netbox-community-netbox/docs/installation/3-http-daemon.md

We'll set up a simple WSGI front end using gunicorn for the purposes of this guide. For web servers, we provide example configurations for both nginx and Apache. (You are of course free to use whichever combination of HTTP and WSGI services you'd like.) We'll use systemd to enable service persistence.

!!! info For the sake of brevity, only Ubuntu 18.04 instructions are provided here, but this sort of web server and WSGI configuration is not unique to NetBox. Please consult your distribution's documentation for assistance if needed.

Web Server Installation

Option A: nginx

The following will serve as a minimal nginx configuration. Be sure to modify your server name and installation path appropriately.

# apt-get install -y nginx

Once nginx is installed, save the following configuration to /etc/nginx/sites-available/netbox. Be sure to replace netbox.example.com with the domain name or IP address of your installation. (This should match the value configured for ALLOWED_HOSTS in configuration.py.)

server {
    listen 80;

    server_name netbox.example.com;

    client_max_body_size 25m;

    location /static/ {
        alias /opt/netbox/netbox/static/;
    }

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8001;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $http_host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    }
}

Then, delete /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default and create a symlink in the sites-enabled directory to the configuration file you just created.

# cd /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
# rm default
# ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/netbox

Restart the nginx service to use the new configuration.

# service nginx restart

To enable SSL, consider this guide on securing nginx with Let's Encrypt.

Option B: Apache

# apt-get install -y apache2 libapache2-mod-wsgi-py3

Once Apache is installed, proceed with the following configuration (Be sure to modify the ServerName appropriately):

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ProxyPreserveHost On

    ServerName netbox.example.com

    Alias /static /opt/netbox/netbox/static

    # Needed to allow token-based API authentication
    WSGIPassAuthorization on

    <Directory /opt/netbox/netbox/static>
        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
        AllowOverride None
        Require all granted
    </Directory>

    <Location /static>
        ProxyPass !
    </Location>

    RequestHeader set "X-Forwarded-Proto" expr=%{REQUEST_SCHEME}
    ProxyPass / http://127.0.0.1:8001/
    ProxyPassReverse / http://127.0.0.1:8001/
</VirtualHost>

Save the contents of the above example in /etc/apache2/sites-available/netbox.conf, enable the proxy and proxy_http modules, and reload Apache:

# a2enmod proxy
# a2enmod proxy_http
# a2enmod headers
# a2ensite netbox
# service apache2 restart

To enable SSL, consider this guide on securing Apache with Let's Encrypt.

gunicorn Installation

Install gunicorn:

# pip3 install gunicorn

Copy contrib/gunicorn.py to /opt/netbox/gunicorn.py. We make a copy of this file to ensure that any changes to it do not get overwritten by a future upgrade.

# cp contrib/gunicorn.py /opt/netbox/gunicorn.py

You may wish to edit this file to change the bound IP address or port number, or to make performance-related adjustments.

systemd configuration

We'll use systemd to control the daemonization of NetBox services. First, copy contrib/netbox.service and contrib/netbox-rq.service to the /etc/systemd/system/ directory:

# cp contrib/*.service /etc/systemd/system/

!!! note These service files assume that gunicorn is installed at /usr/local/bin/gunicorn. If the output of which gunicorn indicates a different path, you'll need to correct the ExecStart path in both files.

Then, start the netbox and netbox-rq services and enable them to initiate at boot time:

# systemctl daemon-reload
# systemctl start netbox.service
# systemctl start netbox-rq.service
# systemctl enable netbox.service
# systemctl enable netbox-rq.service

You can use the command systemctl status netbox to verify that the WSGI service is running:

# systemctl status netbox.service
● netbox.service - NetBox WSGI Service
   Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/netbox.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: active (running) since Thu 2019-12-12 19:23:40 UTC; 25s ago
     Docs: https://netbox.readthedocs.io/en/stable/
 Main PID: 11993 (gunicorn)
    Tasks: 6 (limit: 2362)
   CGroup: /system.slice/netbox.service
           ├─11993 /usr/bin/python3 /usr/local/bin/gunicorn --pid /var/tmp/netbox.pid --pythonpath /opt/netbox/...
           ├─12015 /usr/bin/python3 /usr/local/bin/gunicorn --pid /var/tmp/netbox.pid --pythonpath /opt/netbox/...
           ├─12016 /usr/bin/python3 /usr/local/bin/gunicorn --pid /var/tmp/netbox.pid --pythonpath /opt/netbox/...
...

At this point, you should be able to connect to the HTTP service at the server name or IP address you provided. If you are unable to connect, check that the nginx service is running and properly configured. If you receive a 502 (bad gateway) error, this indicates that gunicorn is misconfigured or not running.

!!! info Please keep in mind that the configurations provided here are bare minimums required to get NetBox up and running. You may want to make adjustments to better suit your production environment.