Re: [cobalt-users] SSL setup - Jeff can you help :-)

[Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Ray Healy (Data Net Services)" wrote:

> Thanks for taking the time the other week to advise me in setting up SSL for
> all my virtual sites to use on my RAQ4. I have been away ill for the last
> few days so not been able to ask for your help again as I have confused
> myself.
> 
> I did not know whether to mail you off-list or not - can you let me know if
> you would rather me do that.

You may always contact me offlist; complete instructions, and even a
telephone number, are at the bottom of every one of my post.  I have
very low long-distance charges to the UK; just ask if you need me to
call you.

> Can I ask a really stupid question, how do I get the name
> secure.example.com - is this a sub domain of my main RAQ account which is
> www.matrixhosting.co.uk which has a self written certificate installed for
> use by the RAQ GUI.

I'm sure by now you've seen Rick's response.  Yes it's technically a
subdomain, but the RaQ doesn't set up subdomains any special way.  Rick
explained how to create the domain in his response.

You create a new hosting account in your RaQ, setting it up as hostname
"secure" instead of "www", and you create an A record for
secure.example.com, where example.com is the name of your domain.

> So do I just create a sub folder called secure.matrixhosting.co.uk using SSH
> and create the folders for each user as you instruct or do I create the
> folders under my main HOME site and substitute my self written cert for a
> paid one. The users would then use
> https://www.matrixhosting.co.uk/example2.com/

While you could do it that way, I wouldn't; the problem is you'd have to
maintain all those subdirectories underneath a working domain of yours.

I'd buy a cert for secure.matrixhosting.co.uk and install it on your
RaQ; then create subdirectories as:

"/home/sites/secure.matrixhosting.co.uk/web/example2.com/"

which would appear on the 'net as
"https://www.matrixhosting.co.uk/example2.com/";.  You can even change
httpd.conf to force secure connections.  Simply on price considerations,
I'd look at Comodo's instantssl (http://www.instantssl.com/) as a good
provider of low-priced certs.  You may become a dealer yourself if
you're going to resell certs, but if you just want one you can buy from
them, or a bit less expensive from us.

> If I am totally wrong and you do create a sub domain of
> secure.matrixhosting.co.uk do I need to alter and DNS records as I do not
> maintain these as present but I can get them altered if I need to.

All explained above.

> Basically are we talking about a totally new name or a derivative of my
> original domain name but the system is already aware or
> secure.matrixhosting.co.uk as it knows www.matrixhosting.co.uk

I'm not sure how the system would be aware of secure.matrixhosting.co.uk
just because it's aware of www.matrixhosting.co.uk.  Perhaps you've
tried to create it and filled in hosting or email aliases for either
matrixhosting.co.uk or for www.matrixhosting.co.uk; you must leave those
fields blank when you create the domain; then it'll create fine.

> I'm really confused at the moment and I'm sure it should be really simple.
> Once I have done one then the rest should be easy - I hope :-)
> 
> Can you help in any way - I possibly may have confused you as well with this
> email as I do not really know how to explain it in written words - if you
> know what I mean.

I hope I've unconfused you a bit.  Please don't feel bad about
contacting me directly offlist; I take calls 24/7 when I'm in, and if
I'm not in I return calls.  For an email address that I respond to
quickly, try my "support" address; I respond to it a lot more quickly
than the "jblists" address, which I only read when I have the time,
sometimes not for days.

> Thanks for your time.

You're welcome.

Jeff
-- 
Jeff Lasman, nobaloney.net, P. O. Box 52672, Riverside, CA  92517 US
Internet & Unix/Linux/Sun/Cobalt Consulting +1 909 778-9980
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To contact us offlist: "http://www.nobaloney.net/contactus.html";