NGINX not show default page on Amazon EC2 Instance

Question

I installed nginx on Fedora. But I don't know why I cannot get the default nginx page by requesting server IP through browser. My request is down by timeout.

But nginx is running.

$ sudo service nginx status
nginx (pid  20372) is running...

My default generated config is

# For more information on configuration, see:
#   * Official English Documentation: http://nginx.org/en/docs/
#   * Official Russian Documentation: http://nginx.org/ru/docs/

user nginx;
worker_processes auto;
error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
pid /var/run/nginx.pid;

events {
    worker_connections 1024;
}

http {
    log_format  main  '$remote_addr - $remote_user [$time_local] "$request" '
                      '$status $body_bytes_sent "$http_referer" '
                      '"$http_user_agent" "$http_x_forwarded_for"';

    access_log  /var/log/nginx/access.log  main;

    sendfile            on;
    tcp_nopush          on;
    tcp_nodelay         on;
    keepalive_timeout   65;
    types_hash_max_size 2048;

    include             /etc/nginx/mime.types;
    default_type        application/octet-stream;

    # Load modular configuration files from the /etc/nginx/conf.d directory.
    # See http://nginx.org/en/docs/ngx_core_module.html#include
    # for more information.
    include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf;

    index   index.html index.htm;

    server {
        listen       80 default_server;
        listen       [::]:80 default_server;
        server_name  localhost;
        root         /usr/share/nginx/html;

        # Load configuration files for the default server block.
        include /etc/nginx/default.d/*.conf;

        location / {
        }

        # redirect server error pages to the static page /40x.html
        #
        error_page 404 /404.html;
            location = /40x.html {
        }

        # redirect server error pages to the static page /50x.html
        #
        error_page 500 502 503 504 /50x.html;
            location = /50x.html {
        }

        # proxy the PHP scripts to Apache listening on 127.0.0.1:80
        #
        #location ~ \.php$ {
        #    proxy_pass   http://127.0.0.1;
        #}

        # pass the PHP scripts to FastCGI server listening on 127.0.0.1:9000
        #
        #location ~ \.php$ {
        #    root           html;
        #    fastcgi_pass   127.0.0.1:9000;
        #    fastcgi_index  index.php;
        #    fastcgi_param  SCRIPT_FILENAME  /scripts$fastcgi_script_name;
        #    include        fastcgi_params;
        #}

        # deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
        # concurs with nginx's one
        #
        #location ~ /\.ht {
        #    deny  all;
        #}
    }

# Settings for a TLS enabled server.
#
#    server {
#        listen       443 ssl;
#        listen       [::]:443 ssl;
#        server_name  localhost;
#        root         /usr/share/nginx/html;
#
#        ssl_certificate "/etc/pki/nginx/server.crt";
#        ssl_certificate_key "/etc/pki/nginx/private/server.key";
#        # It is *strongly* recommended to generate unique DH parameters
#        # Generate them with: openssl dhparam -out /etc/pki/nginx/dhparams.pem 2048
#        #ssl_dhparam "/etc/pki/nginx/dhparams.pem";
#        ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:1m;
#        ssl_session_timeout  10m;
#        ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
#        ssl_ciphers HIGH:SEED:!aNULL:!eNULL:!EXPORT:!DES:!RC4:!MD5:!PSK:!RSAPSK:!aDH:!aECDH:!EDH-DSS-DES-CBC3-SHA:!KRB5-DES-CBC3-SHA:!SRP;
#        ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
#
#        # Load configuration files for the default server block.
#        include /etc/nginx/default.d/*.conf;
#
#        location / {
#        }
#
#        error_page 404 /404.html;
#            location = /40x.html {
#        }
#
#        error_page 500 502 503 504 /50x.html;
#            location = /50x.html {
#        }
#    }

}

I have no idea what is happening. Also /var/log/nginx/access.log and /var/log/nginx/access.log are empty. Help please...

Answer 1

On Amazon EC2, you will need to open up the firewall to allow incoming HTTP connections from your browser to the instance.

1. Login to the Amazon Web Console
2. Go to EC2
3. Find your instance
4. Click on its Security Group
5. Click Inbound Tab
6. Click Edit
7. Add Rule -> HTTP, set the Source field to My Ip

The changes will go into effect immediately.

Please note that if you are accessing your instance from a non fixed IP (coffee shop wifi), you will need to change the Source IP address everytime you connect and get assigned a new IP address. So if it works, and then after a while, it seems to hang, that may be why.

If you are also serving HTTPS, you will to add a specific rule also.