(This ticket is on Fraser's wishlist, but is a potentially breaking behavioural change in some environments.)
Currently to validate a dnsName SAN, we look for an alternative principal (of the same service type as the "primary" subject principal). It is then check for CA ACLs, operator write access to userCertificate attribute, etc.
e.g. if primary principal is "HTTP/domain1.example.com@EXAMPLE.COM", and the CSR has a SAN dnsName for "domain2.example.com", then we look for "HTTP/domain2.example.com@EXAMPLE.COM" and, if found, check CA ACLs and write access.
This code is not straightforward, and the notion of adding a new principal object just so a cert with SANs can be issued is neither intuitive for users nor lightweight.
Fortunately, we are addressing this in #6295 where SAN processing will become aware of Kerberos principal aliases.
THIS ticket is about removing the "alternative principal" validation option. But, note that existing deployments with certs tracked that used the "alternative principal" validation will experience renewal failures if we remove this option. It is significant behavioural change and may break established processes.
I would like to remove it anyway :) I suppose this could get shot down as wontfix but I think it's worth discussing.
Metadata Update from @ftweedal: - Issue assigned to ftweedal - Issue set to the milestone: Future Releases
Counterexample to why we might NOT want to do this: https://pagure.io/freeipa/issue/7058.
Certainly we would want an alternative method to support a concept of "allowed SAN dnsNames", besides Kerberos principal aliases, before we remove this produced. Maybe we should not remove it at all, now that this counterexample has been shown.
Metadata Update from @ftweedal: - Issue close_status updated to: None
Metadata Update from @ftweedal: - Issue close_status updated to: wontfix - Issue status updated to: Closed (was: Open)
Closing WONTFIX. See https://pagure.io/freeipa/issue/7058 for more information (an alternative approach to 7058 is a prerequisite for resolving this ticket, but that ticket was also closed WONTFIX because there is no clear way forward).