SSL certificate expiring on an HAProxy ALOHA load balancer

Swapping an expiring certificate on a load balancer looks routine, but a new certificate that does not match its private key cannot be used, and a change that was never saved is gone after the next reboot. 2501 replaces the certificate on HAProxy ALOHA, confirms the change took effect and saves it to the appliance, within limits you set.

The renewed certificate usually arrives from another team or an outside authority, and the load balancer it goes on often fronts many applications at once.

What 2501 does

The HAProxy ALOHA specialty takes the request from your ticketing system. Before anything changes, it makes sure it has the renewed certificate, its private key and the full chain, and that all three belong together: a set that does not match never goes into service. It then puts the new certificate in place, confirms the change took effect and saves it to the appliance's configuration, so it is still there after a reboot. The report says what it changed and what it confirmed.

You stay in control

• You choose the level: investigate only, act after a person confirms, or act on its own within your rules. The level is set per specialty, not per ticket.
• No mismatched certificate goes live: a certificate is put into service only with its matching private key and complete chain.
• Nothing extra on the appliance: it works with the tools the load balancer already provides and installs no additional software.
• Your rules apply: which services and certificates may change unattended, and which need a person first.

Frequently asked

Why would a valid certificate still fail? Clients check more than its dates. Without its matching private key it cannot be used at all, and without the intermediate certificates that complete its chain, many clients refuse the connection.

Can it show what would change first? Yes. In investigate-only mode it reports the certificate and services involved and the change it would make, and changes nothing.

Related

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