Applications - CertForge

An Application record in CertForge represents a service or system that consumes certificates. It ties a hostname to an owner, an environment, and optionally a preferred Trust Profile — making cert ownership explicit and expiry notifications actionable.

Why applications matter

Without an application record, CertForge can issue and track certificates, but there is no defined owner to notify when they approach expiry. Applications also serve as the parent record for App Connectors — you cannot create an App Connector for a hostname without an Application record.

What an Application record contains

Field	Description
Name	Human-readable service name (e.g., `nginx-prod`, `api-gateway`).
Primary hostname	The main domain this application serves (e.g., `fun.example.com`).
Additional hostnames	Other domains this application owns.
Environment	`production`, `staging`, `development`, or custom.
Owner emails	One or more people notified on expiry warnings, renewal failures, and cert events.
Preferred Trust Profile	Default DTP used when requesting certificates for this application.
GL code	Optional cost attribution.
Notes	Free-form description.

Create an Application

Via the UI

Navigate to Applications in the sidebar.
Click New Application.
Enter a Name and Primary Hostname.
Set the Environment (production for live systems).
Add at least one Owner Email — this person receives expiry notifications.
Optionally select a Preferred Trust Profile matching the hostname.
Save.

Via MCP (AI agent)

"Create an application for fun.example.com, owner john@example.com, production"

The AI calls create_application in two steps — preview then confirm:

Step 1: Preview shown
Step 2: "Create it" → executes with dry_run=false, confirmed=true

Required parameters: name, primary_hostname, owner_emails (array)

Notifications

Owners listed on an Application receive email alerts when:

A certificate is within the expiry warning window (configurable in Settings → Notifications)
A certificate renewal fails
An App Connector reports an installation error
An approval request is created for a cert on this application’s hostname

See Notifications for alert configuration.

App Connectors and Applications

An App Connector must be linked to an Application. The connector uses the Application’s Trust Profile preference to know which DTP to request certs under. When you create an App Connector via the MCP agent, it looks up or creates an Application record for the domain automatically.

Querying applications

"List all production applications"
→ list_applications(environment="production")

"Who owns fun.example.com?"
→ get_application(name="nginx-prod")
  or
→ check_domain(domain="fun.example.com")  — includes application section

​Why applications matter

​What an Application record contains

​Create an Application

​Via the UI

​Via MCP (AI agent)

​Notifications

​App Connectors and Applications

​Querying applications