LetsEncrypt: Tomcat with SSL on Apache

Install LetsEncrypt Certbot Certificate with Apache Server and reverse proxy on tomcat server

Introduction

We assume the following is performed before proceeding.

  • Linux server installed
  • Apache Tomcat running on port 8080 on the same machine.
  • Domain has been attached to this server (e.g. api.example.com)

If the server is pointing to example.com, a virtual host for api.example.com is required to be setup before we can proceed with this tutorial.

Check Servers

Considering you have a web app running on tomcat. Please check if the following is accessible and working.

http://api.example.com:8080/webapp

Why not use certbot on Tomcat

  • Tomcat usually doesn’t bind to port 80
  • Cerbot certificate renewal may be challenging with tomcat.
  • Tomcat uses Java Keystores but certbot creates pem files.
  • Cerbot needs graceful reloads, tomcat doesn't go well with that.

There are many benefits of using Apache in front of tomcat. This leaves tomcat from the burden of managing SSL and proxy.

Install Apache Server

sudo apt-get install apache2

Apache Server is installed on default port 80. This should open the default apache page. http://api.example.com/

Let's Encrypt SSL on Apache

Let's encrypt lets you install free SSL certificate which can be renewed. In this article, we are going to install let's encrypt on apache and forward the requests to tomcat.

https://certbot.eff.org/

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:certbot/certbot
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install python-certbot-apache 

sudo certbot --apache

If you have already installed cerbot and gettign the following error

Client with the currently selected authenticator does not support any combination of challenges that will satisfy the CA.

Upgrade cerbot with the following command.

sudo apt-get install --only-upgrade certbot

Follow the instructions. Agree to terms. You need to map the domain name to the IP on this server. Use the same domain name for the SSL. For example, api.example.com

Remove the default SSL file provided by the Apache.

sudo rm /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default-ssl.conf

Proxy Configuration

Since we did not alter anything in apache. Certbot will generate the following conf file.

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default-le-ssl.conf

We will add forwarding to this file. You can place it below the line containing DocumentRoot

ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost
DocumentRoot /var/www/html

ProxyPreserveHost On

ProxyPass / http://127.0.0.1:8080/
ProxyPassReverse / http://127.0.0.1:8080/

DocumentRoot here is useless. All the forwarding will be done to tomcat.

Enable Proxy Modules

Now enable the following modules before restarting apache server

sudo a2enmod proxy
sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo a2enmod proxy_http
sudo service apache2 restart

If you have port 443 opened on your linux machine https://api.example.com/webapp will take to the desired webapp

If correctly configured, apache should restart properly and all requests sent to

https://api.example.com/webapp

will be forward to 

http://127.0.0.1:8080/webapp

Mapping domain name to tomcat

Newer versions of tomcat check for the origin header. If the below request is made without the Origin header using any http client it will be successful. But the origin header is used by tomcat to match it against the host name specified in server.xml So our next task is to update the host name value in server.xml.

Does tomcat requires Origin header to work? NO. But if you carry a origin header it should match the host name So a call from api.example.com with Origin header as 'api.example.com' (in case of a browser) will not work since <Host name="localhost">is the default value.

Update the host name in server.xml to match the domain name used in the virtual host of apache server. You need to change the name="localhost" to name=api.example.com

<Host name="api.example.com"  appBase="webapps"
            unpackWARs="true" autoDeploy="true" deployXML="true">

Also update your connector tag in server.xml 

<Connector port="8080" protocol="HTTP/1.1"
               connectionTimeout="20000"
               redirectPort="8443"
               scheme="https" secure="true" proxyName="api.example.com" proxyPort="443" />

The following attributes inform tomcat, it is being accessed via a reverse proxy with ssl.

scheme="https" secure="true" proxyName="api.example.com" proxyPort="443"

If you do not perform the above step of adding proxy to Connector tag, every POST request will throw 403 error.

Close Port 8080

Also, care to close the 8080 port from public access so that the users cannot directly open the tomcat server.

http://api.example.com:8080/webapp

apachectl configtest

The above command helps you to test if everything is configured correctly with apache

Apache SSLCertificateFile error: Does not exist or is empty.

If you get this error run the command given below

The error will tell you the file from /etc/letsencrypt/live but they are linked from /etc/letsencrypt/archive so changing permission for /etc/letsencrypt/live will not help

sudo chmod 0755 /etc/letsencrypt/archive

Update

Updates letsencrypt have done recently changing permissions on archive doesn't work. The following will result in Synatax OK from

sudo chmod -R 0755 /etc/letsencrypt/live
apachectl configtest