manuale 1.1.0
A fully manual Let's Encrypt/ACME client
License: MIT

ManuaLE
=======

manuale is a fully manual `Let's
Encrypt <https://letsencrypt.org>`__/`ACME <https://github.com/ietf-wg-acme/acme/>`__
client for advanced users. It is intended to be used by a human in a
manual workflow and contains no automation features whatsoever.

Why?
----

Isn't the point of Let's Encrypt to be automatic and seamless? Maybe,
but here's some reasons:

-  You're not comfortable with an automatic process handling something
   as critical, or your complex infrastructure doesn't allow it in the
   first place.

-  You already have perfect configuration management with something like
   Ansible. Renewing is a matter of dropping in a new certificate. With
   a manual client that works, it's literally a minute of work.

-  You want the traditional and authentic SSL installation experience of
   copying files you don't understand to your server, searching for
   configuration instructions and praying that it works.

Features
--------

-  Simple interface with no hoops to jump through. Keys and certificate
   signing requests are automatically generated: no more cryptic OpenSSL
   one-liners. (However, you do need to know what to do with generated
   certificates and keys yourself!)

-  Support for DNS & HTTP validation. No need to figure out how to serve
   challenge files from a live domain.

-  Obviously, runs without root access. Use it from any machine you
   want, it doesn't care. Internet connection recommended.

-  Awful, undiscoverable name.

-  And finally, if the ``openssl`` binary is your spirit animal after
   all, you can still bring your own keys and/or CSR's. Everybody wins.

Installation
------------

Python 3.3 or above is required.

Using your package manager
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

-  Arch Linux: in the
   `AUR <https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/manuale>`__.

-  Fedora Linux: ``dnf install manuale``.

-  `Gentoo
   Linux <https://packages.gentoo.org/packages/app-crypt/manuale>`__.

-  Package maintainers wanted: your package here?

Using Docker
~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a Docker image on the `Docker
Hub <https://hub.docker.com/r/jgiannuzzi/letsencrypt-manuale/>`__.

Using pip
~~~~~~~~~

You can install the package from
`PyPI <https://pypi.python.org/pypi/manuale>`__ using the ``pip`` tool.
To do so, run ``pip3 install manuale``.

If you're not using Windows or OS X pip may need to compile some of the
dependencies. In this case, you need a compiler and development headers
for Python, OpenSSL and libffi installed.

On Debian-based distributions, these will typically be
``gcc python3-dev libssl-dev libffi-dev``, and on RPM-based
distributions ``gcc python3-devel openssl-devel libffi-devel``.

From the git repository
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

::

    git clone https://github.com/veeti/manuale ~/.manuale
    cd ~/.manuale
    python3 -m venv env
    env/bin/python setup.py install
    ln -s env/bin/manuale ~/.bin/

(Assuming you have a ``~/.bin/`` directory in your ``$PATH``).

Quick start
-----------

Register an account (once):

::

    $ manuale register me@example.com

Authorize one or more domains:

::

    $ manuale authorize example.com
    DNS verification required. Make sure these records are in place:
      _acme-challenge.example.com. IN TXT "(some random gibberish)"
    Press enter to continue.
    ...
    1 domain(s) authorized. Let's Encrypt!

Get your certificate:

::

    $ manuale issue --output certs/ example.com
    ...
    Certificate issued.

    Expires: 2016-06-01
     SHA256: (more random gibberish)

    Wrote key to certs/example.com.pem
    Wrote certificate to certs/example.com.crt
    Wrote certificate with intermediate to certs/example.com.chain.crt
    Wrote intermediate certificate to certs/example.com.intermediate.crt

Set yourself a reminder for renewal!

Usage
-----

You need to create an account once. To do so, call
``manuale register [email]``. This will create a new account key for
you. Follow the registration instructions.

Once that's done, you'll have your account saved in ``account.json`` in
the current directory. You'll need this to do anything useful. Oh, and
it contains your private key, so keep it safe and secure.

``manuale`` expects the account file to be in your working directory by
default, so you'll probably want to make a specific directory to do all
your certificate stuff in. Likewise, created certificates get saved in
the current path by default.

Next up, verify the domains you want a certificate for with
``manuale authorize [domain]``. This will show you the DNS records you
need to create and wait for you to do it. For example, you might do it
for ``example.com`` and ``www.example.com``.

Once that's done, you can finally get down to business. Run
``manuale issue example.com www.example.com`` to get your certificate.
It'll save the key, certificate and certificate with intermediate to the
working directory.

There's plenty of documentation inside each command. Run ``manuale -h``
for a list of commands and ``manuale [command] -h`` for details.

See also
--------

-  `Best practices for server
   configuration <https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Server_Side_TLS>`__
-  `Configuration generator for common
   servers <https://mozilla.github.io/server-side-tls/ssl-config-generator/>`__
-  `Test your server <https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/>`__
-  `Other
   clients <https://community.letsencrypt.org/t/list-of-client-implementations/2103>`__

License
-------

**The MIT License (MIT)**

Copyright © 2016-2017 Veeti Paananen

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a
copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
"Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including
without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish,
distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to
permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to
the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included
in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS
OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY
CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT,
TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE
SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.