Cheat-sheet: How to create a PKI and a Certificate Request
Background There's an API secured by a certificate. To access this API, you need to send a certificate request, based on a PKI. Being a novice in configuring security (or accessing APIs secured by certificates), wrapping my mind around this one took a while! But now I get it, and this is what I learned: First step - ask for your certificate ID and Shape/Subject The first thing you likely need to do, is to request your unique certificate ID. Depending on the target organization, you probably want to tell them who you are and why you need access to their API, so bring forth your best social engineering skills! ;-) Obtaining OpenSSL As you're waiting for your certificate ID, you need to get your hands on an SSL-implementation which you can utilize to create your private keys. OpenSSL is one such implementation and is distributed as a variety of binaries. If you're running Windows, I had the best luck with SL Pro Web's Win32OpenSSL_Light (donation ware). T