Custom reverse proxy

If you want to run Bitcart on a server which already has a reverse proxy (nginx, caddy) running, this usecase is supported as well!

There are a few approaches to running multiple services on one server. For ease of use and proper configuration we recommend Caddy.

Using TLS forwarding (recommended)

This approach requires you to use Caddy with external modules. We will be running caddy in docker for this.

We provide a ready docker image bitcart/caddy. Docker is installed as part of Bitcart install.

Configure Bitcart for reverse proxy

Follow the docker deployment guide, but first time, instead of ./setup.sh, run:

./setup.sh --preset proxied

If you run behind Cloudflare, use the following preset:

./setup.sh --preset cloudflare-proxied

Configure caddy

Prepare caddy directory:

mkdir -p /opt/caddy
cd /opt/caddy

Create docker-compose.yml:

services:
  caddy:
    image: bitcart/caddy:2
    container_name: caddy
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
      - "443:443/udp"
    volumes:
      - ./conf:/etc/caddy
      - ./site:/srv
      - caddy_data:/data
      - caddy_config:/config
    extra_hosts:
      - "host.docker.internal:host-gateway"

volumes:
  caddy_data:
  caddy_config:

Run docker compose up -d to start caddy. Ensure you have stopped all other reverse proxies. Caddy can be easily configured to replace other reverse proxies and host all your sites.

Two folders will be created: site will be the /srv directory inside Caddy container, where you can put your static sites, and conf is /etc/caddy inside our container, where Caddyfile is located.

Now, create the following Caddyfile in conf directory:

(logging) {
	log {
		output stdout
		format console
	}
}

{
	log {
		output stderr
		format console
	}

	servers :443 {
		listener_wrappers {
			layer4 {
				@bitcart tls sni bitcart.yourdomain.tld
				route @bitcart {
					proxy host.docker.internal:10083 {
						proxy_protocol v2
					}
				}
			}
			tls
		}
		# if running behind cloudflare, uncomment this
		# trusted_proxies cloudflare
    # client_ip_headers X-Forwarded-For
	}
}

http://bitcart.yourdomain.tld {
	@wellknown path /.well-known/*
	handle @wellknown {
		reverse_proxy host.docker.internal:10080
	}

	handle {
		redir https://{host}{uri} permanent
	}
}

otherservice.yourdomain.tld {
	import logging
	tls
	respond "your ip: {client_ip}"
}

Ensure to replace bitcart.yourdomain.tld with your actual domain running bitcart

Caddy will not start if you don't configure at least one domain besides the Bitcart one. Make sure to set up your other website(s) in the Caddyfile (like the otherservice.yourdomain.tld block in the example above) before starting Caddy.

Restart caddy:

docker compose down && docker compose up -d

Now everything should work automatically!

Your client ip will be properly determined, and bitcart nginx will handle SSL certificates instead of Caddy. For other apps hosted on the same server, use host.docker.internal to access localhost of your machine.

You can also add caddy to custom docker networks to access other services by container name, for example:

services:
  caddy:
    ...
    networks:
      - default
      - forgejo_default

...

networks:
  forgejo_default:
    external: true