# Sandstorm static hosting proxying and Not Found handling with nginx

From 2020-05-09

I host all my sites on [Sandstorm](https://sandstorm.io) using [Hugo](https://gohugo.io)
and [hugo-sandstorm](https://github.com/johnbintz/hugo-sandstorm). This is super
convenient for a couple reasons:

* I don't have to worry about deploys for new or existing sites, a `git push`
  takes care of it.
* I don't need to architect the `git push` setup, the app does that for me.
* I can easily run the blog locally for testing.
* Because of [sandcats](https://docs.sandstorm.io/en/latest/administering/sandcats/),
  each site magically gets a subdomain I can point at, either with a `CNAME` or
  a proxy like HAProxy or nginx.

However, there are limitations:

* No 404 pages.
* No easy way to use your own HTTPS certificates like [Let's Encrypt](https://letsencrypt.org/) ones.
* I want to clamp down on subdomains so `www.johnbintz.com` redirects properly.

I was solving the latter 2 for a while with HAProxy, but after setting up the
site for [The Industrious Rabbit](https://theindustriousrabbit.com) and
realizing I wanted to shift pages and sections
around as the dust settles on this hit new comic, I wanted 404 pages
so folks could still find what they were looking for.

Here's the nginx config I eventually came up with. You'll still have to
put the site's public ID as a `TXT` record into your domain name as
indicated in your static config setup, and make sure the `Host` header is
sent along correctly so Sandstorm can do the DNS lookup correctly:

```nginx
# redirect http to https without wildcards
server {
  listen 80;

  server_name ~^.*\.johnbintz.com$;

  return 301 https://johnbintz.com$request_uri;
}

# serve subdomainless from sandstorm
server {
  listen 443 ssl;

  # let's encrypt certificates go here

  server_name ~^johnbintz.com$;

  location / {
    proxy_set_header Host johnbintz.com;
    proxy_pass https://the-sandcats-url-sandstorm-static-publishing-gives-you;
    proxy_intercept_errors on;
    error_page 404 /404/;
 }
}
```

Then, if you're using Hugo, create `content/404.md` with the contents of
your 404 page. In the event of [a missing page](/this-page-does-not-exist), the user will be handed the content
of this 404 page, and receive
an `HTTP 404 Not Found` header in response, so search engines will do the right
thing, and it's way better than the blank `Cannot GET /this-page-does-not-exist`
page you get normally with Sandstorm static publishing.