Domain Website Certificate for HTTPS last modified 2025-01-20

HTTPS For Domain Websites

Google encourages websites to switch from using the old HTTP protocol to using the secure HTTPS. Google ranks an HTTPS site higher in search results than a similar HTTP site. In late July 2018, Google’s Chrome browser started marking pages obtained via HTTP as not secure, and will become more forceful. Eventually, HTTPS sites will be considered normal and not marked with the familiar padlock and HTTP sites will receive increasingly strident warnings. As of September 2020, domain certificates expire after one year.

How To Change an HTTP to an HTTPS Website

Note that OlympusNet Support will set up or renew a certificate for you or help you with any part of the setup per the fee published in Services/Pricing at SSL Certificate Setup.

OlympusNet’s upstream hosting provider for domain websites published the following information on setting up a certificate for HTTPS access: Setting up an SSL Certificate. We will use the domain example.com to show how to set up an SSL Certificate.

Steps to setup an SSL certificate:

First, a summary of the steps:

1. Set up an account with a Certificate Authority who will provide your certificate. Save the account password for when your certificate renewal comes up a year later.
2. You’ll be asked to create a password to pick up the certificate once it’s generated.
3. The Certificate Authority will ask you for a password you’ll use to securely retrieve your certificate once it’s made.
4. In your Domain Control Panel, you’ll generate a Certificate Signing Request or CSR.
5. On the Certificate Authority site, you’ll input your CSR, which enables the generation of your Certificate.
6. The Certificate Authority will send an email to you when your certificate is ready to pickup.
7. You’ll input your Certificate into your Domain Control Panel.
8. Your site will be ready to use https://example.com when your certificate is installed on the server. That installation time varies.

And now the steps in detail:
The steps below use the Comodo Certificate Authority at https://name.com, though you’re free to choose any other Authority.
See Setting up an SSL certificate that is not hosted by Name.com for information about using Name.com’s service.

1. In your Domain Control Panel, set up the email alias admin@example.com. Name.com will use that address to send a download link for the certificate to you.
2. Contact OlympusNet support for assistance with setting up your DNS.
3. The following steps generate the Certificate Signing Request or CSR, which Name.com uses to generate your certificate. The CSR is text, which you will paste or upload to Name.com. To generate the CSR …
   1. Log into your Domain Control Panel.
   2. Select Web Apps/Security/SSL Manager.
   3. In the upper right part of the window select Support, then search for the link titled How Do I Install a Vanity (3rd Party) SSL Certificate?
      Copy the link and open the article in another window for guidance.
   4. Back on the SSL Manager window, in the black vertical panel on the left side, select the icon with the nine white squares with the mouse-over title Web Apps Overview and select the red icon SSL Manager. You may need to select it multiple times before the screen pops up with an Install icon.
   5. A window titled Which SSL Certificate would you like to install? opens.
   6. Select Vanity SSL (Comodo Essential SSL).
   7. Select Next.
   8. To the right of Domain appears three choices. Choose the middle one, example.com.
   9. Fill out the fields with company information.
   10. Select I want my website to be secure instantly after installation.
       Do not select I’ve already generated a Private Key.
   11. Select Next.
   12. The CSR will be displayed, ready for pasting or uploading to Name.com.
   13. Copy the CSR for short term safekeeping.
   14. You are now at step 5 of the How Do I Install a Vanity (3rd Party) SSL Certificate? article.
4. Generate your certificate at Name.com.
   1. Paste the CSR into the appropriate place at Name.com to generate your Certificate.
   2. In the Comodo Essential SSL/SSL Domain Setup:
      1. Select your domain as example.com.
      2. Verify that the Contact Information is correct.
      3. Paste the CSR including —–BEGIN CERTIFICATE REQUEST—– and —–END CERTIFICATE REQUEST—–
      4. After selecting Next, a verification email will be sent.
      5. Select the appropriate link in the email to confirm receipt.
      6. In Domain Control Validation (Part 2), you’ll see the Order number. The validation code for Order #410770953 has been sent to you in the email with reference #22550.
      7. Paste that validation code in the Domain Control Validation (Part 2) window.
      8. You will be emailed a link to download your Certificate and will use the password you earlier set up with Name.com to fetch the certificate.
      9. Attached to that certificate email is a .zip file containing:
         1. Root CA Certificate - AAACertificateServices.crt
         2. Intermediate CA Certificate - USERTrustRSAAAACA.crt
         3. Intermediate CA Certificate - SectigoRSADomainValidationSecureServerCA.crt
         4. Your EssentialSSL Certificate - www_example_com.crt
   3. Now that you have the certificate (example_com.crt), you’ll install it using your Domain Control Panel’s SSL Manager.
      1. Return to the page in your Domain Control Panel where you generated the CSR and select Next.
      2. Select Next now, then paste the certificate in the appropriate window.
      3. In the window titled Step 4 of 5: Certificate Ordered you’ll see:
         To complete the installation, there are additional steps you will need to take. Configuration can take from 2 up to 24 hours. Check the status by logging into the SSL Manager. Once the SSL status changes to DNS Update required, click the Next button to get further instructions.
         Typically the installation happens quickly.
      4. Select Go to main menu.
      5. Under SSL Status, confirm that Installed, DNS update completed appears.
      6. Note: to the right of that you’ll see Renew. Keep that in mind for next year when the certificate expires.
      7. In the Domain Control Panel/DNS Manager, confirm that the A record Name/www points to the correct IP address. That IP address should match what the command line dig example.com shows it to be.
      8. Flush the DNS cache on your macOS Catalina or Big Sur computer by running in Terminal
         sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder
      9. Confirm that https://example.com works.
      10. Note that https://example.com will continue to return a not secure until the .htaccess file referred to below is installed in the user’s site.
      11. Note that it might take three days for the updated DNS to be seen thoughout the Internet.
   4. It may be necessary to rewrite HTTP accesses to HTTPS accesses, once the certificate has been installed. If so, an .htaccess file needs to be installed.
      1. The .htaccess file causes HTTP requests to be converted to HTTPS requests as follows:
         1. The client types example.com in the address bar.
         2. The browser assumes HTTP protocol and sends a GET call to example.com.
         3. example.com responds with a moved status code and gives the new location: HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently
            Location: https://example.com/
      2. Install the .htaccess file as follows:
         1. In the Domain Control Panel, select Web Apps/File Manager which opens on the / directory.
         2. Select Upload to upload the .htaccess file.
         3. The .htaccess file should contain:

            RewriteEngine On
            RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
            RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [L,R=301]
            

      3. Note that editing files may be done with SSH, SCP or the following tools: FileZilla, CoreFTP or Cyberduck.

Track SSL Certificate Expiration

1. Select the padlock to the left of your domain name in the browser address bar.
2. Select the Show Certificate button.
3. Record the certificate expiration date in a calendar so that you renew your certificate well before it expires.
4. OlympusNet does NOT track this expiration nor send a reminder about it.
5. Follow the instructions in the section below to renew the certificate.

Renew an SSL Certificate

To renew your certificate, you’ll generate a new SSL Certificate using the previously stored information. Follow the instructions above for installing an SSL Certificate once you have renewed it. See Renewing an SSL certificate on the Name.com website.

If you need assistance, contact Customer Support. The fee for assistance is listed under SSL Certificate Setup on our Pricing page.