2015-12-15

Getting trusted HTTPS on your site with letsencrypt

NOTICE The new script for Lets encrypt has been release which simplifies install and getting a cert, check out certbot.eff.org

If you haven't heard about Let's Encrypt yet, read up on their site. It is a new, free and automated Certificate Authority. This can easily be used to get HTTPS support on your site for free and with a small amount of work.

Note! The cert from lets encrypt is only valid for 90 days and needs to be renewed again after that.

Installing the lets encrypt wrapper script

Start with getting the lets encrypt script that will automate most of the process for us. Clone from github and show the command help:

sudo git clone https://github.com/letsencrypt/letsencrypt
cd letsencrypt
sudo -H ./letsencrypt-auto --help # will check and download all dependencies

Setup SSL with trusted Cert on Apache

Full Apache virtual host config files

Automatic (did not work for me)

Run the automatic script
sudo -H ./letsencrypt-auto --apache
Follow the onscreen guide to enter email, agree to terms of service and select domains
Done!

Manual steps (worked for me)

Stop your apache server, to free up port 80
sudo service apache2 stop
Run letsencrypt script which starts a standalone server and authorizes cert, set all domains that is going to be secured with this cert.
sudo -H ./letsencrypt-auto certonly --standalone -d hmazter.com -d www.hmazter.com
First time you are prompted to enter your email and agree to the terms of service
Edit apache virtual host config to include the cert created in previous step, the path to the files was outputted after successful creation. Mine was to /etc/letsencrypt/live/hmazter.com/ Add this to your SSL virtual host config file (running on port 443):
```
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /path/to/file/fullchain.pem
SSLCertificateKeyFile /path/to/file/privkey.pem
```
Make sure that apache is listening to port 443
Start apache
sudo service apache2 start
Done!

Redirecting traffic from http to https

Apache

If you want to redirect all traffic from http to https, which is a good thing to do if its possible for you. Then this can easily be achieved with apache Redirect directive. Add this to your HTTP virtual host: (but use your full https url)

Redirect permanent / https://www.hmazter.com/

hmazter.com

Web and application development