Can't setup nginx + php5-fpm in a fresh installation getting 404

Question

I just've downloaded nginx 1.4 and right away I see the "Welcome to nginx!" message, then I've installed php5-fpm from the repositories so I create a php file at /usr/share/nginx/html/demo.php just with <?php echo "Hello World"; ?> inside.

(I'm trying under ElementaryOS Ubuntu 12.04 based) and followed this manual: http://wiki.nginx.org/PHPFcgiExample

Then when I visit http://localhost/demo.php it doesn't work, I give a 404 error. This is my /etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf file:

server {
    listen       80;
    server_name  localhost;

    #charset koi8-r;
    #access_log  /var/log/nginx/log/host.access.log  main;

    location / {
        root   /usr/share/nginx/html;
        index  index.html index.htm;
    }

    #error_page  404              /404.html;

    # redirect server error pages to the static page /50x.html
    #
    error_page  500 502 503 504  /50x.html;
    location = /50x.html {
        root   /usr/share/nginx/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$fastcgi_script_name;
    #    include        fastcgi_params;
    #}
    location ~ [^/]\.php(/|$) {
        fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+?\.php)(/.*)$;
        if (!-f $document_root$fastcgi_script_name) {
            return 404;
        }

        fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
        fastcgi_index index.php;
        include fastcgi_params;
    }

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

I thought that was a permissions issue, so I just change the user nginx to user www-data wich is the same user that fpm use (according to the conf file). Then I applied chown -R www-data:www-data /usr/share/nginx/html/ but I have same error.

I was looking for simmilar problems, I read that:

root   /usr/share/nginx/html;
index  index.html index.htm;

They need to be at server level (not local /), if I do that I get a blank page, but nothing else. Analyzing the headers I get an 200 Ok response.

If I use the default php snnipet instead of the one in the manuals:

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;
}

I give a 404 error but only in a blank page and the message "File not found." this rendered page is different from the one that I get earlier. I think this one comes from fpm and the other from nginx (Of course.. I'm not sure).

At the last I did chmod 777 /usr/share/nginx/html/demo.php and now it downloads the script, downloads the file demo.php to my pc.

So I want to know, how I can execute a PHP script with nginx + php5-fpm. I don't mind removing and purge the nginx, the fpm or the php packages, I just want to execute a php script in the webserver.

Thanks in advance. Have a good day.

Answer 1

The config line:

    fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;

Is directing nginx to forward the request to a process listening on localhost port 9000. Do you have anything listening?