Stash is now known as Bitbucket Server.
See the

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of this page, or visit the Bitbucket Server documentation home page.

You can run Stash behind a reverse proxy, such as Apache HTTP Server or nginx, that is secured using HTTPS (HTTP over SSL). You should consider doing this, and making secure access mandatory, if usernames, passwords and other proprietary data may be at risk.

There are other network topology options for running Stash; for an overview of some common options, see Proxying and securing Stash.

When Stash is set up following the instructions on this page, external access to Stash is via Apache HTTP Server as a reverse proxy, where external communication with the proxy uses HTTPS. All communication between the user's browser and Apache will be secured, whereas communication between Apache and Stash will not be secured (it doesn't use SSL).

On this page:

Related pages:

Stash_topo_proxy_ssl

Note that:

  • The reverse proxy (for example, Apache) will listen for requests on port 443.
  • Stash, by default, will listen for requests on port 7990. Stash (Tomcat) needs to know the URL (proxy name) that the proxy serves.
  • Stash (Tomcat) should be configured to refuse requests on port 7990 and to redirect those to the proxy on port 443.
  • Securing Git operations between the user's computer and Stash is a separate consideration - see Enabling SSH access to Git.
  • It would be possible to set up an SSL connection between the proxy server and Tomcat (Stash), but that configuration is very unusual, and not recommended in most circumstances.
  • Incidentally, note that Stash 2.10 and later versions do not support  mod_auth_basic.

Step 1: Configure the Tomcat Connector for SSL

Find the normal (non-SSL) Connector directive in Tomcat's <Stash home directory>/shared/server.xml file, and change the  redirectPort, scheme, proxyName and proxyPort attributes as follows:

<Connector port="7990" 
     protocol="HTTP/1.1"
     connectionTimeout="20000"
     useBodyEncodingForURI="true"
     redirectPort="443"
     compression="on"
     compressableMimeType="text/html,text/xml,text/plain,text/css,application/json,application/javascript,application/x-javascript"
     secure="true"
     scheme="https"
     proxyName="mycompany.com" 
     proxyPort="443" />

The redirectPort directive causes Tomcat-initiated redirections to secured resources to use the specified port. Right now, the Stash configuration of Tomcat does not involve Tomcat-initiated redirections, so the change to redirectPort is redundant. Nevertheless, we suggest that you change it as directed above for the sake of completeness.

Start, or restart, Stash.

Step 2: Set up a virtual host in Apache HTTP Server

Un-comment the following LoadModule directive in Apache HTTP Server's httpd.conf file:

LoadModule ssl_module modules/mod_ssl.so

Add the following directives to the httpd.conf file:

Listen 443
<VirtualHost *:443>
    SSLEngine On
    SSLCertificateFile    "/usr/local/apache2/conf/server.crt"
    SSLCertificateKeyFile "/usr/local/apache2/conf/server.key"
	SSLCertificateChainFile "/usr/local/apache2/conf/server.crt"
    ProxyPass        / http://localhost:7990/ connectiontimeout=5 timeout=300
    ProxyPassReverse / http://localhost:7990/
</VirtualHost>

The  Listen directive instructs Apache HTTP Server to listen for incoming requests on port 443. Actually, we could omit that directive in this case, since Apache HTTP Server listens for https requests on port 443 by default. Nevertheless, it's good to make one's intentions explicit.

The  VirtualHost directive encloses a number of child directives that apply only and always to requests that arrive at port 443. Since our VirtualHost block does not include a ServerName directive, it inherits the server name from the main server configuration.

The  SSLEngine directive toggles the use of the SSL/TLS Protocol Engine. In this case, we're using it to turn SSL on for all requests that arrive at port 443.

The  SSLCertificateFile directive tells Apache HTTP Server where to find the PEM-encoded certificate file for the server.

The  SSLCertificateKeyFile directive tells Apache HTTP Server where to find the PEM-encoded private key file corresponding to the certificate file identified by the SSLCertificateFile directive. Depending on how the certificate file was generated, it may contain a RSA or DSA private key file, making the SSLCertificateKeyFile directive redundant; however, Apache strongly discourages that practice. The recommended approach is to separate the certificate and the private key. If the private key is encrypted, Apache HTTP Server will require a pass phrase to be entered when it starts up.

The  SSLCertificateChainFile is optional. Please consult with the CA vendor to verify if this is required. This directive sets the optional all-in-one file where you can assemble the certificates of Certification Authorities (CA) which form the certificate chain of the server certificate.

The ProxyPass and ProxyPassReverse directives should be set up in the manner described in Step 5 of the Integrating Stash with Apache HTTP Server page. In particular, if Stash is to run on a separate machine from Apache, you should use that domain (and perhaps the port number and context path) in the ProxyPass and ProxyPassReverse directives.

For more information about the support for SSL in Apache HTTP Server, refer to the Apache SSL/TLS Encryption manual. In addition, you will find lots of relevant information in the <apache directory>/conf/extra/httpd-ssl.conf file, which is included in the standard Apache distribution.

Start, or restart, Apache.

Step 3: Create SSL certificate and key files

In Step 2, you specified server.crt and server.key as the certificate file and private key file respectively. Those two files must be created before we can proceed. This step assumes that OpenSSL is installed on your server.

Generate a server key file:

openssl genrsa -des3 -out server.key 2048

You will be asked to provide a password. Make sure that the password is strong because it will form the one real entry point into the SSL encryption set-up. Make a note of the password because you'll need it when starting Apache HTTP Server later.

If you don't wish to specify a password, don't use the -des3 option in the command above.

Generate a certificate request file (server.csr):

openssl req -new -key server.key -out server.csr

Generate a self-signed certificate (server.crt): 

openssl x509 -req -days 365 -in server.csr -signkey server.key -out server.crt

The above command generates a self-signed certificate that is valid for one year. You can use the certificate signing request to purchase a certificate from a certificate authority. For testing purposes though, the self-signed certificate will suffice. Copy the certificate file and private key file to the locations you specified in Step 2.

cp server.key /usr/local/apache2/conf/
cp server.crt /usr/local/apache2/conf/

Step 4: Update the base URL to use HTTPS

Open a browser window and log into Stash using an administrator account. Go to the Stash administration area and click Server settings (under 'Settings'). Change Base URL to use HTTPS, for example, "https://stash.mycompany.com").

Using a self-signed certificate

There are two implications of using the self-signed certificate:

  • When you access Stash in a web browser, you can expect a warning to appear, alerting you that an un-trusted certificate is in use. Before proceeding you will have to indicate to the browser that you trust the certificate.
  • When you perform a Git clone operation, SSL verification will fail.
The SSL verification error message will look something like this:

error:14090086:SSL routines:SSL3_GET_SERVER_CERTIFICATE:certificate verify failed while accessing   https://justme@mycompany/git/TP/test.git

It's easy to fix. Turn SSL verification off for individual Git operations by setting the GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY environment variable. In Unix, you can set the variable in-line with Git commands as follows:

GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY=true git clone   https://justme@mycompany/git/TP/test.git

In Windows you have to set the variable in a separate shell statement:
set GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY=true
Once you have purchased and installed a signed certificate from a certificate authority, you will no longer have to include the GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY modifier.
 

 

 

 

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