Shiny Server on NGINX with SSL

Question

I have a Shiny Server, R 'shiny' package v7.0, NGINX and 3rd party SSL certificate set up on Ubuntu 12.04 64bit system. Everything worked fine when using http, but after I set up a SSL reverse proxy with NGINX - the server.R files stopped working - I don't see anything happening. I see only output from ui.R, no errors, but no results from server.R either. It looks like there's no communication between client a server. I tried IE8 and Google Chrome on Win 7, Google Chrome and Chromium on Ubuntu 12.04 notebook. Same issue. Interestingly though, that it works fine when using iPad.

Please help. Thanks

============================================================== Shiny Server v0.3.6 (Node.js v0.10.21)

sessionInfo() R version 3.0.2 (2013-09-25) Platform: x86_64-pc-linux-gnu (64-bit)

attached base packages: [1] stats graphics grDevices utils datasets methods base

other attached packages: [1] shiny_0.7.0

loaded via a namespace (and not attached): [1] bitops_1.0-5 caTools_1.14 digest_0.6.3 httpuv_1.2.0 RJSONIO_1.0-3 [6] xtable_1.7-1

This is the log for Shiny-Server:

^[[32m[2013-11-12 03:53:43.571] [INFO] shiny-server - ^[[39mStopping listener on 0.0.0.0:3838 ^[[32m[2013-11-12 03:53:43.572] [INFO] shiny-server - ^[[39mShutting down worker processes (with notification) ^[[32m[2013-11-12 03:53:44.393] [INFO] shiny-server - ^[[39mShiny Server v0.3.6 (Node.js v0.10.21) ^[[32m[2013-11-12 03:53:44.395] [INFO] shiny-server - ^[[39mUsing config file "/etc/shiny-server/shiny-server.conf" ^[[32m[2013-11-12 03:53:44.435] [INFO] shiny-server - ^[[39mStarting listener on 0.0.0.0:3838

This is nginx.conf file (showing server section only):

   server {

            listen 80;
            return 301 https://$host$request_uri;

    }

    server {

            listen 443 default ssl;

            ssl on;
            ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/ssl/server.crt;
            ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/ssl/server.key;

            server_name [domain name];
            index index.html;

            location / {
                    proxy_pass http://localhost:3838;
                    proxy_redirect http://localhost:3838/ $scheme://$host/;                                    

            }

    }

======================================================

just for the record: are you using shiny pro or the open source version here? — Matt Bannert
That was open-source version. The pro one was not released at the time of the posting yet. — user2922021

Unknown Unknown · Accepted Answer · 2013-11-14T02:58:13

Turns out the root cause of the problem was not easy to understand as it worked fine on iPad but not on other systems. So, after I found out that there was a new software version Shine Server 0.4.0.0 out there, I have made a move for an upgrade and also I have upgraded the 'shiny' package to shiny_0.8.0.99. After everything was done based on the instructions from this resource: http://rstudio.github.io/shiny-server/latest/ - the issue has gone. Thanks.

Shiny Server on NGINX with SSL

1 Answers