You can use something like this to handle project directories. $PROJECT_DIR=/srv/myproject semanage fcontext -a -t httpd_sys_content_t "$PROJECT_DIR(/.*)?" if [ -d "$PROJECT_DIR" ]; then restorecon -R "$PROJECT_DIR" fi Posted at Nginx Forum: http://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,254456,254497#msg-254497