Certbot NGINX Unit plugin

This is a certbot plugin for using certbot in combination with NGINX Unit https://unit.nginx.org/

Requirement

The command unitc should be installed and executable.

Current Features

• Supports NGINX Unit/1.31*
• Supports cerbot 2.12+ / 3+
• install certificates
• automatic renewal certificates

Installation

• Via Snap (requires certbot to be installed via snap):

  install snapd

  install certbot

  snap install --classic certbot
  

  install and configure this plugin

  sudo snap install certbot-nginx-unit 
  sudo snap set certbot trust-plugin-with-root=ok
  sudo snap connect certbot:plugin certbot-nginx-unit
  

• Via Pip

  pip install certbot certbot-nginx-unit
  

• Via Pip virtual env

  Create a virtual environment, to avoid conflicts

  python3 -m venv /some/path
  

  use the pip in the virtual environment to install or update

  /some/path/bin/pip install -U certbot certbot-nginx-unit
  

  use the cerbot from the virtualenv, to avoid accidentally using one from a different environment that does not have this library

  /some/path/bin/certbot
  

  or uninstall other certbot system installation and link it to /usr/bin

  ln -s /some/path/bin/certbot /usr/bin
  

Usage

Configure the unit listener with *:80 or *:443

# unitc /config

{
    "listeners": {
        "*:80": {
            "pass": "routes"
        }
        "routes": [
            {
                "action": {
                    "share": "/srv/www/unit/index.html"
                }
            }
        ]
    }
}

Now, generate and automatically install the certificate with

# certbot --configurator nginx-unit -d www.myapp.com

The result is a certificate created and installed.

# unitc /certificates

{
	"www.myapp.com_20240202145800": {
		"key": "RSA (2048 bits)",
		"chain": [
			{
				<omissis>
			}
		]
	}
}

and the configuration updated

# unitc /config

{
	"listeners": {
		"*:80": {
			"pass": "routes"
		},

		"*:443": {
			"pass": "routes",
			"tls": {
				"certificate": [
					"www.myapp.com_20240202145800"
				]
			}
		}
	},

	"routes": [
		{
			"match": {
				"uri": "/.well-known/acme-challenge/*"
			},

			"action": {
				"share": "/srv/www/unit/$uri"
			}
		},
		{
			"action": {
				"share": "/srv/www/unit/index.html"
			}
		}
	]
}

Auto-renew certificates

Certbot installs a timer on the system to renew certificates one month before the certificate expiration date.

Multiple domains/applications

You can run the certbot command for each domain

# certbot --configurator nginx-unit -d www.myapp1.com
# certbot --configurator nginx-unit -d www.myapp2.com
# unitc '/config/listeners/*:443' 

{
    "pass": "routes",
    "tls": {
        "certificate": [
            "www.myapp1.com_20240202145800"
            "www.myapp2.com_20240202145800"
        ]
    }
}