nginx directory index is forbidden (403 error)

Question

In a node.js app, I have this strange problem that all media files get 403 error from nginx. the files structure is this:

/www/
└── app
    ├── assets
    │   ├── fonts
    │   │   └── bootstrap
    │   ├── images
    │   │   ├── ios
    │   │   └── photoswipe
    │   ├── js
    │   └── vendor-css
    └── public  <-----------(here is the problem)
        └── files
            ├── attachments
            │   ├── thumbnails
            │   └── thumbnails2
            └── profilepics

And here is my nginx config

server {
  listen example.com:80 default_server;
  server_name example.com;
  root /www/app;

  location ~ ^/media/ {
   alias /www/app/public/files;
  }


  location / {
   root /www/app;
  }

 location ~ ^/assets/ {
   root /www/app;
  }

  location ~ ^.+\..+$ {
    try_files $uri =404;
  }

}


server {
  listen api.example.com:80;
  server_name api.example.com;
  location / {
   proxy_pass http://localhost:3000;
   proxy_http_version 1.1;
   proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https;
   proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
   proxy_set_header Connection 'upgrade';
   proxy_set_header Host $host;
   proxy_cache_bypass $http_upgrade;

  }
}

I have set 777 as File permission for /www (I know it is not good practice but just for test):

# ls -al /www
total 6212
drwxrwxrwx  3 www-data www-data    4096 May  4 03:26 .
drwxr-xr-x 24 root     root        4096 May  4 00:24 ..
drwxrwxrwx  4 www-data www-data    4096 May  5 16:08 app



ls -al /www/app/public/files
total 16
drwxrwxrwx 4 www-data www-data 4096 May  5 15:59 .
drwxrwxrwx 3 www-data www-data 4096 May  5 15:59 ..
drwxrwxrwx 4 www-data www-data 4096 May  5 16:10 attachments
drwxrwxrwx 2 www-data www-data 4096 May  5 15:59 profilepics

Example nginx error log:

[error] 30102#30102: *34 directory index of "/www/app/public/files" is forbidden, client: 1.2.3.4, server: example.com, request: "GET /media/attachments/mycat.jpg/ HTTP/1.1", host: "example.com", referrer: " http://example.com/ "

Notice that nginx adds a trailing slash automatically.

When I try to get mycat.jpg (without trailing slash) using curl, I get:

301 Moved Permanently

Files on other path, ie /www/app/assets are rendered correctly.

I have moved around the path to /public/files and twaked nginx config but this problem still bugs me for hours. Really appreciate your help to resolve this.

Answer 1

Being root should fix the problem. Are you root when trying to access the image "mycat.jpg"? And what are your access rules you can change them by using "chmod"