Fancy Index

Install

Make sure you have the official nginx.org repository configured first. These packages require nginx from nginx.org, not the distro-bundled version.

Add the Blendbyte repository if you haven't already:

sudo install -d -m 0755 /etc/apt/keyrings

curl -fsSL https://apt.blendbyte.net/nginx/blendbyte-archive-keyring.gpg \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/blendbyte.gpg >/dev/null

echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/blendbyte.gpg] https://apt.blendbyte.net/nginx $(lsb_release -cs) main" \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/blendbyte.list

sudo apt update

Then install this module:

$ sudo apt install nginx-module-fancyindex

Most modules auto-enable on install. If yours didn't, enable it manually:

$ sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/modules-available/50-mod-fancyindex.conf \
  /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/
$ sudo nginx -t && sudo systemctl reload nginx

What it does

Nginx's built-in autoindex generates functional but visually unimpressive directory listings. Fancyindex replaces that with a fully configurable output: inject custom HTML headers and footers (local files or upstream-served), apply CSS themes, control column sorting behaviour, configure size display format (bytes vs KB/MB), show or hide dotfiles, adjust symlink display. Header and footer files can reference the current directory path via template variables. Useful for public file mirrors, internal release archives, software distribution endpoints, or anywhere you're sharing files and want it to look like you actually tried.

When to use it

• Public file distribution servers with consistent branding
• Internal software release archives with readable layouts
• Download portals with custom headers, footers, and CSS themes
• Asset mirrors that need to look more polished than the default

Configuration

A starting-point configuration. Adjust to your setup.

location /files/ {
  root              /var/www;
  fancyindex        on;
  fancyindex_exact_size off;    # KB/MB instead of bytes
  fancyindex_localtime  on;     # local timestamps

  # Optional custom header/footer HTML files
  # fancyindex_header /fancyindex-header.html;
  # fancyindex_footer /fancyindex-footer.html;
}

# If you were using Sury, this upgrades in place:
sudo apt install nginx-module-fancyindex

Upstream project

This module is packaged from the upstream open-source project. Bug reports about module behaviour (not packaging) should go upstream.

https://github.com/aperezdc/ngx-fancyindex ↗