stack like this is that no individual tenant has to (nor even gets to) configure or tune distinct elements of the stack for any given application.

Requests in and out could be routed through any number of different elements to and from your Rails app so it's their platform infrastructure (and not any particular tenant) that manages all of the internal configuration and behavior. You give up the fine-grained control for the other conveniences offered by a PaaS such as this.

If you really need what you've described then I'd suggest you might need to look elsewhere for Rails app hosting. I'd be surprised if their answer would be anything else but no.