Puppet server hostname does not match certificate - can't authenticate. How to disable puppet authentication?

Question

I am having issues with getting the puppet agent to authenticate the master.

On the agent, I first did sudo puppet agent --test

info: Creating a new SSL key for m-agent-2
info: Caching certificate for ca
info: Creating a new SSL certificate request for m-agent-2
info: Certificate Request fingerprint (md5): 43:30:57:53:5B:20:F7:12:CD:94:59:17:12:28:68:A4

Then on the master I did sudo puppet cert list and got

"m-agent-2" (43:30:57:53:5B:20:F7:12:CD:94:59:17:12:28:68:A4)

Then I did sudo puppet cert sign m-agent-2, which returned

notice: Signed certificate request for m-agent-2
notice: Removing file Puppet::SSL::CertificateRequest m-agent-2 at                 
'/var/lib/puppet/ssl/ca/requests/m-agent-2.pem'

Then I did sudo puppet agent --test, which returned

info: Caching certificate for m-agent-2
err: Could not retrieve catalog from remote server: Server hostname 'puppet' did not match server certificate; expected master-node-1
warning: Not using cache on failed catalog
err: Could not retrieve catalog; skipping run
err: Could not send report: Server hostname 'puppet' did not match server certificate; expected master-node-1

The conf file contains the line in both certname = master-node-1 in both [main] and [master] sections. I have regenerated the master's certificate by doing

sudo find $(puppet master --configprint ssldir) -name "$(puppet master --configprint certname).pem" -delete   
sudo puppet master --no-daemonize --verbose

Also, my /etc/hosts file contains the lines 10.20.32.10 learn.localdomain learn puppet.localdomain puppet and I can ping both puppet and puppet.learn from the agent.

However I still get the same issue. Is there some way to fix this. Or disable authentication in puppet all together. Both the master and the slave nodes are running Ubuntu 12.04 and I am running puppet 2.7.11. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Solution

Your client's expecting the master to have the hostname puppet, per its server configuration in puppet.conf - that's the default, so if you don't have a server configured then it's using puppet. The master's SSL certificate must be valid for that name, or the client will refuse to connect.

Normally, the master generates a certificate that's valid for its own hostname and the puppet hostname, by using subject alternative names.. but having an explicit certname in the master's puppet.conf might be overriding this. Verify by checking puppet cert --list master-node-1 - it should have something like (alt names: "puppet") displayed after the certificate's thumbprint.

Correct this by either having your client pointed to the real hostname using its server config, or by having the server's cert valid for the hostname puppet.

Comments

[Robert]

or simply you're executing puppet without sudo or root...