General OpenSSL Commands Generate a new private key and Certificate Signing Request openssl req -out CSR.csr -new -newkey. Generate a self-signed certificate (see How to Create and Install an Apache Self Signed Certificate. Generate a certificate signing request (CSR) for an existing private. Mar 30, 2015 Type the following command in an open terminal window on your computer to generate your private key using SSL: $ openssl genrsa -out /path/to/wwwservercom.key 2048 This will invoke OpenSSL, instruct it to generate an RSA private key using the DES3 cipher, and send it as an output to a file in the same directory where you ran the command.
Before you can install a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate, you must first generate a certificate signing request (CSR). You can do this by using one of the following methods:
The following sections describe how to use OpenSSL to generate a CSR for a single host name. If you want to generate a CSR for multiple host names, we recommend using the Cloud Control Panel or the MyRackspace Portal.
Check whether OpenSSL is installed by using the following command:
CentOS® and Red Hat® Enterprise Linux®
The following output provides an example of what the command returns:
Debian® and the Ubuntu® operating system
The following output provides an example of what the command returns:
If the preceding packages are not returned, install OpenSSL by running the following command:
CentOS and Red Hat
Debian and the Ubuntu operating system
Run the following commands to create a directory in which to store your RSA key, substituting a directory name of your choice:
Run the following command to generate a private key:
Run the following command to create a CSR with the RSA private key (output is in Privacy-Enhanced Mail (PEM) format):
When prompted, enter the necessary information for creating a CSR by using the conventions shown in the following table.
Note: You cannot use the following characters in the Organization Name or Organizational Unit fields: < > ~ ! @ # $ % ^ * / ( ) ? . , &
Field | Explanation | Example |
---|---|---|
Common Name | The fully qualified domain name to which the certificate applies. The domain names example.com and www.example.com are distinct from each other, so be sure to submit your request for the right domain. If you are purchasing a wildcard certificate, use *.example.com. | example.com |
Organization Name | The exact legal name of your organization. The Certificate Authority (CA) might seek to confirm that your organization is real and legally registered, so don’t abbreviate words that aren’t abbreviated in the organization’s legal name. | Example Inc. |
Organizational Unit | The branch of your organization that is making the request. | Marketing |
City/locality | The city where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the city name. | San Antonio |
State/province | The state or province where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the state or province name. | Texas |
Country/region | The two-letter International Standards Organization (ISO) abbreviation for your country. | US |
Warning: Leave the challenge password blank (press Enter).
Run the following command to verify your CSR:
After you have verified your CSR, you can submit it to a CA to purchase an SSL certificate.
Use the following steps to generate a CSR by using Windows IIS Manager:
Note: The following steps are for IIS 8 or IIS 8.5 on Windows Server 2012.
In the Request Certificate wizard, on the Distinguished Name Properties page, enter the following information and then click Next.
Field | Explanation | Example |
---|---|---|
Common Name | The fully qualified domain name to which the certificate applies. The domain names example.com and www.example.com are distinct from each other, so be sure to submit your request for the right domain. If you are purchasing a wildcard certificate, use *.example.com. | example.com |
Organization Name | The exact legal name of your organization. The CA might seek to confirm that your organization is real and legally registered, so don’t abbreviate words that aren’t abbreviated in the organization’s legal name. | Example Inc. |
Organizational Unit | The branch of your organization that is making the request. | Marketing |
City/locality | The city where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the city name. | San Antonio |
State/province | The state or province where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the state or province name. | Texas |
Country/region | The two-letter ISO abbreviation for your country. | US |
On the Cryptographic Server Provider Properties page, enter the following information and then click Next.
After you have generated the CSR, you can submit it to a CA to purchase an SSL certificate.
Rackspace provides the CSR Generator for generating a CSR. The CSR Generator shows you the CSRs that you currently have and lets you create new CSRs with a simple form. After you have entered your details, the generator combines them with your private key so that you can submit the combined encoded information to a CA.
When you are done with the generator, you can return to the Cloud Control Panel by clicking any of the links in the top navigation or by going to login.rackspace.com and selecting Rackspace Cloud from the drop-down product menu in the top navigation bar.
Access the CSR Generator directly or through the Control Panel by using the following steps:
The generator lists your existing CSRs, if you have any, organized by domain name.
Click Create CSR.
Enter the following information, which will be associated with the CSR:
Field | Explanation | Example |
---|---|---|
Domain Name | The fully qualified domain name to which the certificate applies. The domain names example.com and www.example.com are distinct from each other, so be sure to submit your request for the right domain. If you want to secure both domains, you can use the Alt Names field. If you are purchasing a wildcard certificate, use *.example.com. | example.com |
Alt Names | (Optional) Additional domains that you want to add to the request. Each CA treats these differently, and the CA might charge for additional names. You can submit a comma-separated list. | www.example.com, secure.example.com |
Email Address | (Optional) A contact email address for the certificate. | [email protected] |
Organization Name | The exact legal name of your organization. The CA might seek to confirm that your organization is real and legally registered, so don’t abbreviate words that aren’t abbreviated in the organization’s legal name. | Example Inc. |
Organizational Unit | (Optional) The branch of your organization that is making the request. | Marketing |
City | The city where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the city name. | San Antonio |
State or Province | The state or province where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the state or province name. | Texas |
Country | Choose your country from the drop-down menu. The two-letter ISO abbreviation for your country is included in the CSR. | United States |
Private Key Bit Length | Key sizes smaller than 2048 are considered insecure and might not be accepted by a CA. | 1024,2048,4096 |
Hashing Algorithm | Both algorithms are currently trusted in mainstream browsers and offer industry recommended security. SHA-512 requires additional CPU processing. | SHA-256, SHA-512 |
Note: You cannot use the following characters in the Organization Name or Organizational Unit fields: < > ~ ! @ # $ % ^ * / ( ) ? . , &
After you have entered all the required information, click Create CSR.
