Articles
Plain-English guides to certificates and web trust — written for people who need a clear answer first and the technical detail second.
What is an SSL certificate? What certificates actually do, who issues them, and what browsers check before showing the padlock. SSL vs TLS: what is the difference? Why everyone still says SSL, what TLS changed, and which term you should use where. Why certificates expire — and how renewal works Certificate lifetimes, ACME and Let’s Encrypt, paid CAs, and how to stop expiry taking your site down. Common SSL errors explained The NET::ERR_CERT_* family in plain English — what each browser error means and how to fix it. Wildcard vs SAN certificates How one certificate covers many names, and how to choose between wildcards and SAN lists. How to check when an SSL certificate expires Four ways to read a certificate’s expiry date — in your browser, with our checker, and from the command line.
Looking for protocol-level depth — TLS versions, cipher suites, handshakes? That lives on tls.studio.