WP Super Cache + (optional) Domain-Mapping

Update: This article is updated for WordPress 3.5 multisite’s file-handling.

ee site create example.com --wpsubdir --wpsc

In this article, we will setup WordPress Multisite using subdomains with Nginx with added support for WP Super Cache Plugin.

If you haven’t created a WordPress Multisite network, please check this guide first.

Nginx Config

Below is recommended Nginx configuration.

server {
        ##DM - uncomment following line for domain mapping  
        #listen 80 default_server;
    server_name example.com *.example.com ;
    ##DM - uncomment following line for domain mapping
    #server_name_in_redirect off;

    access_log   /var/log/nginx/example.com.access.log;
    error_log    /var/log/nginx/example.com.error.log;

    root /var/www/example.com/htdocs;
    index index.php;

    if (!-e $request_filename) {
        rewrite /wp-admin$ $scheme://$host$uri/ permanent;  
        rewrite ^(/[^/]+)?(/wp-.*) $2 last;
        rewrite ^(/[^/]+)?(/.*\.php) $2 last;
    }

    set $cache_uri $request_uri;

    # POST requests and urls with a query string should always go to PHP
    if ($request_method = POST) {
        set $cache_uri 'NULL';
    }   
    if ($query_string != "") {
        set $cache_uri 'NULL';
    }   

    # Don't cache uris containing the following segments
    if ($request_uri ~* "(/wp-admin/|/xmlrpc.php|/wp-(app|cron|login|register|mail).php|wp-.*.php|/feed/|index.php|wp-comments-popup.php|wp-links-opml.php|wp-locations.php|sitemap(_index)?.xml|[a-z0-9_-]+-sitemap([0-9]+)?.xml)") {
        set $cache_uri 'NULL';
    }   

    # Don't use the cache for logged in users or recent commenters
    if ($http_cookie ~* "comment_author|wordpress_[a-f0-9]+|wp-postpass|wordpress_logged_in") {
        set $cache_uri 'NULL';
    }

    # Use cached or actual file if they exists, otherwise pass request to WordPress
    location / {
        try_files /wp-content/cache/supercache/$http_host/$cache_uri/index.html $uri $uri/ /index.php?$args ;
    }    

    location ~ \.php$ {
        try_files $uri =404;
        include fastcgi_params;
        fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
    }

    location ~* ^.+\.(ogg|ogv|svg|svgz|eot|otf|woff|mp4|ttf|rss|atom|jpg|jpeg|gif|png|ico|zip|tgz|gz|rar|bz2|doc|xls|exe|ppt|tar|mid|midi|wav|bmp|rtf)$ {
        access_log off; log_not_found off; expires max;
    }

    location = /robots.txt { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
    location ~ /\. { deny  all; access_log off; log_not_found off; }
}

Important Note:

WP Super Cache caching may conflict with plugins that uses query vars. WooCommerce is an example known plugin known to work with above configuration. Reason is following line: 

try_files /wp-content/cache/supercache/$http_host/$cache_uri/index.html $uri $uri/ /index.php$args ;

Change it as follow if you run into issues:

try_files /wp-content/cache/supercache/$http_host/$cache_uri/index.html $uri $uri/ /index.php ;

Domain Mapping

You need to uncomment few lines in above nginx-config to get domain-mapping working. Apart from above config changes, you can read this guide to setup/configure domain-mapping.

Must Read:

• Checklist For Perfect WordPress-Nginx Setup – It will help you verify if your caching will work after PHP/MySQL crash.
• Nginx Maps for Better Static File Handling in WordPress-Multisite – useful for multisite created before WordPress 3.5 released
• WordPress-Nginx tutorials