SortPEM

Sorting utility for PEM files. Failing to remember what order to put the certificate and its intermediates in? And what intermediate should we include? Wonder no longer, and let sortpem resolve the chain for you.

It is assumed your system receives software updates, and it has a recent copy of the trusted certificate bundle for your operating system. sortpem does not provide root certificates; there are many sources out there that can provide you that information.

If you wish to use a custom trusted roots bundle (in PEM format), you can pass the -ca <file> flag to sortpem.

Options

Most of the flags are compatible with the sort(1) utility:

-D    Enable debug logging
-a    Output all blocks, not only the ones matching -t
-c    Count blocks
-ca string
      CA file
-d    Dump text output of decoded PEM block
-o string
      Print the output to a file in stead of standard output
-p string
      Preset (use "list" for an overview)
-r    Reverse sort
-root
      Include root certificate
-s    Stable sort
-t value
      Type of block order and filter (regular expression(s))
-u    Unique blocks

Presets

There are presets available that sets a combination of default options based on the chose preset:

certs    -t "^CERTIFICATE$" -R
keys     -t "PRIVATE KEY$"
nginx    -t "^CERTIFICATE$" -t "PRIVATE KEY$"
haproxy  -t "^CERTIFICATE$" -t "PRIVATE KEY$" -R

Example

Sort a PEM bundle, CERTIFICATEs first, then any PRIVATE KEY:

user@host:~$ ls -1 testdata/*.crt testdata/endpoint.key
testdata/endpoint.crt
testdata/endpoint.key 
testdata/intermediate.crt 
testdata/issuer.crt 
testdata/root.crt

# We have a self-signed root:
user@host:~$ openssl x509 -in testdata/root.crt -noout -subject -issuer
subject= /CN=Test Root
issuer= /CN=Test Root

# By default, the root certificate is omitted (enabled -d which decodes blocks):
user@host:~$ cat testdata/*.crt testdata/endpoint.key | sortpem -d | grep Subject:
  Subject:    CN=endpoint.example.org,L=IL
  Subject:    CN=Test Intermediate
  Subject:    CN=Test Issuer

# We can include it, with -root:
user@host:~$ cat testdata/*.crt testdata/endpoint.key | sortpem -root -d | grep Subject:
  Subject:    CN=endpoint.example.org,L=IL
  Subject:    CN=Test Intermediate
  Subject:    CN=Test Issuer
  Subject:    CN=Test Root

# The private key is in there too, by the way:
user@host:~$ cat testdata/*.crt testdata/endpoint.key | sortpem -root | grep 'BEGIN '
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY-----

# Download a public certificate:
user@host:~$ echo "" | openssl s_client -connect google.com:443 -showcerts > testdata/google.com.crt
depth=1 C = US, O = Google Trust Services, CN = Google Internet Authority G3
verify error:num=20:unable to get local issuer certificate
verify return:0
DONE

# It sent us 2 certificates:
user@host:~$ grep -c 'BEGIN CERTIFICATE' testdata/google.com.crt
2

# Inspect them:
user@host:~$ sortpem -d testdata/google.com.crt | grep Subject:
  Subject:    CN=*.google.com,O=Google LLC,L=Mountain View,ST=California,C=US
  Subject:    CN=Google Internet Authority G3,O=Google Trust Services,C=US

# Get the full chain, including root:
user@host:~$ sortpem -root -d testdata/google.com.crt | grep Subject:
  Subject:    CN=*.google.com,O=Google LLC,L=Mountain View,ST=California,C=US
  Subject:    CN=Google Internet Authority G3,O=Google Trust Services,C=US
  Subject:    CN=GlobalSign,OU=GlobalSign Root CA - R2,O=GlobalSign