Testing SSL in localhost
In some cases is useful to access the localhost environment under SSL (ie: https://localhost:3000/).
A typical use case is when you want to test login integration with 3rd party systems using OAuth (which in the latest versions only the HTTPS protocol is allowed).
Using Puma, the default server for Rails, you can easily do the trick by creating a self-signed certificate and using it when starting your development environment.
Create a self-signed certificate for localhost
First you need a SSL certificate for the localhost domain (you only need to execute this command once):
openssl req -x509 -out localhost.crt -keyout localhost.key \
-newkey rsa:2048 -nodes -sha256 \
-subj '/CN=localhost' -extensions EXT -config <( \
printf "[dn]\nCN=localhost\n[req]\ndistinguished_name = dn\n[EXT]\nsubjectAltName=DNS:localhost\nkeyUsage=digitalSignature\nextendedKeyUsage=serverAuth")This will generate two files: localhost.crt and localhost.key, you can store them anywhere you want to use them later. In this example we’ll suppose we have them in the folder certs in our root user home:
mkdir ~/certs/
mv localhost.crt ~/certs/
mv localhost.key ~/certs/Starting development in SSL mode
Once you have your certificate is generated, just use the next command in order to start puma instead of the typical bin/rails s:
bin/rails s -b "ssl://127.0.0.1:3000?key=$HOME/certs/localhost.key&cert=$HOME/certs/localhost.crt"Now you are ready to visit your favorite browser at the address https://localhost:3000/ (note "https").
Note: Your browser is going to complain as this is a self-signed certificate, that’s ok for development, just add an exception and accept the certificate.
Also take into account that starting Puma in SSL mode will disable accessing it in non-ssl mode (normal http protocol).
Testing tenants using lvh.me
You can also test the multi-tenant capabilities of Decidim by using alternative domains or subdomains that points to your local machine. lvh.me is a service that does just that without configuring anything in your machine (an alternative is to add entries in your /etc/hosts with a testing domain of your choice). Just point your browser to any subdomain of lvh.me and you’ll be in your own machine.
Just access your /system admin and create new organization with some subdomain of lvh.me: organization.lvh.me, tenant2.lvh.me, etc.
You can combine this with the previously generated certificate (your browser is going to complaint but just tell it to proceed vising the site).
Finally remember to add the port as lvh.me do not forwards anything, for instance (use http or https depending on how you’ve started Rails):
etc.