Registration of RedHat 6.2 server fails under SuseManager 3.0: "[Errno 14] Peer cert cannot be verified or peer cert invalid".

This document (7020969) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

SUSE Manager 3

Situation

Trying to register a Red Hat 6.2 (or previous RH 6.X versions) server to SUSE Manager 3.0 using salt fails.
Newer Red Hat versions may work though.

Resolution

The bootstrap script should be edited in order to make sure the following changes are applied:

ORG_GPG entry should be set:

ORG_PGP_KEY=ptf-gpg-pubkey-b37b98a9-5328792f.key,sle11-gpg-pubkey-307e3d54-53287cdc.key,res-gpg-pubkey-0182b964-4911a584.key,sle12-gpg-pubkey-39db7c82-510a966b.key,sle10-gpg-pubkey-9c800aca-53287d18.key,sle12-reserve-gpg-pubkey-50a3dd1c-50f35137.key

The following lines should be commented out:

#echo "* removing TLS certificate used for bootstrap"
#echo " (will be re-added via salt state)"
#removeTLSCertificate

Cause

The current bootstrap script has a section to remove the certificate and instead allow it to be salt maintained.

While this is a nice thought, right now it causes the issue described for traditional clients.

In addition, outdated versions of openssl can also cause this SSL certificate error. Unless a newer version of openssl is installed, the problem cannot be bypassed.

More information available in this related TID:

https://www.suse.com/support/kb/doc/?id=000018859

Additional Information

The full output of the registration will be similar to this:

CHECKING THE REGISTRATION STACK
-------------------------------------------------
* check for necessary packages being installed...
* client codebase is res-6
package salt is not installed
package salt-minion is not installed
* going to install missing packages...
WARNING: cannot verify XXXXXX’s certificate, issued by “/C=GB/ST=xxx/L=yyy/O=zzz/OU=IT/CN=aaa.bbb.ccc.com”:
Unable to locally verify the issuer’s authority.
2017-05-25 16:57:13 URL:https://aaa.bbb.ccc.com/pub/repositories/res/6/bootstrap/repodata/repomd.xml [1509/1509] -> "repomd.xml" [1]
FINISHED --2017-05-25 16:57:13--
Downloaded: 1 files, 1.5K in 0s (2811 GB/s)
adding client software repository at https://aaa.bbb.ccc.com/pub/repositories/res/6/bootstrap
Loaded plugins: product-id, refresh-packagekit, subscription-manager
This system is not registered to Red Hat Subscription Management. You can use subscription-manager to register.
Setting up Install Process
https://aaa.bbb.ccc.com/pub/repositories/res/6/bootstrap/repodata/repomd.xml: [Errno 14] Peer cert cannot be verified or peer cert invalid
Trying other mirror.
It was impossible to connect to the Red Hat servers.
This could mean a connectivity issue in your environment, such as the requirement to configure a proxy,
or a transparent proxy that tampers with TLS security, or an incorrect system clock.

Disclaimer

This Support Knowledgebase provides a valuable tool for SUSE customers and parties interested in our products and solutions to acquire information, ideas and learn from one another. Materials are provided for informational, personal or non-commercial use within your organization and are presented "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.