Need a nginx setup doc

http://wiki.nginx.org/HttpGzipStaticModule should do the gzip stuff. The other rules has to do with the expiration time and changing it from the default 2 weeks to 1 year.

I use this URL as a the test for fast 404s example.com/sites/default/files/advagg_css/css_missing_0.css

I then check for the X-AdvAgg header. If that is set in the request then I know missing files are correctly being routed to the advagg handler. My guess is you have a rule for the files directory in your nginx config. What you need to do is look for the imagecache rules and adapt them for the advagg_css and advagg_js directories.

I use the similar logic in this module for what is used in core in D7. Aggregates do not get flushed till they haven't been used in 30 days drupal_delete_file_if_stale(). Let me know if you have any more questions :)

My working configuration supporting advagg in Nginx:

https://github.com/omega8cc/nginx-for-drupal/blob/master/aegir/conf/ngin...

After testing on a lot of browsers I brought back etags. I don't think nginx has full etag support out of the box, so I would turn back on Last-Modified; they accomplish the same goal.
http://drupalcode.org/project/advagg.git/commitdiff/c132a7e45375def56d41...

    ###
    ### advagg_css and advagg_js support
    ###
    location ~* /files/advagg_(?:css|js)/ {
        access_log off;
        expires 365d;
        rewrite ^/files/advagg_(.*)/(.*)$ /sites/$host/files/advagg_$1/$2 last;
        add_header Pragma "";
        add_header Cache-Control "public";
        add_header X-Header "AdvAgg Generator 1.0-boa-T-5";
        try_files $uri @drupal;
    }

Right, there is an experimental module for Nginx: http://mikewest.org/2008/11/generating-etags-for-static-content-using-nginx but we should stay with Last-Modified probably.

Thanks for the update!

@spacereactor you could try this, as you don't need any rewrite, IMO:

    ###
    ### advagg_css and advagg_js support
    ###
    location ~* advagg_(?:css|js)/ {
        access_log off;
        expires 365d;
        add_header Pragma "";
        add_header Cache-Control "public";
        try_files $uri @drupal;
    }

I remember reading about Etags in Nginx and the program author said that it's not supported in Nginx because it essentially duplicates last-modified.

Etag can be useful for static and dynamic content, typically - when the modify time is not known. Etag is more granular than 'Last-Modified'.

'Last-Modified' is typically accurate to the second, and only measures change along the axis of time. Touching [date/time] a file does not change it’s content, but would force a cache miss when the cache is based on nothing but it's time-stamp ['Last-Modified'].

In contrast, Etags are 'content-based' identifiers that provide a mechanism for confirmation that the content of the file you’re reading is accurate, regardless of various delivery deployment methods on the server.

Some thoughts: It is not a bad practice to rely entirely on 'Last-Modified' when serving truly static content. In this case, the correct use of 'Cache-Control' and 'Expires' headers, will allow client browsers and upstream proxies to cache the static content correctly.

see http://mikewest.org/2008/11/generating-etags-for-static-content-using-nginx

Yahoo!’s Exceptional Performance team explicitly recommends against using the Etag header unless you know what you’re doing (which really boils down to ensuring that Apache doesn’t use the file’s inode to generate the key). I think they've painted with a really broad brush, though, as YSlow’s admonitions against Etags really only apply to the default configurations of Apache and IIS. Etag can be a very valuable addition to the caching arsenal if you think about them; Yahoo!’s throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

HTTP 1.1 introduces a new kind of validator called the ETag. ETags are unique identifiers that are generated by the server and changed every time the representation does. Because the server controls how the ETag is generated, caches can be posotive that if the ETag matches when they make a If-None-Match request, the representation really is the same.

Almost all caches use Last-Modified times in determining if an representation is fresh; However, ETag validation is also becoming more prevalent.

Most modern Web servers will generate both ETag and Last-Modified headers to use as validators for static content (files) automatically; you won’t have to do anything. However, they don’t know enough about dynamic content (like CGI, ASP or database sites) to generate them; see Writing Cache-Aware Scripts -> http://www.mnot.net/cache_docs/#SCRIPT.

