How to Install Free Lets Encrypt SSL Certificate on GoDaddy Managed WordPress Hosting?

Question

I'm posting this question here along with an answer for reference in case anyone else is wondering how to install free SSL certificates from Let's Encrypt on GoDaddy Managed WordPress plans. The answer below is not 100% complete as I was unable to get it working 100% at the very end with certificate generation most likely because I was trying this on a Windows machine. You may have better luck working through the steps on a linux machine.

Answer 1

1. Install ssfhs or a FUSE (filesystem in user space) type of tool that allows you to mount remote file systems via SSH. You can use sshfs-win for Windows or possibly FUSE for macOS but I did this on Windows.

2. Open your Managed WordPress dashboard and locate your SSL credentials:

3. Open a command terminal on your local computer and execute the following command to mount the remote file system to your local machine:

Mac/Linux:

sshfs <username godaddy>@www.<domain>:/home/<username godaddy>/public_html/<domain> /tmp/mnt -o uid=1000 -o gid=1000 -o allow_other
sudo ./letsencrypt-auto certonly --webroot -w /tmp/mnt --agree-tos --redirect --duplicate --text --email <email> -d <domain> -d www.<domain>

Windows:

Navigate to My Computer and select Add a network location:

Follow the prompts to enter the path and specify your username and password when requested to do so.

Now navigate to the newly mounted drive at the command line and create a certificate for your website. For me it was mounted at drive Z:

Z:
cygwin
bash C:/Users/<USER>/Desktop/acme.sh-2.8.2/acme.sh issue --webroot -w Z:/ --accountemail <email> -d <domain> -d www.<domain>