Managing Certificates

This chapter contains the following sections:

Managing SSL Certificates

This section describes how to generate a Self-Signed certificate and Certificate Signing Request (CSR) that can be used to obtain SSL certificates from a Certificate Authority such as VeriSign, Digicert, and so on It also provides instructions to import the generated Self-Signed certificate or CA certificate in Cisco UCS Director.

Generating Self-Signed Certificates and Certificate Signing Requests

When you generate a self-signed certificate, a new self-signed certificate in PEM format and a Certificate Signing Request (CSR) file are created in the opt/certs/ directory. When generating a self-signed certificate, clicking enter will select the default option. For example, if you do not specify a domain name, the shell admin by default chooses the domain name of the appliance that is configured.

You can generate a self-signed certificate and a CSR using the Generate Self-Signed Certificate and Certificate Signing Request option.

    Step 1   From the Cisco UCS Director Shell menu, choose the Generate Self-Signed Certificate and Certificate Signing Request and press Enter.
    The following information is displayed:
    Domain Name [localdom]:
    Step 2   Enter the domain name and press Enter.

    By default the shell menu selects the domain name of the local appliance that is configured.

    The following information is displayed:

    How many days is self-signed certificate valid for? [365]:
    Step 3   Enter the number of days that you want the self-signed certificate to be valid for and press Enter.

    The following information is displayed:

    Generating a 2048 bit RSA private key
    writing new private key to 'opt/certs/localdom.key'
    ------
    You are about to be asked to enter information that will be incorporated
    into your certificate request.
    What you are about to enter is what is called a Distinguished Name or DN.
    There are quite a few fields but you can leave some blank.
    For some fields there will be a default value,
    If you enter '.', the field will be left blank.
    ------
    Country Name (2 letter code) [GB]:
    State or Province Name (full name) [Berkshire]:
    Locality Name (eg, city) [Newbury]:
    Organization Name (eg, company) [My Company Ltd]:
    Organizational Unit Name (eg, section) []:
    Common Name (eg, your name or your server's hostname) []:
    Email Address []:
    
    Step 4   Enter the country name, state or province name, locality name, organization name, organizational unit name, common name, and email address, and press Enter.

    The following information is displayed:

    Please enter the following 'extra' attributes
    to be sent with your certificate request
    A challenge password []:
    An optional company name:
    Step 5   (Optional) Enter a challenge password and an optional company name, and press Enter.

    The following information is displayed:

    Writing new CSR (Certificate Signing Request) to /opt/certs/localdom.csr.
    Use the CSR to obtain a certificate in PEM format from a CA (Certificate Authority).
    
    Writing new self-signed certificate in PEM format to opt/certs/localdom.pem.
    
    Press return to continue ...

    Importing Certification Authority or Self-Signed Certificates

    You can either import the generated self-signed certificate or import a certificate generated by another system or third party by copying .pem and .key (private key) files to the /opt/certs/ directory. The shell admin will automatically discover the .pem and .key files for the given domain in the /opt/certs/ directory. The .pem file provided is exported into PKCS12 format, and then converted to JKS format. The JKS file can be imported into Tomcat.

    You can import a CA signed certificate or self-signed certificate using the Importing CA/Self-Signed Certificate option.


      Step 1   From the Cisco UCS Director Shell menu, choose the Importing CA/Self-Signed Certificate option and press Enter.

      The following information is displayed:

      Domain Name [localdom]:
      Step 2   Enter the domain name and press Enter.

      By default the shell menu selects the domain name of the local appliance that is configured.

      The following information is displayed:

      Enter CA/self-signed certificate [/opt/certs/localdom.pem]:
      Step 3   Enter the path to the CA signed certificate or self-signed certificate, and press Enter.

      The following information is displayed:

      Enter private key [/opt/certs/localdom.key]:
      Step 4   Enter the path to the private key and press Enter.

      The following information is displayed:

      Enter keystore password:
      Step 5   Enter the Java KeyStore (JKS) password and press Enter.

      Information similar to the following is displayed

      Exporting /opt/certs/localdom.pem to PKCS12 format....
      
      Converting PKCS12 to JKS format...
      
      Importing /opt/certs/keystore.jks into tomcat for secured access to UCSD UI using HTTPS.
      
      Certificate /opt/certs/keystore.jks imported to tomcat succesfully.
      
      Do you want to import the certificate file:///opt/certs/localdom.pem into WebProxy for secured access to VM console through VNC [y/n]?:
      Step 6   Enter y and press Enter to import the certificate file into WebProxy for secured access to the VM console through VNC.

      The following information is displayed:

      Certificate file:///opt/certs/localdom.pem imported to WebProxy succesfully.
      Press return to continue ...