[nginx.conf:] config settings for advagg module see -> http://drupal.org/project/advagg

        # advagg_css support (for Drupal Advanced CSS/JS Aggregation module)
        location ~* /files/advagg_css/ {
            access_log         off;
            expires           365d;
            rewrite  ^/files/advagg_css/(.*)$ /sites/$host/files/advagg_css/$1 last;
            add_header Pragma "";
            add_header Cache-Control "public";
            add_header X-Header "AdvAgg CSS Generator 1.0";
            try_files $uri @drupal;
        }

        # advagg_js support (for Drupal Advanced CSS/JS Aggregation module)
        location ~* /files/advagg_js/ {
            access_log         off;
            expires           365d;
            rewrite  ^/files/advagg_js/(.*)$ /sites/$host/files/advagg_js/$1 last;
            add_header Pragma "";
            add_header Cache-Control "public";
            add_header X-Header "AdvAgg JS Generator 1.0";
            try_files $uri @drupal;
        }
...
...
        # send not cached requests to Drupal 6.x with clean URLs support
        location @drupal {
            rewrite ^/(.*)$  /index.php?q=$1 last;
        }
...
...
    # send non-static requests to php-fpm
    location ~ \.php$ {
          try_files $uri =404;            # check for existence of php file first
          fastcgi_pass   127.0.0.1:9000;  # php-fpm listening on port 9000
    }
...
...

Nginx STATIC 'etag' support

See: https://github.com/kkung/nginx-static-etags/
Compile this into nginx (source)


Nginx 'etag' [nginx.conf] Sample Usage: (for above 'static etags')

location / {
    ...
    etags               on;                     # etags required
    etag_hash           on;
    etag_hash_method    md5;
    ...
}

Nginx DYNAMIC 'etag' support
See: https://github.com/kali/nginx-dynamic-etags
Per Nginx DYNAMIC 'etag' 'readme':

Attempt at handling ETag / If-None-Match on proxied content.
I plan on using this to front a Varnish server using a lot of ESI

Etags Final Notes / Warning: The ETag format for Apache 1.3 and 2.x is 'inode-size-timestamp', please be sure to NOT include the 'inode'. Simply override the default and only use modify time [timestamp] and size [size] only. eg: "FileETag MTime Size"
This means that the same static object across cluster hosts can have the same etag! The same logic will apply for using Etags with Nginx. See code sample above:

Added in the configuration from #11 into the readme.

>Added in the configuration from #11 into the readme.

nginx: [emerg] "location" directive is not allowed here in /usr/local/nginx//conf/nginx.conf:91
nginx: configuration file /usr/local/nginx//conf/nginx.conf test failed

Line 91: location ~* advagg_(?:css|js)/ {

Any suggestion?

Thanks

Based off of the recommendations in the CDN module (#974350-57: Far Future setting for Origin Pull mode), these are the headers we need to set/unset in nginx. The CDN module could use these rules translated over as well.

    Header set Cache-Control "max-age=290304000, no-transform, public"
    Header set Expires "Tue, 20 Jan 2037 04:20:42 GMT"
    Header set Last-Modified "Wed, 20 Jan 1988 04:20:42 GMT"
    Header unset ETag

These changes have been committed to AdvAgg in #1334460-12: Slow Loading CSS Aggregate

Here is modified Nginx config:

###
### advagg_css and advagg_js support
###
location ~* files/advagg_(?:css|js)/ {
  access_log off;
  expires    max;
  add_header ETag "";
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=290304000, no-transform, public";
  add_header Last-Modified "Wed, 20 Jan 1988 04:20:42 GMT";
  try_files  $uri @drupal;
}

BTW: expires max; sets max-age for Cache-Control to 10 years, automatically - see http://wiki.nginx.org/NginxHttpHeadersModule#expires

@superfedya - see http://wiki.nginx.org/NginxHttpCoreModule#location

In short, location directive is expected inside server directive, but it is Nginx basics, not really discussed in this issue.

I'll add the code without etags to the readme. Apache by default has etags turned on, I believe nginx has it off by default. I'll add in a note about etags in the comment block at the top. I believe add_header ETag ""; doesn't do what we want in this case.

I just translated it to Nginx config literally, but you are right that Nginx has no (default) support for ETag header. But you don't need any extra HttpHeadersMoreModule to unset most headers. The add_header SomeHeader ""; trick does the same - at least for headers we want to unset.

Sounds good! Thanks for your help with this. The following patch has been committed.