[Bug]: Backup Web interface awaits potentially long time on HTTP response, causing timeout issues with proxies

[jeanas]

⚠️ This issue respects the following points: ⚠️

• This is a bug, not a question or a configuration/webserver/proxy issue.
• This issue is not already reported on Github OR Nextcloud Community Forum (I've searched it).
• Nextcloud Server is up to date. See Maintenance and Release Schedule for supported versions.
• I agree to follow Nextcloud's Code of Conduct.

Bug description

The Web interface for updating Nextcloud (at /updater/) seems to be performing an HTTP request to request the creation of the backup and keep the connection open until it receives a response that indicates backup success.

Unfortunately, backups can take a very long time (tens of minutes), and Web servers usually do not expect requests to stay alive that long. As a result, when Nextcloud is behind a reverse proxy like nginx, the default timeout of the proxy will probably shut down the connection before the backup is completed. For example, I get this on my instance (which serves Nextcloud with Apache as recommended in the docs, but behind nginx as a reverse proxy to distribute between services):

Steps to reproduce

1. Install Nextcloud behind nginx as reverse proxy and keep the default timeout.
2. Run the updater.

Expected behavior

I'm a doofus in Web development, but I guess the client should instead poll the server regularly to get the backup advancement status?

Nextcloud Server version

30

Operating system

Debian/Ubuntu

PHP engine version

PHP 8.2

Web server

Apache (supported)

Database engine version

MySQL

Is this bug present after an update or on a fresh install?

None

Are you using the Nextcloud Server Encryption module?

Encryption is Disabled

What user-backends are you using?

• Default user-backend (database)
• LDAP/ Active Directory
• SSO - SAML
• Other

Configuration report

{
    "system": {
        "passwordsalt": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "secret": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "trusted_domains": [
            "localhost",
            "cloud.abou-samra.fr"
        ],
        "trusted_proxies": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "datadirectory": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbtype": "mysql",
        "dbname": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbhost": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbport": "",
        "dbtableprefix": "oc_",
        "mysql.utf8mb4": true,
        "dbuser": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbpassword": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "version": "30.0.4.1",
        "installed": true,
        "instanceid": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "maintenance": false,
        "overwrite.cli.url": "https:\/\/cloud.abou-samra.fr",
        "htaccess.RewriteBase": "\/",
        "mail_domain": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_from_address": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtpmode": "smtp",
        "mail_smtphost": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtpport": 465,
        "mail_smtpsecure": "ssl",
        "mail_smtpauth": true,
        "mail_smtpname": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtppassword": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "default_phone_region": "FR",
        "theme": "",
        "loglevel": 2,
        "redis": {
            "host": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
            "port": 6379
        },
        "memcache.local": "\\OC\\Memcache\\APCu",
        "memcache.distributed": "\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis",
        "memcache.locking": "\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis",
        "maintenance_window_start": 1,
        "overwriteprotocol": "https",
        "updater.secret": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***"
    }
}

List of activated Apps

Enabled:
  - activity: 3.0.0
  - app_api: 4.0.3
  - bruteforcesettings: 3.0.0
  - calendar: 5.0.8
  - circles: 30.0.0
  - cloud_federation_api: 1.13.0
  - comments: 1.20.1
  - contacts: 6.1.3
  - contactsinteraction: 1.11.0
  - dashboard: 7.10.0
  - dav: 1.31.1
  - federatedfilesharing: 1.20.0
  - federation: 1.20.0
  - files: 2.2.0
  - files_downloadlimit: 3.0.0
  - files_pdfviewer: 3.0.0
  - files_reminders: 1.3.0
  - files_sharing: 1.22.0
  - files_trashbin: 1.20.1
  - files_versions: 1.23.0
  - firstrunwizard: 3.0.0
  - logreader: 3.0.0
  - lookup_server_connector: 1.18.0
  - nextcloud_announcements: 2.0.0
  - notes: 4.11.0
  - notifications: 3.0.0
  - oauth2: 1.18.1
  - password_policy: 2.0.0
  - photos: 3.0.2
  - privacy: 2.0.0
  - provisioning_api: 1.20.0
  - recommendations: 3.0.0
  - related_resources: 1.5.0
  - serverinfo: 2.0.0
  - settings: 1.13.0
  - sharebymail: 1.20.0
  - support: 2.0.0
  - survey_client: 2.0.0
  - systemtags: 1.20.0
  - text: 4.1.0
  - theming: 2.5.0
  - twofactor_backupcodes: 1.19.0
  - updatenotification: 1.20.0
  - user_status: 1.10.0
  - viewer: 3.0.0
  - weather_status: 1.10.0
  - webhook_listeners: 1.1.0-dev
  - workflowengine: 2.12.0
Disabled:
  - admin_audit: 1.20.0
  - encryption: 2.18.0
  - files_external: 1.22.0
  - suspicious_login: 8.0.0
  - twofactor_nextcloud_notification: 4.0.0
  - twofactor_totp: 12.0.0-dev
  - user_ldap: 1.21.0

Nextcloud Signing status

No errors have been found.

Nextcloud Logs

Additional info

No response

[joshtrichards]

This is mostly the result of #507 and addressed in #516 (which will be available as of v32.0.0).