NAME

       CA.pl - friendlier interface for OpenSSL certificate programs

SYNOPSIS

       CA.pl [-?]  [-h] [-help] [-newcert] [-newreq] [-newreq-nodes] [-newca] [-xsign] [-sign]
       [-signreq] [-signcert] [-verify] [files]

DESCRIPTION

       The CA.pl script is a perl script that supplies the relevant command line arguments to the
       openssl command for some common certificate operations.  It is intended to simplify the
       process of certificate creation and management by the use of some simple options.

COMMAND OPTIONS

       ?, -h, -help
           prints a usage message.

       -newcert
           creates a new self signed certificate. The private key is written to the file
           "newkey.pem" and the request written to the file "newreq.pem".

       -newreq
           creates a new certificate request. The private key is written to the file "newkey.pem"
           and the request written to the file "newreq.pem".

       -newreq-nodes
           is like -newreq except that the private key will not be encrypted.

       -newca
           creates a new CA hierarchy for use with the ca program (or the -signcert and -xsign
           options). The user is prompted to enter the filename of the CA certificates (which
           should also contain the private key) or by hitting ENTER details of the CA will be
           prompted for. The relevant files and directories are created in a directory called
           "demoCA" in the current directory.

       -pkcs12
           create a PKCS#12 file containing the user certificate, private key and CA certificate.
           It expects the user certificate and private key to be in the file "newcert.pem" and
           the CA certificate to be in the file demoCA/cacert.pem, it creates a file
           "newcert.p12". This command can thus be called after the -sign option. The PKCS#12
           file can be imported directly into a browser.  If there is an additional argument on
           the command line it will be used as the "friendly name" for the certificate (which is
           typically displayed in the browser list box), otherwise the name "My Certificate" is
           used.

       -sign, -signreq, -xsign
           calls the ca program to sign a certificate request. It expects the request to be in
           the file "newreq.pem". The new certificate is written to the file "newcert.pem" except
           in the case of the -xsign option when it is written to standard output.

       -signCA
           this option is the same as the -signreq option except it uses the configuration file
           section v3_ca and so makes the signed request a valid CA certificate. This is useful
           when creating intermediate CA from a root CA.

       -signcert
           this option is the same as -sign except it expects a self signed certificate to be
           present in the file "newreq.pem".

       -verify
           verifies certificates against the CA certificate for "demoCA". If no certificates are
           specified on the command line it tries to verify the file "newcert.pem".

       files
           one or more optional certificate file names for use with the -verify command.

EXAMPLES

       Create a CA hierarchy:

        CA.pl -newca

       Complete certificate creation example: create a CA, create a request, sign the request and
       finally create a PKCS#12 file containing it.

        CA.pl -newca
        CA.pl -newreq
        CA.pl -signreq
        CA.pl -pkcs12 "My Test Certificate"

DSA CERTIFICATES

       Although the CA.pl creates RSA CAs and requests it is still possible to use it with DSA
       certificates and requests using the req(1) command directly. The following example shows
       the steps that would typically be taken.

       Create some DSA parameters:

        openssl dsaparam -out dsap.pem 1024

       Create a DSA CA certificate and private key:

        openssl req -x509 -newkey dsa:dsap.pem -keyout cacert.pem -out cacert.pem

       Create the CA directories and files:

        CA.pl -newca

       enter cacert.pem when prompted for the CA file name.

       Create a DSA certificate request and private key (a different set of parameters can
       optionally be created first):

        openssl req -out newreq.pem -newkey dsa:dsap.pem

       Sign the request:

        CA.pl -signreq

NOTES

       Most of the filenames mentioned can be modified by editing the CA.pl script.

       If the demoCA directory already exists then the -newca command will not overwrite it and
       will do nothing. This can happen if a previous call using the -newca option terminated
       abnormally. To get the correct behaviour delete the demoCA directory if it already exists.

       Under some environments it may not be possible to run the CA.pl script directly (for
       example Win32) and the default configuration file location may be wrong. In this case the
       command:

        perl -S CA.pl

       can be used and the OPENSSL_CONF environment variable changed to point to the correct path
       of the configuration file "openssl.cnf".

       The script is intended as a simple front end for the openssl program for use by a
       beginner. Its behaviour isn't always what is wanted. For more control over the behaviour
       of the certificate commands call the openssl command directly.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       The variable OPENSSL_CONF if defined allows an alternative configuration file location to
       be specified, it should contain the full path to the configuration file, not just its
       directory.

SEE ALSO

       x509(1), ca(1), req(1), pkcs12(1), config(5)