Running Nitro with FastCGI and Lighttpd

I'm assuming you've installed Lighttpd with the package manager of your distribution of choice. Next you need to enable the fastcgi module.

If you're using Debian or a variant (like Ubuntu) you can use the lighty-enable-mod script:

lighty-enable-mod fastcgi

This will create a symlink from /etc/lighttpd/conf-available/10-fastcgi.conf to /etc/lighttpd/conf-enabled/10-fastcgi.conf. Open this file in your editor. If this doesn't work for you simply edit the main configuration file /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf.

To enable the module you need this line:

server.modules  = ( "mod_fastcgi" )

If you find any fastcgi.server portions in the configuration comment them out, we won't be needing them. Now add a fresh portion:

fastcgi.server = ("" =>
                   ((
                     "bin-path" => "/path/to/app.rb",
                     "socket" => "/tmp/nitro.socket",
                     "check-local" => "disable",
                     "max-procs" => 1,
                     "bin-environment" => ("RUBYOPT" => "-rubygems -I/path/nitro_repo/script -rlib/glycerin")
                   ))
                 )

Issue

sudo /etc/init.d/lighttpd force-reload

and you should be all set. Keep an eye on /var/log/lighttpd/error.log in case stuff doesn't work right.

Adapt bin-environment to whatever is necessary on your site to get nitro running. I'm assuming you're using the repo version. Otherwise a simply "-rubygems" might suffice.