From: Shannon Sterz <s.sterz@proxmox.com>
To: pbs-devel@lists.proxmox.com
Subject: [PATCH datacenter-manager/proxmox{,-backup} 00/16] TLS Certificate Rotation
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 2026 15:31:42 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260730133158.418015-1-s.sterz@proxmox.com> (raw)
this series adds certificate rotation to Proxmox Backup Server and Proxmox
Datacenter Manager. currently, both products issue a certificate that is valid
for almost 1000 years (365000 days). no cryptographic key can reasonably be
considered secure for this amount of time. this series:
- allows specifying the lifetime of the certificate when creating one via
proxmox-acme-api and reduces the default to 3650 days (almost ten years).
- sends and logs reminders 30 days before a certificate expires (pdm currently
does not support the notification framework yet, so adding notifications is
left as future work here).
- refreshes a certificate at the earliest 15 days before it expires, logs
and notifies when that happens.
- warns on certificates with excessive lifetimes (>3650 days) and documents
how to manually update them.
- for pdm: exposes cert handling cli methods in proxmox-datacenter-manager-admin.
- fixes up some inconsistencies in the ui and docs in regards to pdm's
certificate location.
- adjusts the severity of acme renewal error notifications for pbs
## Testing
the easiest way to test this is to manipulate the date of the host with `date
--set` and then manually trigger the daily update binary for each product:
* PBS: `/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/proxmox-backup/proxmox-daily-update`
* PDM: `/usr/libexec/proxmox/proxmox-datacenter-manager-daily-update`
you can then check the logs and the certificate itself to see what happened.
specifying the `PBS_LOG` environment variable with the parameter `trace` or
`debug` will also enable debug logging here.
## Open Questions
+ 10 years is still a long time and i'd rather reduce that further down if
possible. see the patch 02 for proxmox-tls-certificates for more info.
+ should we remove pre-existing long lasting certificates by ourselves? imo
that is too risky at the moment given that an unplanned certificate rotation
could cause backups to fail.
+ notifying every day for 15 days before the renewal might be excessive, see
the second commit for pbs.
## Future Work
- pve and pdm should be extended to allow automatically updating allowed
fingerprints before a new self-signed certificate goes into action. a series
demonstrating this for pve<->pdm has already been sent [1]. if this series gets
approved, i'll happily adapt the mechanism for pbs<->pve and pbs<->pdm.
- pdm should send notifications similar to pbs once support for notifications
is added.
## Changelog
* v1: https://lore.proxmox.com/pbs-devel/20260422124022.17952-1-s.sterz@proxmox.com/
changes since v1 (thanks @ Lukas Wagner):
+ dropped a patch for proxmox-yew-comp that got applied already
+ rebased on current master for all three repos
+ created new `proxmox-tls-certificates` crate and moved several helpers
there. reexposing functions in proxmox-acme-api to avoid breakage.
+ added unit tests and more documentation to tls helpers
+ adjusted the severity of error and renewal notifications
+ adapted the upcoming renewal template for pbs to inform about the
earliest data a renewal could happen
* rfc: https://lore.proxmox.com/pbs-devel/20260407135714.490747-1-s.sterz@proxmox.com/
changes since rfc:
+ add patches that avoid hard-coding the certificate file name in yew-comp
and use the proper filename in pdm
+ update pdm renewal docs patch to avoid confusion
+ re-base on current master
[1]: https://lore.proxmox.com/pdm-devel/20260611120327.257523-1-s.sterz@proxmox.com/
proxmox:
Shannon Sterz (4):
acme-api/tls-certificates: add new crate collecting tls realted
helpers
tls-certificates: add days_valid parameter to create_self_signed_cert
tls-certificates: add self_signed_cert_expires_in to check
certificates
acme-api: stop re-exporting create_self_signed_cert
Cargo.toml | 2 +
proxmox-acme-api/Cargo.toml | 2 +
proxmox-acme-api/src/certificate_helpers.rs | 195 ----------
proxmox-acme-api/src/lib.rs | 2 +-
proxmox-acme-api/src/types.rs | 51 +--
proxmox-tls-certificates/Cargo.toml | 41 ++
proxmox-tls-certificates/src/lib.rs | 7 +
proxmox-tls-certificates/src/types.rs | 54 +++
proxmox-tls-certificates/src/util.rs | 395 ++++++++++++++++++++
9 files changed, 503 insertions(+), 246 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 proxmox-tls-certificates/Cargo.toml
create mode 100644 proxmox-tls-certificates/src/lib.rs
create mode 100644 proxmox-tls-certificates/src/types.rs
create mode 100644 proxmox-tls-certificates/src/util.rs
backup:
Shannon Sterz (6):
config: use proxmox_tls_certificates for generating self-signed
certificates
config/server/api: add certificate renewal logic including
