Problem with Automatically Directing Users to Port 443

[Andrew Kaplan]

I am trying to have users who log into a webserver be automatically redirected to a secure port.did Here is where I am at:

1. I installed the OS from scratch, and loaded the bundled Apache server with the mod_ssl package.
INFO: Red Hat Linux 8.0
Apache 2.0.40
OpenSSL 0.9.6

2. I tested connectivity to ports 80 and 443, and both came back with the test page.

3. I want to achieve an automatic redirection to port 443, so I added the following to the
VirtualHost section of the httpd.conf file -


ServerName example.com
ServerAdmin webmaster@example.com
DocumentRoot /www
Redirect / https://example.com/



ServerName example.com
ServerAdmin webmaster@example.com
DocumentRoot /www

SSLEngine On
SSLCertificateFile /usr/local/apache/conf/ssl.crt/ca-bundle.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile
/usr/local/apache/conf/ssl.key/server.key
SSLCertificateChainFile
/usr/local/apache/conf/ssl.key/server.key
SetEnvIf User-Agent ".*MSIE.*" nokeepalive ssl-unclean-shutdown


4. The Apache server (version 2.0.40 bundled with Red Hat 8.0 along with mod_ssl) did not start with the above information added. THe error message that appeared in the error_log
file was -
Failed to configure CA certificate chain!

5. After I removed the above text, I was able to restart the server successfully.

[Alexander Chuzhoy]

Here's a link :
http://www.sans.org/rr/papers/index.php?id=302

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Did you use the same certificates in the working config? The error seems to indicate a problem with the certs.

[Andrew Kaplan]

I am almost positive that I did. Just to be sure, what procedure do you follow to create the certificates? The one that I went by is on the www.modssl.org website. Thanks.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello Andrew,

I don't use modssl, but you might want into the generic openssl verify command to check if your certificates are good.

Greetings, Martin