Configuring Apache2 (Unofficial)

Unofficial, community-maintained guides for configuring Apache as a proxy instead of NGINX.

Configuring Apache2 as a proxy for Mattermost Server (Unofficial)

Important

This unofficial guide is maintained by the Mattermost community and this deployment configuration is not yet officially supported by Mattermost, Inc. Community testing, feedback and improvements are welcome and greatly appreciated. You can edit this page on GitHub.

On a Debian-based operating system such as Ubuntu, Apache2 proxy configuration is done in the /etc/apache2/sites-available directory. Red Hat-based systems organize Apache configuration files differently. If you’re setting up Mattermost on a subdomain, you’ll want to create a new configuration file along the lines of mysubdomain.mydomain.com.conf.

To configure Apache2 as a proxy

  1. SSH into your server.

  2. Make sure the Apache modules mod_rewrite , mod_proxy, mod_proxy_http, and mod_proxy_wstunnel are installed and enabled. If not, follow the instructions from your Linux distribution to do so.

  3. Create the above mentioned configuration file. It is often helpful to start with a copy of 000-default.conf or default-ssl.conf (on Ubuntu).

  4. Edit your configuration using the guide below:

    1. If you’re not setting up a subdomain, your ServerName will simply be set to mydomain.com.
    2. ServerAlias can been added too if you want to capture www.mydomain.com.
    3. Remember to change the values to match your server’s name, etc.
    4. If you have enabled TLS in the Mattermost settings, you must use the protocol wss:// instead of ws:// in the RewriteRule.
    5. To serve requests on a different port (such as 8443), in addition to setting the port in the VirtualHost element, add Listen 8443 on a separate line before the VirtualHost line.
<VirtualHost *:80>
  # If you're not using a subdomain you may need to set a ServerAlias to:
  # ServerAlias www.mydomain.com
  ServerName mysubdomain.mydomain.com
  ServerAdmin hostmaster@mydomain.com
  ProxyPreserveHost On

  # Set web sockets
  RewriteEngine On
  RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} /api/v[0-9]+/(users/)?websocket [NC,OR]
  RewriteCond %{HTTP:UPGRADE} ^WebSocket$ [NC,OR]
  RewriteCond %{HTTP:CONNECTION} ^Upgrade$ [NC]
  RewriteRule .* ws://127.0.0.1:8065%{REQUEST_URI} [P,QSA,L]

  <Location />
        Require all granted
        ProxyPass http://127.0.0.1:8065/
        ProxyPassReverse http://127.0.0.1:8065/
        ProxyPassReverseCookieDomain 127.0.0.1 mysubdomain.mydomain.com
  </Location>

</VirtualHost>

  1. (Debian/Ubuntu only) Because you’ll likely have not set up the subdomain before now on Apache2, run a2ensite mysubdomain.mydomain.com to enable the site (do not run a2ensite mysubdomain.mydomain.com.conf).

  2. Restart Apache2.

    • On Ubuntu 14.04 and RHEL 6: sudo service apache2 restart
    • On Ubuntu 16.04+ and RHEL 7+: sudo systemctl restart apache2

You should be all set! Ensure that your Mattermost config file is pointing to the correct URL (which may include a port), and then ensure that your socket connection is not dropping once deployed. To prevent external access to Mattermost on port 8065, in the config file, set ListenAddress to localhost:8065 instead of :8065.

Configuring Apache2 with SSL and HTTP/2 (Unofficial)

Important

This unofficial guide is maintained by the Mattermost community and this deployment configuration is not yet officially supported by Mattermost, Inc. Community testing, feedback and improvements are welcome and greatly appreciated. You can edit this page on GitHub.

In order to use Apache as a reverse proxy for the Mattermost Server, you need to install and enable the following apache modules: mod_rewrite , mod_proxy, mod_proxy_http, mod_headers, and mod_proxy_wstunnel. Follow the installation instructions for your Linux distribution.

Once you’ve configured Apache2 as a proxy for your Mattermost Server, the easiest way to enable SSL on Apache2 is via Let’s Encrypt and Certbot.

Note

If Let’s Encrypt is enabled, forward port 80 through a firewall, with Forward80To443 config.json setting set to true to complete the Let’s Encrypt certification.

Once installed, run $ certbot --apache and follow the guide. Afterwards you should find a new configuration file in /etc/apache2/sites-available which should follow the format mysubdomain.mydomain.com-le-ssl.conf.

When opened, edit it to look something like the following:

<IfModule mod_ssl.c>
<VirtualHost *:443>
        ServerName mysubdomain.mydomain.com
        ServerAdmin hostmaster@mydomain.com
        ProxyPreserveHost On
        RequestHeader set "X-Forwarded-Proto" expr=%{REQUEST_SCHEME}
        RequestHeader set "X-Forwarded-SSL" expr=%{HTTPS}

        RewriteEngine On
        RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} /api/v[0-9]+/(users/)?websocket [NC,OR]
        RewriteCond %{HTTP:UPGRADE} ^WebSocket$ [NC,OR]
        RewriteCond %{HTTP:CONNECTION} ^Upgrade$ [NC]
        RewriteRule .* ws://127.0.0.1:8065%{REQUEST_URI} [P,QSA,L]

        <Location />
                Require all granted
                ProxyPass http://127.0.0.1:8065/
                ProxyPassReverse http://127.0.0.1:8065/
                ProxyPassReverseCookieDomain 127.0.0.1 mysubdomain.mydomain.com
        </Location>

        # Generated by Certbot
        SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/mydomain.com/fullchain.pem
        SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/mydomain.com/privkey.pem
        Include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf
</VirtualHost>
</IfModule>

  1. Restart Apache2

    • On Ubuntu 14.04 and RHEL 6: sudo service apache2 restart
    • On Ubuntu 16.04 and RHEL 7: sudo systemctl restart apache2

  2. Test that the site is working, that WebSockets are working, and if you enabled HTTP redirect to HTTPS during Certbot installation that the redirect is working.

  3. Lastly, test your SSL configuration with https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/index.html.

Using Certbot means that you shouldn’t have to do anything in the configuration of Mattermost.