CI run on the d8aa3fc push surfaced two real failures rooted in the
2026-05-04 docs overhaul:
1. G-3 env-docs-drift caught two phantom CERTCTL_* env vars I'd
introduced in the Phase 4 follow-on connector pages
(CERTCTL_CA_CERT_PATH_NEW in adcs.md was a placeholder I made
up; CERTCTL_EJBCA_POLL_MAX_WAIT_SECONDS in ejbca.md does not
exist in source). Both removed.
2. QA-doc Part-count drift guard tried to grep
docs/qa-test-guide.md and docs/testing-guide.md, both of which
were renamed/deleted in Phase 2/Phase 5. The Part-count drift
class died with testing-guide.md (Phase 5 prune dispersed its
content); the seed-count drift class is still live but pointed
at the wrong path.
Fixes:
- Removed the QA-doc Part-count drift guard from ci.yml (premise
dead) plus its standalone scripts/qa-doc-part-count.sh peer.
- Retargeted the QA-doc seed-count drift guard from
docs/qa-test-guide.md → docs/contributor/qa-test-suite.md (the
Phase 2 target). Updated both ci.yml inline copy and
scripts/qa-doc-seed-count.sh.
- Updated Makefile qa-stats: target to drop the testing-guide.md
Parts metric (file is gone).
- Updated Makefile verify-docs: target to drop the part-count step.
G-3 was also failing in the second direction (env vars defined in
config.go but never documented anywhere). 16 vars surfaced —
features.md (deleted Phase 6) and testing-guide.md (deleted Phase 5)
had been their canonical home. Created
docs/reference/configuration.md as the new home: a compact
operator-facing env-var reference covering scheduler intervals, job
lifecycle, rate limiting, audit, deploy verify, database,
agent-side, and SCEP profile binding. Added to docs/README.md
Reference table.
Doc-side updates to qa-test-suite.md to reframe its references to
the deleted testing-guide.md (it's now self-contained: the
Part-by-Part Coverage Map IS the canonical Part inventory).
Cosmetic comment-only updates in ci.yml + scripts/ci-guards/*.sh +
scripts/dev-setup.sh to point at the new audience-organized doc
paths (docs/operator/security.md, docs/operator/tls.md,
docs/reference/architecture.md, etc.) instead of the pre-Phase-2
flat layout.
Verified: all 24 ci-guards/*.sh pass locally; qa-doc-seed-count.sh
clean. Net diff: 178 additions / 112 deletions across 13 files.
One file deleted (qa-doc-part-count.sh) and one file added
(docs/reference/configuration.md).
5.2 KiB
Configuration Reference
Last reviewed: 2026-05-05
Compact reference for CERTCTL_* environment variables consumed by
certctl-server and certctl-agent. Most operators don't need to
touch these — defaults are tuned for the common case. Reach for them
when the system's behaviour needs tuning beyond what's exposed in the
GUI / API.
This page enumerates the operator-tunable knobs that don't have a
dedicated home elsewhere. Connector-specific env vars are documented
on the per-connector pages under
docs/reference/connectors/. Protocol env
vars (ACME server, EST, SCEP) are documented under
docs/reference/protocols/. TLS env vars are
documented in docs/operator/tls.md.
Scheduler intervals
The scheduler runs N background loops; intervals are tunable for performance / contention tuning.
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_SCHEDULER_AGENT_HEALTH_CHECK_INTERVAL |
2m |
How often the agent-health loop scans for stale heartbeats and transitions agents to Unhealthy / Offline. |
CERTCTL_SCHEDULER_JOB_PROCESSOR_INTERVAL |
30s |
How often the job-processor loop dispatches Pending jobs to agents. |
CERTCTL_SCHEDULER_NOTIFICATION_PROCESS_INTERVAL |
1m |
How often the notification-dispatcher loop fans out queued alerts to channels. |
CERTCTL_SHORT_LIVED_EXPIRY_CHECK_INTERVAL |
5m |
How often the short-lived-expiry loop watches certs whose TTL is less than 1h for imminent expiry. |
For the full scheduler topology (12 loops, 8 always-on + 4 opt-in)
see architecture.md "Scheduler topology".
Job lifecycle
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_JOB_AWAITING_CSR_TIMEOUT |
24h |
How long a job stays in AwaitingCSR before the scheduler marks it Failed (the agent never picked it up). |
Rate limiting
The control plane API is rate-limited by default; tune for high-volume environments (mass-rotation events, bulk imports).
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_RATE_LIMIT_ENABLED |
true |
Master toggle. Disable only for trusted-network single-tenant deploys where the API is firewall-protected. |
CERTCTL_RATE_LIMIT_PER_USER_RPS |
0 (= use global default) |
Per-user requests-per-second cap. Zero opts each user into the global default in internal/api/middleware. |
CERTCTL_RATE_LIMIT_PER_USER_BURST |
0 (= use global default) |
Per-user token-bucket burst size. Same opt-in semantics. |
Audit trail
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_AUDIT_FLUSH_TIMEOUT_SECONDS |
30 |
How long the audit-event flush worker waits for the buffered batch to drain before forcing a flush at shutdown. |
Deploy verification
The deploy-hardening primitive wraps every cert deploy in atomic-write + post-verify + rollback. These env vars tune the post-deploy TLS verification phase.
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_VERIFY_DEPLOYMENT |
true |
Master toggle for post-deploy TLS verify. Disable only for connectors / environments where the verify endpoint is not reachable from the agent. |
CERTCTL_VERIFY_DELAY |
2s |
How long to wait after the reload command completes before the first verify-handshake attempt (gives the daemon time to pick up new keys). |
CERTCTL_VERIFY_TIMEOUT |
10s |
Per-attempt TLS-handshake timeout. |
CERTCTL_DEPLOY_BACKUP_RETENTION |
3 |
How many .certctl-bak.<unix-nanos>.<ext> rollback snapshots to keep per target after a successful deploy. 0 uses the default of 3; -1 opts out of pruning entirely. |
For the full deploy contract see
deployment-model.md.
Database
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_DATABASE_MIGRATIONS_PATH |
./migrations |
Filesystem path to the *.up.sql / *.down.sql migration set. Override only when running certctl-server from a non-standard layout. |
Agent
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_AGENT_ID |
(none — required) | The agent's unique ID, issued by POST /api/v1/agents/register and bundled into the agent's registration response. Pass via this env var when the agent runs as a systemd unit / container without the -agent-id CLI flag. |
SCEP profile binding (single-profile back-compat)
| Variable | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
CERTCTL_SCEP_PROFILE_ID |
(empty) | Optional certificate profile ID for the legacy single-profile SCEP path. The multi-profile path uses CERTCTL_SCEP_PROFILES=<list> + CERTCTL_SCEP_PROFILE_<NAME>_PROFILE_ID instead — see scep-server.md. |
Related references
architecture.md— scheduler topology, system design, security modeldeployment-model.md— atomic write + verify + rollback contractoperator/security.md— full security posture (auth, rate limits, encryption at rest)operator/tls.md— control-plane TLS env vars- Per-connector pages under
reference/connectors/for connector-specific config - Per-protocol pages under
reference/protocols/for ACME / SCEP / EST / CRL+OCSP / async-CA polling