Create Local SSL Certificate (Untrusted)

For debugging and testing, setting up a local SSL certificate on a staging system can be useful for various scenarios:

  • Copy and paste nodes between streams (available only when SSL is activated)

  • Export and import streams without needing to adjust potential HTTPS endpoints

  • Use encrypted communication for secure data transfer

Note: The drawback is that the certificate won't be trusted by a root authority.

Prerequisites

  • IP Address of your Helmut4 VM/Machine: 172.16.189.133

  • DNS Name: fusion-helmut

  • Access to modify local hosts configuration

Create certificate on server

  • Establish an SSH connection to the Helmut4 server: 

    # Ensure OpenSSL is installed/available
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install openssl -y

  • Create a private RSA key: 

    openssl genrsa -out server.key 2048

  • Generate a Certificate Signing Request (CSR) using the key: 

    openssl req -new -key server.key -out server.csr

    During this process, you'll be prompted to enter information about your organization. Make sure to enter fusion-helmut as the Common Name (CN) when prompted:

    • Country Name: Enter your two-letter country code (e.g., US).

    • State or Province Name: Enter your state or province name.

    • Locality Name: Enter your city.

    • Organization Name: Enter your organization’s name.

    • Organizational Unit Name: Enter your department.

    • Common Name: Enter fusion-helmut (this is important as it matches the DNS name).

    • Email Address: Enter your email address.

    You can leave the other fields (Challenge Password, etc.) blank.

  • Generate a self-signed certificate using the CSR:

openssl x509 -req -days 365 -in server.csr -signkey server.key -out server.crt

The certificate will be valid for 365 days.

Install and test the certificate

  • Copy the server.crt and server.key files into the /root/certs directory.

  • Verify the certificate with the following command:

cd /root/certs
openssl x509 -in server.crt -text -noout

Enabling https and link to certificates

Please refer to this documentation: Enable https mode

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