conditional within an "if" in Nginx

Using so many ‘if’ is bad practice and in most case means misunderstanding of nginx way configuration, the real power of nginx.

1. Regarding if ($request_uri = /) {}

Writing such statement means you do not understand nginx ‘location’ directive. Location is already optimized for checking $request_uri againt expressions. It works faster and safer.

So your statement can be replaced with more proper location = / { }

2. Regarding other ‘if’ - in most cases it can be reduced with nginx ‘map’. This statement:

---

if ($host ~* zencocoon.com) { set $test “${test}+zencocoon.com”; }

if ($http_cookie !~* "auth_token") {
  set $test  "${test}+no_auth_token";
}

if ($test = "root+zencocoon.com+no_auth_token") {
  proxy_pass http://www.zencocoon.com;
  break;
}

---

Can be rewritten with

map “$hostname:$http_cookie” $pass_to_proxy { default 0; “~*zencocoon.com:?!auth_token” 1; }

if ($pass_to_proxy) { proxy_pass http://www.zencocoon.com; break; }

It’s more short, safe, elegant and nginx-way.

You can also use something like:

    if ($request_uri = /) {
      set $test "root";
    }

    if ($host ~* zencocoon.com) {
      set $test  "${test}+zencocoon.com";
    }

    if ($http_cookie !~* "auth_token") {
      set $test  "${test}+no_auth_token";
    }

    if ($test = "root+zencocoon.com+no_auth_token") {
      proxy_pass http://www.zencocoon.com;
      break;
    }

Taken from https://gist.github.com/jrom/1760790

http://rosslawley.co.uk/archive/old/2010/01/04/nginx-how-to-multiple-if-statements/