Ubuntu : connect() to unix:/var/run/php5-fpm.sock failed (13: Permission denied) while connecting to upstream

Encountered a permission denied problem while setting up a server with Ubuntu + PageSpeed + Nginx + PHP5-FPM. From the log file, the error message is

2015/10/04 23:32:41 [crit] 5107#0: *6 connect() to unix:/var/run/php5-fpm.sock failed (13: Permission denied) while connecting to upstream, client: xx.xxx.xxx.xxx, server: xxxxxxxxx.com, request: "GET /info.php HTTP/1.1", upstream: "fastcgi://unix:/var/run/php5-fpm.sock:", host: "xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx"

Diagnostic :

ls -la /var/run/php5-fpm.sock

returns

srw-rw---- 1 www-data www-data 0 Oct 4 23:29 /var/run/php5-fpm.sock

and because php5-fpm will be used by Nginx with the user nginx instead of www-data. Therefore, the permission, owner and owner group need to be changed to nginx.

For PHP5-FPM under Ubuntu, modify the /etc/php5/fpm/pool.d/www.conf file.

vi /etc/php5/fpm/pool.d# vi www.conf

change

 #user = www-data
 #group = www-data

 user = nginx
 group = nginx

and

 listen.owner = nginx
 listen.group = nginx
 listen.mode = 0660

NOTE : IF you just change the /var/run/php5-fpm.sock file with the chmod 066 /var/run/php5-fpm.sock command. The problem will go away momentarily before coming back again. You need to change the /etc/php5/fpm/pool.d/www.conf file to have permanent effect.

IF your server does not have user nginx. Create one with the command below :

sudo adduser --system --no-create-home --disabled-login --disabled-password --group nginx

To test if the your php5-fpm is set correctly, go to your root directory and create a php file with this content :

 <?php
 phpinfo();
 ?>

Restart php5-fpm with

service php5-fpm restart

and point your browser to your server

http://your-server-address/info.php

and if everything goes well, you should see the PHP configuration information that looks like this.

Hope this helps!