This is every step, in detail, to create a Django App with Postgres, NGINX, Gunicorn, and HTTPS on Digital Ocean. The only thing I don't go over is how to create a droplet and manage the domain.

Step By Step Virtualenv, Django, Postgres, NGINX, Gunicorn, HTTPS on DigitalOcean

Reference:
Django/Postgres/Nginx/Gunicorn in Ubuntu: https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-set-up-django-with-postgres-nginx-and-gunicorn-on-ubuntu-16-04
Encryption: https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-secure-nginx-with-let-s-encrypt-on-ubuntu-16-04

Where you see "user", "myproject" and "myprojectuser" replace that with what is relevent to what you are working on.

User Setup

$ ssh root@SERVER_IP_ADDRESS
Complete login process
$ adduser demo - Creates new user
Complete new user process
$ gpasswd -a demo sudo - add new user to root group

Secure Server - SSH

$ cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub
Copy key to clipboard
$ su - demo - switch to new user
$ mkdir .ssh - create ssh dir in new user home
$ chmod 700 .ssh - make it accessable
$ vim .ssh/authorized_keys to create file
Paste key in file
$ chmod 600 .ssh/authorized_keys to restrict permissions
$ exit - to return to root
 $ vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config
 Change PermitRootLogin to no
 Change PasswordAuthentication to no
 $ sudo service ssh restart to restart ssh

Test that you can login with SSH and the new user in a new terminal window BEFORE you logout of the ROOT user

Secure Server - Basic Firewall

$ sudo ufw allow ssh - Allows SSH
$ sudo ufw allow 80/tcp - for HTTP
$ sudo ufw allow 443/tcp - for SSL
$ sudo ufw show added - to show what was changed
$ sudo ufw enable - enable firewall

Setup Timezone and NTP

$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
Set to timezone for local (or for choice)
$ sudo apt-get update - Because this is the first time you are running this it will be big
$ sudo apt-get install ntp

For Python 3

sudo apt-get install python3-pip libpq-dev postgresql postgresql-contrib nginx build-essential libssl-dev libffi-dev python3-dev python3-venv


Create Postgres DB and User

$ sudo su - postgres
$ psql - login to server
$ CREATE DATABASE myproject;
$ CREATE USER myprojectuser WITH PASSWORD 'password';
$ ALTER ROLE myprojectuser SET client_encoding TO 'utf8';
$ ALTER ROLE myprojectuser SET default_transaction_isolation TO 'read committed';
$ ALTER ROLE myprojectuser SET timezone TO 'UTC';
$ GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE myproject TO myprojectuser;
$ \q to quit
$ exit to exit

Setup VE

$ mkdir ~/envs to create dir
$ cd ~/envs to cd into the virtualenvs
$ python3 -m venv myproject
$ source myproject/bin/activate - to fire up the env

Create SSH key for Git

$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "your_email@example.com" 
$ eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
$ vim ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub - Copy the Key
Follow these instructions to add key to Github account: https://help.github.com/articles/adding-a-new-ssh-key-to-your-github-account/

Get project and install requirements

$ git clone git@github.com:youraccount/repo-name.git
$ cd projectname/
In case you don’t have your VE enabled, $workon vename
$ pip install -r requirements/base.txt - Obviously, this will depend on how you have your requirements setup
If error: sudo apt-get install python-dev sudo apt-get install libncurses5-dev
$ python manage.py check - to ensure everything is right
$ python manage.py migrate - to install DB
$ python manage.py createsuperuser - create superuser
$ python manage.py createcachetable - If applicable
$ gunicorn --bind 0.0.0.0:8000 production - to test the gunicorn setup

Create an Upstart Script
$ mkdir ~/run to create the dir where the sock file will live
$ sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/gunicorn.service

[Unit]
Description=gunicorn daemon
After=network.target

[Service]
User=dave
Group=www-data
WorkingDirectory=/home/dave/myproject
ExecStart=/home/dave/envs/myproject/bin/gunicorn --workers 3 --bind unix:/home/dave/run/myproject.sock production

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

$ sudo systemctl start gunicorn
$ sudo systemctl enable gunicorn

Configure NGINX

# sudo vim /etc/nginx/sites-available/myproject

server {
    listen 80;

    access_log /home/user/logs/nginx/nginx-access.log;
    error_log  /home/user/logs/nginx/nginx-error.log;

    client_max_body_size 4G;

    server_name domain_name_or_ip;

    root /home/user/myproject; 

    keepalive_timeout 5;

    location = /favicon.ico { access_log off; log_not_found off; }

    location /static {
        alias /home/user/myproject/static;
    }


    location /uploads {
        alias /home/user/myproject/uploads;
    }

    error_page 500 502 503 504 /500.html;
    location = /500.html {
        alias /home/user/myproject/templates;
    }

    location / {
        include proxy_params;
        proxy_pass http://unix:/home/user/myproject/project.sock;
    }
}

2. $ sudo mkdir -p ~/logs/nginx/
3. $ sudo nginx -t
4. $ sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/myproject /etc/nginx/sites-enabled
5. $ sudo systemctl restart nginx
7. $ sudo ufw allow 'Nginx Full'

SSL Certificate:

Just go here: https://certbot.eff.org/ and do what it says.

8. $ sudo systemctl restart nginx

You’re done!

Re: https://gist.github.com/davemerwin/75420b25ae8a975ec6916d5141eb39d4#file-step-by-step-virtualenv-django-postgres-nginx-gunicorn-https-on-digitalocean-L35-L39

Have you played with DO's built-in firewall? I tried it out this weekend and it worked really well for me. It prevents traffic from ever getting to your boxes with is a nice bonus.

Have you used certbot/SSL on an IP address? Or always on a named domain?