Caddy Web Server

Caddy offers simple, easy-to-manage configuration with automatic HTTPS, making secure hosting straightforward. It’s lightweight and well-suited for home servers, helping me focus on learning without complex setup.

1. Installing and Configuring Caddy on Ubuntu Server

1.1. Install Caddy

First, you’ll need to install Caddy. Follow the official instructions for your Linux distribution. For Ubuntu, you can use these commands:

sudo apt install -y debian-keyring debian-archive-keyring apt-transport-https
curl -1sLf 'https://dl.cloudsmith.io/public/caddy/stable/gpg.key' | sudo tee /usr/share/keyrings/caddy-stable-archive-keyring.gpg
curl -1sLf 'https://dl.cloudsmith.io/public/caddy/stable/debian.deb.txt' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/caddy-stable.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt install caddy

1.2. Basic Caddyfile Setup

Now, let’s configure Caddy to serve your Astro site and enable automatic HTTPS. Edit the Caddyfile located at /etc/caddy/Caddyfile. Make sure to replace pablolebed.dev with your actual domain and /home/admin/portfolio/dist with the correct path to your Astro project’s dist directory.

# Redirect HTTP to HTTPS for your domain
http://pablolebed.dev, http://www.pablolebed.dev {
    redir https://pablolebed.dev{uri}
    bind 0.0.0.0
}

# Serve your Astro site securely over HTTPS
https://pablolebed.dev, https://www.pablolebed.dev {
    root * /home/pablo/portfolio/dist
    file_server
    encode gzip
    tls contact@pablolebed.dev # Important: Use your actual email for TLS certificate registration
    bind 0.0.0.0
}

1.3. Reload Caddy

After you’ve made changes to your Caddyfile, you’ll need to reload the Caddy service for them to take effect:

sudo systemctl reload caddy

2. Network Configuration

2.1. Firewall Setup

To allow Caddy to serve your website, you need to open ports 80 (HTTP) and 443 (HTTPS) on your server’s firewall. If you’re using ufw, here’s how:

sudo ufw allow 80
sudo ufw allow 443

2.2. Router Port Forwarding

If your server is behind a router (common in home setups), you must configure your router to forward incoming traffic on ports 80 and 443 to your server’s internal IP address. Consult your router’s manual for specific instructions on how to do this.

3. DNS Setup

You need to point your domain’s A record (e.g., pablolebed.dev and www.pablolebed.dev) to your server’s public IP address. For instance, if your server’s IP is 2.50.34.108, your DNS configuration should reflect this.

4. TLS Certificate and HTTPS

One of Caddy’s best features is its automatic handling of TLS certificates. It obtains and renews certificates from Let’s Encrypt automatically, ensuring your site is always served securely over HTTPS. This process works smoothly when:

• Your domain’s A record correctly points to your server’s public IP address.
• Ports 80 (HTTP) and 443 (HTTPS) on your server are publicly accessible.

If you encounter any issues with certificates or connections, you can check Caddy’s logs for insights:

sudo journalctl -u caddy -f

5. Potential problems

Caddy Could Not Serve the Site Files

• Symptom:
  When trying to access the website, the browser showed connection refused or empty responses despite Caddy running.

• Cause:
  Caddy was configured to serve the website from a directory (root * /home/admin/portfolio/dist) that either:

  • Did not exist yet (no built files),
  • Or had incorrect permissions preventing Caddy from reading the files,
  • Or the Astro build (dist folder) was missing or outdated on the server.

Solution:

1. Build the Astro project locally to generate the dist/ folder with static files.

2. Push the built files (including dist/) to GitHub so the server can pull them.

3. On the server:

   • Pull the latest changes from GitHub.
   • Run npm install and npm run build to regenerate the dist/ folder if needed.
   • Verify that the dist/ folder exists and contains the static files.
   • Check and fix permissions so Caddy can read the files (e.g., owned by the Caddy user or readable by others).

4. Reload Caddy to apply the configuration.

5. Test the site again to confirm Caddy can serve the files properly.

This resolved the issue, enabling Caddy to serve the static Astro site successfully.