Solved: SSL not installing on Ant Media Server

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If you needed to embed your streams on a third-party website with a domain name that has SSL integrated into it, you would also need to make sure you have an SSL certificate and a domain name configured on your Ant Media server instance.

And if you don’t have an SSL certificate configured on Ant Media server, and when you try to embed your streams on other sites that have SSL certificates on their domains, these streams are likely not to play.

Now, if you’ve tried to configure SSL on Ant Media and it has failed, there are a couple of reasons that can explain this. Let’s break them down in detail;

The Domain Name wasn’t added correctly

Installing an SSL certificate on Ant Media is only possible if you’ve successfully pointed your choice domain to the server IP address on which Ant Media server is running. This means that if you purchased the domain from a third-party vendor, you need to make sure you change its nameservers by replacing them with the nameservers provided by your VPS or DNS hosting provider. Inside your VPS server management console, you need to confirm if your VPS provider offers DNS hosting; to enable you to create the necessary DNS records.

In summary, during the process of pointing your domain name, make sure the following checklist is put into consideration:

Create DNS Records

As we said above, to successfully point your domain to the Ant Media server IP address, you will need to first confirm if your VPS provider offers the DNS hosting service. DNS hosting allows you to create and add your domain name by setting up the appropriate DNS records.

Assuming your VPS provider offers DNS hosting, here is a simple setup for the DNS records you will need to create;

Record Type	Name	Content	TTL
A	@	178.09.23.78	Auto
A	*.	178.09.23.78	Auto
CNAME	www	yourdomain.com.	Auto

Configuring Custom Nameserver Settings

Most importantly, if your VPS provider offers the DNS hosting service, then they will also assign you the nameservers you’re supposed to use.

At the basic level, you’re supposed to change the nameservers from where your domain was purchased from. In other words, you will need to log into your domain account and find the custom DNS or Nameserver change settings. And then, you will need to copy and paste the nameservers provided to you by your VPS hosting provider.

To emphasize it again, these nameservers have to be added to the custom nameserver settings of your domain using the domain purchase account.

DNS Hosting with Cloudflare

Assuming you’re using Cloudflare to host your DNS records, then you will need to create an account with them or log in. Now you will need to add your domain name to Cloudflare, and so, you will be assigned Cloudflare nameservers that will be used in your Domain Name custom Nameserver settings we talked about earlier.

After you’ve set up the Cloudflare nameservers in your Domain account, you will need to go back to Cloudflare to complete the configurations by creating the appropriate DNS records as seen in the example below;

Record Type	Name	Content	TTL	Proxy Status
A	@	178.09.23.78	Auto	DNS Only
A	*.	178.09.23.78	Auto	DNS Only
CNAME	www	yourdomain.com.	Auto	DNS Only

Please note that in some cases, when you’re using third-party DNS hosting services like Cloudflare or Amazon route 53, and if you wanted to install an SSL certificate, you would be required to create a TXT DNS record to verify the ownership of your domain. The SSL certificate provider would want to know if you’re the owner of the domain you’re trying to configure. This step usually applies if you’re using third-party DNS hosting services.

Your Domain name has not yet propagated

If you correctly configured your domain and added the custom nameservers, but still you can’t install an SSL certificate on Ant media, the problem could be because the domain name you’re using in this process has not yet propagated.

By definition, Domain name propagation is the process by which changes made to your domain name’s DNS (Domain Name System) records are provisioned or spread across the Internet.

This works in such a way that when you register a new domain name or make changes to the DNS records of an existing domain, such as updating the IP address associated with the domain or changing the name servers, it takes some time for these changes to be reflected universally. This delay occurs because the DNS information is cached or temporarily stored by various DNS servers, and it takes time for these caches to update with the new information.

During the propagation period, different DNS servers around the world update their records to reflect the changes made to the domain name. This process usually takes a few hours but can sometimes take up to 24-48 hours or longer, depending on the TTL (Time-to-Live) value set for the DNS records and the DNS caching behavior of various ISPs (Internet Service Providers) and DNS resolvers.

To help you understand if your Domain is successfully pointing to the right IP address of your server, you can use tools like DNS checker.

You’re not in the right Ant Media Directory

Ant Media natively ships with an SSL installation script, enable_ssl.sh. To execute this script, you need to first locate it in the Ant Media directory, which is;

cd /usr/local/antmedia

When you’re inside the Ant Media directory, you will need to run the ls command to confirm if the SSL installation script is available as seen below;

So, if you confirm that the SSL installation script is available, then you will need to execute it by running the following command on your server terminal;

sudo ./enable_ssl.sh -d example.com

Make sure you use your domain name instead of using example.com as indicated in the above command.

Appropriate Firewall ports are not open

In our experience with Ant Media server, we’ve come to learn that the installation of an SSL certificate is likely to fail if critical Ant Media ports are not set up through the firewall. Basically, Ant Media needs a couple of ports to be opened to allow various services and functionalities to work.

Here is a detailed guide you need to read to understand which Ant Media ports are supposed to be opened using the firewall.

You’re running an outdated or older Ant Media version

Another reason that may explain why the SSL certificate is failing to install on Ant Media is because of running an older version of the software, which is likely to be causing compatibility issues. The Ant Media software is frequently updated and new builds are always released from their GitHub profiles.

Now, you will need to try upgrading or updating your Ant media by taking a couple of steps as we explained in this article. Doing this may help you to fix the problem.

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