notifications
daily update: warn about excessive self-signed certificate lifetime
docs: document force refreshing long-lived certificates
backup-manager cli: `cert update` can create auth and csrf key
notifications: use `Severity::Error` for acme renewal failures
Cargo.toml | 3 +
debian/control | 2 +
debian/proxmox-backup-server.install | 6 ++
docs/certificate-management.rst | 31 ++++++
src/api2/node/certificates.rs | 9 +-
src/bin/proxmox-daily-update.rs | 43 ++++++++-
src/bin/proxmox_backup_manager/cert.rs | 2 +
src/config/mod.rs | 96 ++-----------------
src/server/notifications/mod.rs | 58 ++++++++++-
src/server/notifications/template_data.rs | 11 +++
templates/Makefile | 68 +++++++------
templates/default/cert-err-body.txt.hbs | 7 ++
templates/default/cert-err-subject.txt.hbs | 1 +
templates/default/cert-refresh-body.txt.hbs | 8 ++
.../default/cert-refresh-subject.txt.hbs | 1 +
.../cert-upcoming-refresh-body.txt.hbs | 10 ++
.../cert-upcoming-refresh-subject.txt.hbs | 1 +
17 files changed, 237 insertions(+), 120 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-err-body.txt.hbs
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-err-subject.txt.hbs
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-refresh-body.txt.hbs
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-refresh-subject.txt.hbs
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-upcoming-refresh-body.txt.hbs
create mode 100644 templates/default/cert-upcoming-refresh-subject.txt.hbs
datacenter-manager:
Shannon Sterz (6):
certs: use proxmox-tls-certificates directly, add days_valid paramter
api/auth/bin: add certificate renewal logic
cli: expose certificate management endpoints via the cli
daily-update: warn about certificates with excessive lifetimes
docs: add section on forcing a new self-signed certificate
docs/certificates: use correct certificate file name
Cargo.toml | 2 +
cli/admin/Cargo.toml | 2 +
cli/admin/src/cert.rs | 86 +++++++++++++++++++
cli/admin/src/main.rs | 2 +
debian/control | 2 +
docs/certificate-management.rst | 32 +++++++
server/Cargo.toml | 1 +
server/src/api/nodes/certificates.rs | 19 ++--
server/src/auth/certs.rs | 19 +++-
...proxmox-datacenter-manager-daily-update.rs | 38 ++++++++
10 files changed, 190 insertions(+), 13 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 cli/admin/src/cert.rs
Summary over all repositories:
36 files changed, 930 insertions(+), 379 deletions(-)
--
Generated by murpp 0.12.0
next reply other threads:[~2026-07-30 13:32 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 18+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-07-30 13:31 Shannon Sterz [this message]
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox 01/16] acme-api/tls-certificates: add new crate collecting tls realted helpers Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox 02/16] tls-certificates: add days_valid parameter to create_self_signed_cert Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox 03/16] tls-certificates: add self_signed_cert_expires_in to check certificates Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox 04/16] acme-api: stop re-exporting create_self_signed_cert Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 05/16] config: use proxmox_tls_certificates for generating self-signed certificates Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 06/16] config/server/api: add certificate renewal logic including notifications Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 07/16] daily update: warn about excessive self-signed certificate lifetime Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 08/16] docs: document force refreshing long-lived certificates Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 09/16] backup-manager cli: `cert update` can create auth and csrf key Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH proxmox-backup 10/16] notifications: use `Severity::Error` for acme renewal failures Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 11/16] certs: use proxmox-tls-certificates directly, add days_valid paramter Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 12/16] api/auth/bin: add certificate renewal logic Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 13/16] cli: expose certificate management endpoints via the cli Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 14/16] daily-update: warn about certificates with excessive lifetimes Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 15/16] docs: add section on forcing a new self-signed certificate Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:31 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager 16/16] docs/certificates: use correct certificate file name Shannon Sterz
2026-07-30 13:44 ` [PATCH datacenter-manager/proxmox{,-backup} 00/16] TLS Certificate Rotation Shannon Sterz
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