Flarum in the root directory with WordPress installed in a subdirectory - Nginx

proffstudy

I have Flarum installed and working properly in the root directory at example.com. The root directory is:
root /var/www/example.com/html/flarum;
I have WordPress installed in the subfolder: example.com/wordpress but it is not working properly. The root directory for WordPress is:
root /var/www/example.com/html/wordpress;

The Nginx configuration is:

# Default server configuration
#
server {
	root /var/www/example.com/html/flarum;
	include /var/www/example.com/html/flarum/.nginx.conf;

	# Add index.php to the list if you are using PHP
	index index.php index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;

	server_name example.com www.example.com;

	# pass PHP scripts to FastCGI server
	#
	location ^~ /wordpress {
		root /var/www/example.com/html;
  		index index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html index.php;
  		try_files $uri $uri/ /wordpress/index.php?q=$uri&$args;
		location ~ \.php$ {
		fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.*\.php)(.*)$;
		include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
		fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.1-fpm.sock;
	}
}
 	# Flarum Support
	location ~ \.php$ {
	root /var/www/example.com/html/flarum;
	fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+.php)(/.+)$;
	fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.1-fpm.sock;
	include fastcgi_params;
	fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
	fastcgi_index index.php;
	}
	location = /sitemap.xml {
    	try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
	}
	# deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
	# concurs with nginx's one
	#
	location ~ /\.ht {
		deny all;
	}
	# Protect my wordpress login page and directory with a password 
	location = /wordpress/wp-login.php {
	auth_basic  "Login";
	include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
	auth_basic_user_file /etc/nginx/.htpasswd;
	fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php8.1-fpm.sock;
	}
	#Block All XML-RPC Traffic
        location /xmlrpc.php {
	        deny all;
        }
	#Stop favicon logging	
	location = /favicon.ico {
                log_not_found off;
                access_log off;
        }
	#Allow robots traffic
	location = /robots.txt {
                allow all;
                log_not_found off;
                access_log off;
        }
	#Session Caching
	ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:20m;
	#OCSP Stapling
	ssl_stapling on;
	ssl_stapling_verify on;
	resolver 8.8.8.8 8.8.4.4 valid=300s;
	#End of the rules we added

    listen [::]:443 ssl; # managed by Certbot
    listen 443 ssl http2; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem; # managed by Certbot
    include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-nginx.conf; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_dhparam /etc/letsencrypt/ssl-dhparams.pem; # managed by Certbot
}

server {
    if ($host = www.example.com) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    } # managed by Certbot
    if ($host = example.com) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    } # managed by Certbot

	listen 80;
	listen [::]:80;

	server_name example.com www.example.com;
    return 404; # managed by Certbot
}

How can I make WordPress work properly when I visit www.example.com/wordpress?
I am currently getting a 404 error page - not found.

peopleinside

proffstudy your question seems related to "make working Wordpress" while this is a Flarum community.
Anyway, maybe you have some wrong configuration like maybe you did not include the html directory somewhere so Wordpress is not found 404?

I use Apache so I don't know well Nginx.
You can also try to look into your error server logs.

proffstudy

peopleinside Thank you very much. I agree with that but to be honest, I like the community here and wanted to give it a try 😄
No errors in the error log, so clean this time lol

clarkwinkelmann

I'm not sure root statements are allowed inside location blocks in nginx.

Usually for a subfolder install, you would use an actual subfolder in a common webroot. So you could create a wordpress folder inside of Flarum's public folder, and place Wordpress there.

You will probably need to edit the default location/try_files statement(s) to make sure 404 pages under Wordpress are handled by Wordpress and not Flarum.

Using a subdomain is generally easier since you can provide a custom root value for each app.

proffstudy

clarkwinkelmann Thank you! I tried that, and I moved the WordPress folder inside flarum folder (i.e., the root directory), but it is the same. The configuration now is:

# Default server configuration
#
server {
	root /var/www/example.com/html/flarum;
	include /var/www/example.com/html/flarum/.nginx.conf;

	# Add index.php to the list if you are using PHP
	index index.php index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;
	server_name example.com www.example.com;

	location /wordpress {
		# First attempt to serve request as file, then
		# as directory, then fall back to displaying a 404.
		try_files $uri $uri/ /wordpress/index.php?q=$uri&$args;
	}

	# pass PHP scripts to FastCGI server
	#
	location ~ \.php$ {
	include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
	fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.1-fpm.sock;
	}

 	# Flarum Support
	location ~ \.php$ {
	root /var/www/example.com/html/flarum;
	fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+.php)(/.+)$;
	fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.1-fpm.sock;
	include fastcgi_params;
	fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
	fastcgi_index index.php;
	}
	location = /sitemap.xml {
    	try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
	}

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

	## We added these rules
	# Protect my wordpress login page and directory with a password 
	location = /wordpress/wp-login.php {
	auth_basic  "Login";
	include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
	auth_basic_user_file /etc/nginx/.htpasswd;
	fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php8.0-fpm.sock;
	}
	#Block All XML-RPC Traffic
        location /xmlrpc.php {
	        deny all;
        }
	#Stop favicon logging	
	location = /favicon.ico {
                log_not_found off;
                access_log off;
        }
	#Allow robots traffic
	location = /robots.txt {
                allow all;
                log_not_found off;
                access_log off;
        }
	#Session Caching
	ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:20m;
	#OCSP Stapling
	ssl_stapling on;
	ssl_stapling_verify on;
	resolver 8.8.8.8 8.8.4.4 valid=300s;
	#End of the rules we added

    listen [::]:443 ssl; # managed by Certbot
    listen 443 ssl http2; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem; # managed by Certbot
    include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-nginx.conf; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_dhparam /etc/letsencrypt/ssl-dhparams.pem; # managed by Certbot
}

server {
    if ($host = www.example.com) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    } # managed by Certbot

    if ($host = example.com) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    } # managed by Certbot

	listen 80;
	listen [::]:80;

server_name example.com www.example.com;
return 404; # managed by Certbot
}

I hope the subfolder works as the subdomain is my last resort. Again, thank you for all of your help.

proffstudy

Solved!
The second option suggested by clarkwinkelmann worked but I had to edit wp-config.php and add these two lines to wp-config.php, where “example.com/wordpress” is the correct location of my site:

define( 'WP_HOME', 'http://example.com/wordpress' );
define( 'WP_SITEURL', 'http://example.com/wordpress' );

Previously, it was an example.com only causing a 404 error.