Using PowerShell to Create Self-Signed Certificate - powershell

Question

I'm using code similar to that found here to create a self-signed certificate for use in IIS:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/vishalagarwal/archive/2009/08/22/generating-a-certificate-self-signed-using-powershell-and-certenroll-interfaces.aspx
Works fine except I want to give it a friendly name to make locating it easier when I want to assign the certificate to a dynamically created site.
Anyone know how to change the above to set the friendly name (I've tried what seemed obvious to no avail).
Got a better way to create a cert via PowerShell that does not prompt the user for information?
Followup on the script I am using - based on the url above but turned into a cmdlet:
function Add-SelfSignedCertificate
{
[CmdletBinding()]
param
(
[Parameter(Mandatory=$True, ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$True)]
[Alias('cn')]
[string]$CommonName
)
$name = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CX500DistinguishedName.1"
$name.Encode("CN=$CommonName", 0)
$key = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CX509PrivateKey.1"
$key.ProviderName = "Microsoft RSA SChannel Cryptographic Provider"
$key.KeySpec = 1
$key.Length = 1024
$key.SecurityDescriptor = "D:PAI(A;;0xd01f01ff;;;SY)(A;;0xd01f01ff;;;BA)(A;;0x80120089;;;NS)"
$key.MachineContext = 1
$key.Create()
$serverauthoid = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CObjectId.1"
$serverauthoid.InitializeFromValue("1.3.6.1.5.5.7.3.1")
$ekuoids = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CObjectIds.1"
$ekuoids.add($serverauthoid)
$ekuext = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CX509ExtensionEnhancedKeyUsage.1"
$ekuext.InitializeEncode($ekuoids)
$cert = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CX509CertificateRequestCertificate.1"
$cert.InitializeFromPrivateKey(2, $key, "")
$cert.Subject = $name
$cert.Issuer = $cert.Subject
$cert.NotBefore = get-date
$cert.NotAfter = $cert.NotBefore.AddDays(90)
$cert.X509Extensions.Add($ekuext)
$cert.Encode()
$enrollment = new-object -com "X509Enrollment.CX509Enrollment.1"
$enrollment.InitializeFromRequest($cert)
$certdata = $enrollment.CreateRequest(0)
$enrollment.InstallResponse(2, $certdata, 0, "")
}

Answer 1

It might not help for your specific use, but there is a new Powershell CmdLet installed in Windows 8.1 and Server 2012 that is pretty quick and easy to use:
New-SelfSignedCertificate [-CertStoreLocation <String> ] [-CloneCert <Certificate> ] [-DnsName <String> ] [-Confirm] [-WhatIf] [ <CommonParameters>]
More details can be found here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/pkiclient/new-selfsignedcertificate?view=win10-ps
In my usage, the friendly name of the cert has always been set as the first DnsName specified in the CmdLet.
Example that places the certificate in your Local Computer's Personal store:
New-SelfSignedCertificate -CertStoreLocation cert:\LocalMachine\My -DnsName www.example.com
Note: Powershell has to be started with admin rights for this to work.

Answer 2

You can set the CertificateFriendlyName directly in you code, you just need to know where to do it:
$enrollment.InitializeFromRequest($cert)
$enrollment.CertificateFriendlyName = 'whatever'
$certdata = $enrollment.CreateRequest(0)
$key has a FriendlyName but I don't see that showing up anywhere so I don't think it helps you.

Answer 3

Scott Hanselman wrote up a nice blog post on how to create a self-signed cert using the SDK tool makecert.exe. That tool looks to be a good bit easer to use than the code in the post you reference. With makecert.exe you can use the -n option to specify a subject name. I've used that subject name to refer to the certificate in other tools like signtool.exe. Although, I've found that subject names don't have to be unique so I tend to use the Thumbprint value which appears to be unique. Signtool will also accept a thumbprint (via the /sha1 parameter) to identify the cert.