It can take between 5 and 60 seconds for the CSR to be generated. You might need to refresh the page that displays your CSRs before the new CSR is listed.
When CSR has been generated, you can click its UUID (unique identifier) in the CSR list to view its details screen.
This screen displays the information that you provided, the text of the CSR, and its associated private key.
The text in the Certificate Request field is the CSR. It contains encoded details of the CSR and your public key.
To request your SSL certificate, copy the Certificate Request text and submit it to your CA. Include all the text, including the BEGIN and END lines at the beginning and end of the text block.
Copy the private key to the server that will host the certificate. See your application documentation to determine where to install the private key and certificate on your server.
If you are a Managed or Dedicated customer, you can request a CSR through the MyRackspace Portal by using the following steps:
Enter the following information in the Ticket Details section:
Field | Explanation | Example |
---|---|---|
Device(s) | The server or servers for which you want to generate a CSR. Use the drop-down menu to select your servers. | |
Common Name | The fully qualified domain name to which the certificate applies. The domain names example.com and www.example.com are distinct from each other, so be sure to submit your request for the right domain. If you want to secure both domains, you can use the Alt Names field. If you are purchasing a wildcard certificate, use *.example.com. | example.com |
Alt. Names | (Optional) Additional domains that you want to add to the request. Each CA treats these differently, and the CA might charge for additional names. You can submit a comma-separated list. | www.example.com, secure.example.com |
Email Address | (Optional) A contact email address for the certificate. | [email protected] |
Organization | The exact legal name of your organization. The CA might seek to confirm that your organization is real and legally registered, so don’t abbreviate words that aren’t abbreviated in the organization’s legal name. | Example Inc. |
Organizational Unit | (Optional) The branch of your organization that is making the request. | Marketing |
Locality (City) | The city where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the city name. | San Antonio |
State or Province Name | The state or province where your organization is legally located. Do not abbreviate the state or province name. | Texas |
Country | Choose your country from the drop-down menu. The two-letter ISO abbreviation for your country is included in the CSR. | United States |
Note: The bit length is automatically set to 2048.
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OpenSSL is a CLI (Command Line Tool) which can be used to secure the server to generate public key infrastructure (PKI) and HTTPS. This article helps you as a quick reference to understand OpenSSL commands which are very useful in common, and for everyday scenarios especially for system administrators.
If we want to obtain SSL certificate from a certificate authority (CA), we must generate a certificate signing request (CSR). A CSR consists of mainly the public key of a key pair, and some additional information. Both these components are merged into the certificate whenever we are signing for the CSR.
While generating a CSR, the system will prompt for information regarding the certificate and this information is called as Distinguished Name (DN). The important field in the DN is the Common Name (CN) which should be the FQND (Fully Qualified Domain Name) of the server or the host where we intend to use the certificate with.
The next item in a DN is to provide the additional information about our business or organization. If we purchase an SSL certificate from a certificate authority (CA), it is very important and required that these additional fields like “Organization” should reflect your organization for details.
Here is a general example for the CSR information prompt, when we run the OpenSSL command to generate the CSR.
We can also provide the information by non-interactive answers for the CSR information generation, we can do this by adding the –subj option to any OpenSSL commands that we try to generate or run.
Below is an example for the –subj option where we can provide the information of the organization where we want to use this CSR.
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In this section, we will cover about OpenSSL commands which are related to generating the CSR. This CSR can be used to request an SSL certificate from a certificate authority.
If we want to use HTTPS (HTTP over TLS) to secure the Apache or Nginx web servers (using a Certificate Authority (CA) to issue the SSL certificate). Also, the ‘.CSR’ which we will be generating has to be sent to a CA for requesting the certificate for obtaining CA-signed SSL.
Below is the command to create a 2048-bit private key for ‘domain.key’ and a CSR ‘domain.csr’ from the scratch.
The ‘–newkey rsa:2048’ is the option which we are specifying that the key should be 2048-bit using the RSA algorithm. The ’ –nodes’ option is to specifying that the private key should not be encrypted with a pass phrase. The ‘-new’ option, indicates that a CSR is being generated.
Here we will learn about, how to generate a CSR for which you have the private key.
Below is the command to create a new .csr file based on the private key which we already have.
Here we can generate or renew an existing certificate where we miss the CSR file due to some reason. Here, the CSR will extract the information using the .CRT file which we have.
Below is the example for generating –
Where -x509toreq is specified that we are using the x509 certificate files to make a CSR.
Here we will generate the Certificate to secure the web server where we use the self-signed certificate to use for development and testing purpose.
Here, we generate self-signed certificate using –x509 option, we can generate certificates with a validity of 365 days using –days 365 and a temporary .CSR files are generated using the above information.
Please note that, CSR files are encoded with .PEM format (which is not readable by the humans). This is required to view a certificate. In this section, we can cover the OpenSSL commands which are encoded with .PEM files.
The below command will be used to view the contents of the .CRT files Ex (domain.crt) in the plain text format.
In this section, will see how to use OpenSSL commands that are specific to creating and verifying the private keys.
Below is the command to create a password-protected and, 2048-bit encrypted private key file (ex. domain.key) –
Enter a password when prompted to complete the process.
Below is the command to check that a private key which we have generated (ex: domain.key) is a valid key or not
If the private key is encrypted, you will be prompted to enter the pass phrase. Upon the successful entry, the unencrypted key will be the output on the terminal.
In this article, we have learnt some commands and usage of OpenSSL commands which deals with SSL certificates where the OpenSSL has lots of features. We will learn more features and usage in the future. I hope this article will help us to understand some basic features of the OpenSSL.