404 issue with Laravel 5.4.24 and Nginx 1.12 - php

Question

I've hit a wall while setting up a new localhost on windows 8. The setup was done with laragon (3.0.5) and is comprised of:
php 7.1.5
laravel 5.4.24
nginx 1.12.0
The config file for nginx is
server {
listen 8080;
server_name new_project.dev *.new_project.dev;
root "C:/lar/laragon/www/new_project/dir1/";
index index.html index.htm index.php;
location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php$is_args$args;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
fastcgi_pass php_upstream;
#fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock;
}
charset utf-8;
location = /favicon.ico { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
location = /robots.txt { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
location ~ /\.ht {
deny all;
}
}
in routes/web.php I have added the following route
Route::get('/foo', function () {
return 'Everything is awesome!';
});
I would expect when going to http://new_project.dev:8080/dir1/public/foo to see the string "Everything is awesome!", instead i get a 404 from nginx.
Absolutely any help will be more than appreciated.
---- UPDATE 1 ----
Again in routes/web.php there is the following route
Route::get('/', function () {
return 'You are on the home page.';
});
When I go to http://new_project.dev:8080/dir1/public/ I get a 200 and the expected string.

Answer 1

You are using Laragon's power but you destroyed it with wrong setting and wrong url.
Your setting must like this: (note the public/)
root "C:/lar/laragon/www/new_project/dir1/public/";
Now, your life is easier - this url should work:
http://new_project.dev:8080/foo

Answer 2

new_project/dir1/ is a part of your root directive and it must not be in request as all file and script searches are doing relative to it. Correct request is http://new_project.dev:8080/public/foo

Answer 3

With your current configuration I think this make work. I updated the try_files index.php location
server {
listen 8080;
server_name new_project.dev *.new_project.dev;
root "C:/lar/laragon/www/new_project/dir1/";
index index.html index.htm index.php;
location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ /public/index.php$is_args$args;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
fastcgi_pass php_upstream;
#fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock;
}
charset utf-8;
location = /favicon.ico { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
location = /robots.txt { access_log off; log_not_found off; }
location ~ /\.ht {
deny all;
}
}
Although I am not sure about your configuration, I would suggest you set your project root to the public folder instead of having to do /public. You would then leave the try_files from above as it once was.
Laravel Homestead is also a great choice for setting up a dev enviroment: https://laravel.com/docs/5.4/homestead