I have used MakeCert a while back to issue my dev box a certificate.  Then I could browse with https://localhost…. no problem.  But I was only testing with IE.  I tried it with FireFox and received a dialog box with the error: “Error establishing an encrypted connection to localhost. Error Code: -8183”.  If I made the request from a different machine to my development box SSL communications worked fine.  And I could initiate SSL traffic from my dev box to external SSL locations.  I search and found many issues but those issues never quoted the -8183 code but some codes very close.  But the underlying theme was a bad certificate.  So I started searching my emails and file system with X1 and found Cory’s post about using MakeCert.  In the past I have followed his lead but It always took a while.  Actually I remember finding MakeCert.exe to be a problem.  This time I decided to use the SelfSSL.exe tool that is located in the IIS 6.0 Resource Kit.  A quick look through X1 revealed I am storing the installation of the IIS 6.0 Resource Kit.  So I installed it.  First I removed my current cert from IIS.  Then I ran the following: “SelfSSL.exe /T /V:700”.  That is it.  /T adds the self-signed certificate to the “Trusted Certificates” list.  /V sets how long he cert is good for.  Default is 7 days.  I don’t want to worry about doing this again until I rebuild the machine.  Check out IIS and you will see the cert and 443 port enabled.

That was easy.

• Get IIS 6.0 Resource Kit.
• Run SelfSSL.exe /T /V:700 .   Use the shortcut from the Start | All Programs Menus