Jenkins in an awesome integration server, that can be used for free. However, having it on a non-standard www port, without a SSL, might be a problem. Accessing it from a public network might create a security threat. If you've got a Apache in front of your server, you can easily provide a secured proxy to Jenkins.
To do so, you need to create a VirtualHost for Apache, which will contain both: Proxy and SSL. Also it would be wise, to redirect standard HTTP requests.
VirtualHost to redirect from HTTP to HTTPS
So, first lets create our HTTP VirtualHost and let's redirect it to HTTPS version:
<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName jenkins.my.domain
ServerAlias www.jenkins.my.domain
RewriteEngine on
ReWriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} !^443$
RewriteRule ^/(.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}/$1 [NC,R,L]
</VirtualHost>
SSL keys
To get things started, we will need a key. To generate it, follow given steps (as root):
sudo su # or any other way to be a root
cd /etc/apache2/
mkdir ssl
cd ssl/
mkdir crt
mkdir key
openssl req -new -x509 -days 365 -keyout key/jenkins.key -out crt/jenkins.crt -nodes -subj '/O=Jenkins/OU=Jenkins/CN=jenkins.my.domain'
Just remember to replace all the domain references from "jenkins.my.domain" to an appropriate one. After you execute the above commands, you should have a ssl key and ssl cert generated.
Installing Apache necessary mods
To create a SSL Proxy pass we need to install some Apache mods (still as a root):
a2enmod proxy
a2enmod proxy_http
a2enmod rewrite
a2enmod ssl
/etc/init.d/apache2 restart
HTTPS Jenkins Virtual Host
And finally, the virtual host for secured Jenkins proxy pass:
<VirtualHost *:443>
ServerName jenkins.my.domain
ServerAlias www.jenkins.my.domain
SSLEngine On
SSLCertificateFile /etc/apache2/ssl/crt/jenkins.my.domain.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/apache2/ssl/key/jenkins.my.domain.key
ProxyRequests Off
ProxyPass / http://localhost:8080/
ProxyPassReverse / http://localhost:8080/
ProxyPassReverse / http://my.jenkins.host/
<Proxy http://localhost:8080/*>
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
</Proxy>
ProxyPreserveHost on
</VirtualHost>
