Adding an NGINX location block for cache exception, but it's giving me a 404 error.

Location still need to return the file itself.

location ~* loader\.js$ {
    add_header Cache-Control 'no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate, proxy-revalidate, max-age=0';
    if_modified_since off;
    expires off;
    root /your/site/folder/with/this/file/;
}

This will serve /loader.js, /whatever/loader.js so be careful. If you call loader always from root, you can use location = /loader.js

Heya,

an update on an older topic

The issue you’re encountering with the loader.js file returning a 404 error after adding the new location block for cache control in Nginx is likely because the new location block does not include instructions on how to handle the request for the file beyond setting the header. As a result, Nginx does not know where to find loader.js or what to do with the request.

To fix this, you need to ensure that the location block for loader.js not only sets the appropriate headers but also processes the request correctly, typically by including a try_files directive or a root/alias directive pointing to the location of the file on the filesystem. Here’s how you can adjust your configuration:

location ~* loader\.js$ {
    add_header Cache-Control "no-store";
    try_files $uri =404;  # Adjust this line as needed
}

In this revised block:

• add_header Cache-Control "no-store"; ensures that loader.js will not be cached.
• try_files $uri =404; tells Nginx to look for loader.js at the specified URI and return a 404 error if it is not found. This line might need to be adjusted depending on the actual location of loader.js in your project’s directory structure.

If loader.js is not in the root directory that the rest of your server block serves files from, you might need to use the alias directive to point to its location. For example:

location ~* loader\.js$ {
    add_header Cache-Control "no-store";
    alias /path/to/directory/;  # Path to the directory containing loader.js
}

Make sure you replace /path/to/directory/ with the actual directory path where loader.js is located.

After making these changes, don’t forget to test your Nginx configuration again with sudo nginx -t and reload Nginx with sudo systemctl reload nginx.

If you continue to experience issues, you may want to review other parts of your Nginx configuration to ensure there are no conflicts or missing directives related to the handling of JavaScript files or the specific path to loader.js.