An API to provision custom hostnames with SSL
We launched an API for custom hostnames today. A simple HTTP post with a hostname gets a temp hostname with CNAME/a record instructions, as soon as DNS is setup we issue SSL and start accepting traffic for that hostname. It's the quickest way we know of to provision custom hostnames: https://fly.io/mix/custom-hostnames/ When we started building Fly, we figured it was too late to "make SSL easy and the customers will come". Lets Encrypt changed the world, and we knew many companies rolling their own SSL support with nginx, Traefik, etc, etc. It seemed like a…
What it does
In the maker’s words, at launch
We launched an API for custom hostnames today. A simple HTTP post with a hostname gets a temp hostname with CNAME/a record instructions, as soon as DNS is setup we issue SSL and start accepting traffic for that hostname. It's the quickest way we know of to provision custom hostnames: https://fly.io/mix/custom-hostnames/ When we started building Fly, we figured it was too late to "make SSL easy and the customers will come". Lets Encrypt changed the world, and we knew many companies rolling their own SSL support with nginx, Traefik, etc, etc. It seemed like a solved problem. It turns out that SSL is still a pain, particularly companies with lots of hostnames pointed at them ... anyone hosting apps/content on behalf of their own customers. Distributing certificates, keeping them renewed, and — most of all‚ making https fast is still hard. Devs can solve the basic problem in a week or so with a proxy, but then it sits, and no one feels very comfy with untouched infrastructure. And it's usually something distracting devs from more important work that's core to their own customers. So this is our way of solving that problem. We can handle any number of hostnames for applications, devs can spend more timeon what makes their apps special. It's a relatively "simple" use of what we've built, but solves a really fundamental problem for a many companies. It's the most fun thing we've discovered this year. So, if you're building an app, and serve stuff on behalf of your users, we can make your life easier: https://fly.io/mix/custom-hostnames/
Does the same job
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- BIBackname.io – every IP address gets its own domain2023 · backname.io · ▲46
I was setting up tests involving DNS resolution recently, where something like 127.0.0.1.service.foo would have been tremendously useful. Back in the day, I'd have used xip.io - but sadly that service died. Well, every excuse is a good one when it comes to writing a DNS server! Backname.io joins nip.io and sslip.io in the wildcard DNS game.
- IBI built a DNS resolver from scratch in Rust – no DNS librariesApr 2026 · github.com · ▲115
I built a DNS resolver that lets me use https://frontend.numa instead of localhost:5173 — auto-generated TLS certs, WebSocket passthrough, path routing. No mkcert, no nginx, no /etc/hosts.

- DNDomain Name Search with AI2022 · ▲313
In my exploration of OpenAI, I just created a domain-name search that takes business description as an input, and generates interesting domain names for it. It then uses DNSimple API to check if .com is available. In my view it is a much easier way to find a suitable domain, as the AI thinks of a much large pool of possible names than my own brain. SmartyNames found its own name, using the tool itself. Hope you enjoy it! https://smartynames.com/
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