Access VM webserver over internet

[Tidosho]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm looking for some help with virtual webservers, and accessing them over the internet. This is a big one, and quite technical, so I was trying to eye up @BudMan at the bar for this waving a pint at him, let's see if he bites. First off, some info about my server:

 

MB/CPU/RAM: SuperMicro X9DRL-iF MB, dual Xeon E5-2620 CPU's & 32GB ECC RAM

Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro full size tower case with dual Corsair watercoolers and case fans.

OS: Windows Server 2012 - configured as Active Directory and Apache server for domain "kitamuracomputers.net" with several subdomains.

System hostname: riku.kitamuracomputers.net

Network IP addressing: Manual/Static

Virtualisation Software: VirtualBox and VMWare Workstation 12 Pro

 

This beastly computer above, known as Riku, is the leading mechanical lady that powers my entire small computer repair business with her companion mirror backup server Cleo, they never miss a beat (reliable multitasking ladies lol), and I want to start using Riku for virtualisation, except I'm not as up-to-date with virtualisation as I should be, too busy running the business and looking after customers, and the servers. I know, I know, solutions not excuses, but oh well, abusing my own company oath! I'm the boss, I can be naughty now and again, it's in my geek blood

 

I can install OS'es and all that stuff, and set up VM's for access over the internet via RDP, and assign manual IP addresses to VM's. I'm not quite at the VMWare eSXi (is it still called that?!?) data farm stage lol, but I'm getting there and I love virtualization, it's so easy backing them up and snapshotting!

 

My issue

 

I want to set up virtual servers. Here's the steps I take:

 

1. Use either Linux or Windows in a VM, and install a LAMP or WAMP stack (fully securing it regards passwords and all that before web facing it, of course), giving it a static IP address and host name, in this case, "sarah.kitamuracomputers.net".

2. Create a basic website on the VM, testing the stack locally which works fine, also works outside the VM on the network.

3. Set up subdomain A records for the (example) name "sarah.kitamuracomputers.net" on both Active Directory on Riku and my domain registrar.

 

However, I can access the VM site perfectly on the internal network, but not over the internet, the main webpage for kitamuracomputers.net comes up (which is handled by the host webserver) instead of the one for the sarah.kitamuracomputers.net VM.

Riku herself is our main webserver for the domain, running Apache, PHP, MySQL and TomCat. She also handles subdomains via Virtual Hosts in Apache. This is where I think the problem lies. It's either a port issue (port 80 on both?) or either Active Directory or Apache VirtualHost isn't redirecting the requests properly. Apache on the host and the Apache on the VM seem to be conflicting somewhere, and I can't figure out where. All the guides on StackOverflow et-al assume the host doesn't have a server on it, which ours does.

 

The reason I ask all this is because we want to start a cloud service using OwnCloud, and a tutorial video system using ClipBucket for customer/staff use, but only Linux is supported as OS for both, so I will need to virtualize it as we don't want another machine running just to run this when our beasty leading electrical lady has all that power.

 

Am I getting the traffic direction right? Router -> Riku (Server) -> Active Directory/Apache -> VM?

 

From what I can see through research I need to set up RewriteRules because the host and guest are webservers? Our router has all the appropriate forwarding done. You're probably thinking I'm biting off too much, but I love a challenge, even an impossible one!

[+BudMan MVC]

You want to run a business running on workstation and virtualbox?  Those are type 1 hypervisors... Move to something a bit more stable and less resource hungry.. Esxi is still FREE.. Or if your windows show why not run hyper-v?  Or Xen even.. 

 

How many public IPs do you have to host this cloud service?  You can for sure point different fqdn to different boxes behind your public IP... But you would have to use a reverse proxy to do it..

 

What sort of bandwidth do you have to host a cloud business?

 

 

 

[Tidosho]

  On 18/12/2017 at 20:50, BudMan said:

You want to run a business running on workstation and virtualbox?  Those are type 1 hypervisors... Move to something a bit more stable and less resource hungry.. Esxi is still FREE.. Or if your windows show why not run hyper-v?  Or Xen even.. 

 

How many public IPs do you have to host this cloud service?  You can for sure point different fqdn to different boxes behind your public IP... But you would have to use a reverse proxy to do it..

 

What sort of bandwidth do you have to host a cloud business?

 

 

 

Expand  

It's not going to be a fully blown cloud business like OneDrive, just some free space for customers to store backups and personal stuff. We were going to use it as a promotional USP say "Have a repair with us and get 500GB free cloud space!" It also makes it easier for staff out on repair jobs to backup systems if they wash & wipe, we've had occurrences of external HDD & USB drives failing out on jobs, this is a failsafe.

 

As to bandwidth I'm not sure, but I know we can have it extended if need be. We have 1 static public IP. Reverse proxy, sounds familiar. How would I go about it in a VirtualHost?

[+BudMan MVC]

https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/howto/reverse_proxy.html