and upgrade to Nginx 1.26, will this break my existing Nginx configuration that’s working with Virtualmin? In other words, is it safe to switch to this newer Nginx version without losing my current Virtualmin site configs ?
Any advice or experience with this would be really helpful.
That’s a question about that specific nginx package. Has very little to do with Virtualmin (Virtualmin supports newer nginx versions).
But, the answer is probably.
Assuming that package leaves the config files in their usual locations, it should just restart after the upgrade with everything as it was before.
Virtualmin is not really involved in this question. Virtualmin manages the virtual hosts in the nginx config file, but it isn’t in the loop when you upgrade or change nginx package versions.
So, check to be sure that package uses all the standard locations for stuff. If it does, it’s probably fine. I assume you have good, tested, backups of everything.
For anyone who may encounter the same situation in the future, I’d recommend backing up your nginx.conf file before performing the upgrade.
When I upgraded to the latest version, my nginx.conf file was removed/replaced during the process. Fortunately, I had a backup and was able to restore it, which allowed the upgrade to complete without any issues.
So as always make sure to keep a copy of your existing configuration before upgrading.
Yeah, generally speaking any upgrade of a package will respect the existing config files if they have changed since the initial installation.
It’s a problem specific to the non-standard package being switched to, not a problem with the regular Alma Linux nginx package, so whoever maintains that module is who needs to address it.