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Certdog DotNet Client

This client enables rapid integration with your .NET applications enabling the ability to obtain certificates from the certdog application

You can obtain the client from GitHub here

Or the dll from here

Usage

Add certdognet as a reference to your project

using certdognet;

String p12Base64Data = Certdog.GetCert(certDogUrl, certIssuer, requestedDn, 
                                       csrGenerator, p12Password, sans, certDogUsername, certDogPassword);

Where:

certDogUrl: Is the URL to the api e.g. https://yourhost/certdog/api

certIssuer: Is the name of the issuer as configured in certdog

requestedDn: Is the DN of the certificate required e.g. CN=MyCert,O=My Org

csrGenerator: Is the name of the CSR generator to generate the CSR, as configured in certdog

p12Password: Is the password the returned PKCS#12 file will be returned protected under

sans: Is a List<String> of subject alternative names, e.g. {“DNS:domain.com”, “IP:10.1.1.2”}. Pass an empty list of null if not required

certDogUsername: Is the username of the user as configured in certdog that has access to the required certificate issuer

certDogPassword: Is the password of the user

For example, to obtain a certificate from the demo environment and save the response to a local PFX file you could do the following:

List<String> sans = new List<String>();
sans.Add("DNS:mydomain.com");

String p12Base64Data = Certdog.GetCert("https://certdog.net/certdog/api", "Certdog TLS", "CN=mydoma.com", 
    "RSA2048 Generator", "password", sans, "certdogtest", "password");

byte[] p12BinaryData = Convert.FromBase64String(p12Base64Data);
using (BinaryWriter binWriter = new BinaryWriter(File.Open("C:\\temp\\test.pfx", FileMode.Create)))
	binWriter.Write(p12BinaryData);

You also have the option of storing the certdog credentials in the Windows Credential Manager (see Setting Credentials below for details on storing these). You can then simplify the call further:

String p12Base64Data = Certdog.GetCert(certDogUrl, certIssuer, requestedDn, csrGenerator, p12Password, sans);

Setting Credentials

It is possible to store the certdog username and password in the Windows Credential Manager. This secures these credentials and ensures they can only be accessed by that user, on that machine

If you will perform these steps with the same account that the application (that calls the dot net client) will be running under, then you only need to run the commands without the username and password

If the application will be running under another account (e.g. the LOCAL SYSTEM account), then you need to run these commands under that account. See Running as Local System for an example

  1. Open a Command Prompt
  2. Type the following 
    cmdkey /generic:CERTDOGCREDS /user:certdogusername /pass:certdogpassword
  3. Setting the required username and password for certdogusername and certdogpassword

To list the updates, type the following:

cmdkey /list:CERTDOGCREDS

Running as Local System

If not already installed, obtain PSTools from here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/pstools

Unzip to a local folder and optionally, update your path to reference the folder (this will allow you to run the tools from any location on the machine)

  1. Open a new command prompt as Administrator

  2. Type

psexec -i -s cmd.exe
  1. And press Enter

A new command prompt will open - running under the LOCAL SYSTEM account

Now run the cmdkey steps above. This will result in these credentials being accessible by an application running under the LOCAL SYSTEM account