Running tutor on a local LAN server

Tutor
1

I have successfully installed tutor on a headless, dedicated, non-gui Debian server box on my local LAN where I hope to trial Open EdX. I have also installed the the tutor management GUI on the server and can successfully access that from the browser on my normal (i.e. a separate client) machine.

I have started tutor on the server in local QuickStart mode, but don’t seem to be able to access it (neither CMS nor LMS) from my client machine.

Edited to add: I should clarify that I have so far only tried the ‘n’ option to the tutor QuickStart production installation answer as I am not ready to run a production environment.

My question is this: do I need to start tutor in production, dev, or local mode in order to be able to access it from a different machine on the same LAN?

Any hints or pointers to relevant material would be welcome.

2

I’m in the same situation, did you resolve the problem ?
I installed tutor in developpment (non-production), which is fully accessible from my server at the adress http://local.overhang.io but I can’t access it with my client machine with its IP address. I tried production mode, but it didn’t work either.

How can I make it accessible from my local network ?

3

Still waiting for a reply, though I only posted yesterday. :slight_smile:

4

Just taking a stab in the dark here, but I would try using an Nginx reverse proxy that directs the traffic to the internal name (local.overhang.io). If you can access Tutor using curl --head http://local.overhang.io from the server command line, then the reverse proxy should also work.

server {
    listen <port>;

    server_name <server_ip>;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://local.overhang.io;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    }
}
5

How about register your server in local host file /etc/hosts (linux) or C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts (windows)? Just replace 127.0.0.1 with your server IP.

127.0.0.1 studio.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 minio.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 discovery.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 notes.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 ecommerce.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 courses.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 preview.local.overhang.io
127.0.0.1 apps.local.overhang.io

6

Thanks for your suggestion.

The curl command works from the server’s command line, which leads me to my next question: is the nginx config file inside the docker container, or can I configure it in one of the yaml files user the .local tree?

7

I assume you’re referring to the client hosts file?

8

Good question. Tutor has commands to change the Nginx configurations. I don’t know if changing Nginx settings manually in .local will persist. Running quickstart will likely revert them.

I was thinking that you could install Nginx on the host and then use it as a reverse proxy to expose Tutor. The configuration is not complicated, but using it practically will take some work. One problem that I see you is how to access studio, notes, preview, etc. You’ll likely have to create a new site for each subdomain that uses a unique port (8080 for LMS, 8081 for CMS, etc.) because you lack a DNS service.

  1. Create the new site: nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/tutor-local
  2. Use the config that I listed above (change the port):
    server {
    listen <port>;

   # catch all; default
    server_name _;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://local.overhang.io;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    }
}
  3. Enable it, and then restart Nginx
    ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/tutor-local /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
9

This seems like a more straightforward solution for a limited number of machines accessing it.

10

OK. Thanks for your assistance. I’ll have to go away and ‘play’. :slight_smile:

11

You are right, I am refering to local host file. However I’ve another solution, tunneling port using ssh. From your desktop run ssh :

sudo ssh your_username@your_server -L80:127.0.0.1:80

and access it using http://local.overhang.io.

12

Thanks for that, too. :slight_smile:

13

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