[Tfug] debian and nginx and rails

[christopher floess]

Hi all,

Sorry if some of this is hard to follow because it's pretty rails 
specific, but I didn't think it was inappropriate to ask, since it has 
to do with linux, and I just know this list :)

I've recently started to maintain the Debian servers at my job, and one 
of the things that I quickly noticed is that our installation of nginx 
is installed by Passenger.

That is, in order to get Passenger support in nginx, Passenger comes 
with a script to run that compiles and installs nginx in /opt. The thing 
that concerned me though, was that it's not registered in the package 
database as an installed package, which means some unsuspecting new 
intern could come along and install the package all over again because 
with apt-get (as was the case with me)

I know the argument can be made that the Passenger-installed version 
lives in the /opt directory and that by being isolated from the rest of 
the system, it's easy enough to uninstall it by simply deleting 
/opt/nginx . I like to keep things tidy though, and feel more at ease if 
I had a package install that has passenger support.

So, I've done exactly that. The deb has been compile and installed on a 
trial basis. It seems to work too :), and all I have to do is install 
officially now.

So here's my question(s): How would you other debian admins/veterans 
feel about this? Am I over-complicating this and should I maybe just let 
Passenger install nginx the way that it wants? Do any of you have 
Rails/Passenger specific experience here, that would advise me away from 
messing with the way that Passenger installed nginx?

Thanks in advance -- chris