How To Create Custom Share Links With NextCloud

I run a NextCloud instance and one of the little paper cuts that bug me is that I can’t create a custom link to a publicly accessible folder.

When a shared folder is created in the NextCloud file manager a random URL is created that has the following form:

https://example.comm/index.php/s/catTLcZxBbgSjXA

This is not easy to remember when I want to give out a link to a file I want to share.

I found an easy way to fix this so that https://example.comm/public will redirect to https://example.comm/index.php/s/catTLcZxBbgSjXA using Apache2’s mod_rewrite module.

The example here is for Apache2 but you will be able to do something similar with NGINX.

All you need to do is to open the VirtualHost file for your NextCloud instance and add the following lines

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule "^/public/?$" "https://example.com/index.php/s/catTLcZxBbgSjXA" [R]

This will redirect https://example.comm/public -> https://example.comm/index.php/s/catTLcZxBbgSjXA. You need to edit this to fit your requirements as your NextCloud share link will be different.

You need to put this in the correct location in your VirtualHost file. You can see it here in a full VirtualHost file:

<VirtualHost 1.2.3.4:443>
DocumentRoot /var/www/nextcloud
ServerName   example.com

<Directory /var/www/nextcloud/>
  Options +FollowSymlinks
  AllowOverride All

 <IfModule mod_dav.c>
  Dav off
 </IfModule>

 SetEnv HOME /var/www/nextcloud
 SetEnv HTTP_HOME /var/www/nextcloud

</Directory>

 SSLCertificateFile    /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem
 SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem
 Include               /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf

 CustomLog /var/log/apache2/example.com.access.log common
 ErrorLog  /var/log/apache2/example.com.error.log

 RewriteEngine on
 RewriteRule "^/public/?$" "https://example.com/index.php/s/catTLcZxBbgSjXA" [R]

</VirtualHost>

After you’ve added those lines restart Apache2:

systemctl restart apache2.service

And test it from an anomymous browser tab to avoid any cache issues.