EMQTT client configuration for mTLS

I tested the certificates with openssl tool as well. Based on that PKI part is ok. mTLS works. But how to configure this with emqtt is now a mistery to me.

As mentioned on slack many of those setting need to be charlists instead of binaries based on the specs on the emqtt repo and ones pointed to on OTP:

• host
• ssl_opts → all …_file ones

You can prefix the quoted values with ~c"…" to make them charlists.

clientid is speced as iodata, which is a supertype to binary, so that one is fine.

I did that as well.

config :testko, :emqtt,
  host: ~c"prefix.mydomain.com",
  port: 8883,
  clientid: "testko",
  clean_start: false,
  ssl: true,
  ssl_opts: [
    cacertfile: ~c"certs/ca-chain.cert.pem",
    certfile:
      ~c"certs/client-nemo_gw_3.cert.pem",
    keyfile:
      ~c"certs/client-nemo_gw_3.key.pem",
    tls_versions: [:"tlsv1.2", :"tlsv1.3"],
    verify: :verify_peer,
    log_level: :debug,
    server_name_indication: ~c"prefix.mydomain.com",
    # depth: 3,
    customize_hostname_check: [
      match_fun: :public_key.pkix_verify_hostname_match_fun(:https)
    ],
    fail_if_no_peer_cert: true
  ],
  name: :emqtt,
  reconnect: true,
  reconnect_interval: 10000

And this still don’t work. Though now I get bunch of messages like this - reconnecting

➜  testko git:(drugi) ✗ iex -S mix
Erlang/OTP 27 [erts-15.0.1] [source] [64-bit] [smp:10:10] [ds:10:10:10] [async-threads:1] [jit]


10:05:26.241 [info] Starting MQTT Supervisor

10:05:26.243 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.254 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.254 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds
Interactive Elixir (1.17.2) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)

10:05:26.382 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.382 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.382 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds

10:05:26.442 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.442 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.442 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds

10:05:26.497 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.497 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.497 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds

10:05:26.553 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.554 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.554 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds

10:05:26.602 [info] Starting MQTT Client

10:05:26.602 [info] Client ID set to: testko

10:05:26.602 [debug] Timer set to 5000 milliseconds

I have not used emqtt, but have 2 thoughts to try:

• Use absolute paths instead of relative to rule out file structure inconsistency. Or even use the DER format there instead of files just to get it working
• Many brokers only allow one connection at a time. When I see things seem to connect and then disconnect without much else, it’s usually because the same cert and/or client ID is already connected elsewhere and the broker ungracefully kicks the connection. This could be some test process already connect elsewhere (ie on host) or multiple processes trying to make the connection and getting in each others way

Outside of that, I’m unsure. I think we need the SSL debug logs here to maybe be useful. Or reach out to the library maintainers. There is nothing different starting it on server, host, or nerves device

This is now what works. I found the right configuration.

config :testko, :emqtt,
  host: "prefix.mydomain.com",
  port: 8883,
  clientid: "testko",
  clean_start: false,
  ssl: true,
  ssl_opts: [
    cacertfile: ~c"/root/certificates/ca-chain.cert.pem",
    certfile: ~c"/root/certificates/client-nemo_gw_1.cert.pem",
    keyfile: ~c"/root/certificates/client-nemo_gw_1.key.pem",
    tls_versions: [:"tlsv1.2", :"tlsv1.3"],
    verify: :verify_peer,
    server_name_indication: ~c"prefix.mydomain.com"
  ],
  name: :emqtt,
  reconnect: true,
  reconnect_interval: 10000

Thanks for the help.