NOTE: Instructions are only tested for CentOS 6.5. NOTE: Pretty much every step here requires root access.

Install the Shiny R package and Shiny server

The shiny R package can be installed directly in R via install.packages("shiny").

Download and install the Shiny server binary (link).

CentOS

wget https://download3.rstudio.org/centos5.9/x86_64/shiny-server-1.4.2.786-rh5-x86_64.rpm
sudo yum install --nogpgcheck shiny-server-1.4.2.786-rh5-x86_64.rpm

Ubuntu

NOTE: The additional gdebi dependence may be optional and dpkg may work just fine, but I haven't tested this out.

$ sudo apt-get install gdebi-core
$ wget https://download3.rstudio.org/ubuntu-12.04/x86_64/shiny-server-1.4.2.786-amd64.deb
$ sudo gdebi shiny-server-1.4.2.786-amd64.deb

Modify the shiny configuration file

The Shiny configuration file is located in /etc/shiny-server/shiny-server.conf. Comment out the entire file and add the following, replacing <username> with your user name and <location> with the URL location you want for your app. This will allow you to run Shiny apps from your web browser at https://your.server.edu/shiny/your-location

run as shiny;
server {
    listen 3838;
    location /<location>/ {
        run as <username>;
        site_dir /path/to/your/shiny/app;
        log_dir /var/log/shiny-server;
        directory_index on;
    }
}

For example, my configuration on the old test-pecan looks like this.

run as shiny;
server {
    listen 3838;
    location /ashiklom/ {
        run as ashiklom;
        site_dir /home/ashiklom/fs-data/pecan/shiny/;
        log_dir /var/log/shiny-server;
        directory_index on;
    }
}

...and I can access my Shiny apps at, for instance, https://test-pecan.bu.edu/shiny/ashiklom/workflowPlots.

You can add as many location <loc> { ... } fields as you would like.

run as shiny;
server {
    listen 3838;
    location /ashiklom/ {
        ...
    }
    location /bety/ {
        ...
    }
}

Set the httpd proxy

Create a file /etc/httpd/conf.d/shiny.conf containing the following proxy settings:

ProxyPass           /shiny/ http://localhost:3838/
ProxyPassReverse    /shiny/ http://localhost:3838/
RedirectMatch permanent ^/shiny$ /shiny/

Create a symbolic link to the shiny server service

sudo ln -s /opt/shiny-server/config/init.d/redhat/shiny-server /etc/init.d

Start the shiny server and restart httpd

sudo service shiny-server stop
sudo service shiny-server start
sudo service httpd restart

You can check that Shiny is running with service shiny-server status.

Troubleshooting

Refer to the log files for shiny (/var/log/shiny-server.log) and httpd (/var/log/httpd/error-log).

Shiny-CentOS