Let's say you are trying to do something with certbot, such as using the certbot certonly command to request a new certificate, and The requested plugin does not appear to be installed is being returned.

~]$ sudo certbot certonly --dns-route53 --domains "example.com"
Saving debug log to /var/log/letsencrypt/letsencrypt.log
The requested dns-route53 plugin does not appear to be installed

There are a few different ways that Certbot may have been installed, and checking for installed plugins is dependent on how Certbot was installed. Here are some ways that Certbot may have been installed.

• Via a Linux package manager such as apt-get or dnf or yum
• Via pip
• Via snapd
• In a Docker container

If Certbot was installed with snap, the snap list command can be used to determine if the plugin is installed.

~]$ snap list
Name                 Version    Rev    Tracking       Publisher     Notes
certbot              2.6.0      3024   latest/stable  certbot-eff✓  classic
certbot-dns-multi    4.13.3     77     latest/stable  i-alez-o      -
certbot-dns-route53  2.6.0      2607   latest/stable  certbot-eff✓  -
core                 16-2.59.5  15511  latest/stable  canonical✓    core
core20               20230622   1974   latest/stable  canonical✓    base

If Certbot was installed with pip, the pip list command can be used to determine if the plugin is installed.

~]$ pip list
Package             Version
------------------- ---------
certbot             2.6.0
certbot-dns-godaddy 0.2.2
certbot-dns-route53 2.6.0
certbot-route53     0.2.

If Certbot was installed with a package manager, the apt-get install or dnf install or yum install command can be used to install the plugin.

~]$ sudo dnf install python3-certbot-dns-route53

The certbot plugins command can be used to list the plugins certbot has loaded.

~]$ certbot plugins

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* dns-godaddy
Description: Obtain certificates using a DNS TXT record (if you are using
godaddy for DNS).
Interfaces: Authenticator, Plugin
Entry point: dns-godaddy = certbot_dns_godaddy:Authenticator

* dns-route53
Description: Obtain certificates using a DNS TXT record (if you are using AWS
Route53 for DNS).
Interfaces: Authenticator, Plugin
Entry point: dns-route53 =
certbot_dns_route53._internal.dns_route53:Authenticator

* standalone
Description: Runs an HTTP server locally which serves the necessary validation
files under the /.well-known/acme-challenge/ request path. Suitable if there is
no HTTP server already running. HTTP challenge only (wildcards not supported).
Interfaces: Authenticator, Plugin
Entry point: standalone = certbot._internal.plugins.standalone:Authenticator

* webroot
Description: Saves the necessary validation files to a
.well-known/acme-challenge/ directory within the nominated webroot path. A
seperate HTTP server must be running and serving files from the webroot path.
HTTP challenge only (wildcards not supported).
Interfaces: Authenticator, Plugin
Entry point: webroot = certbot._internal.plugins.webroot:Authenticator
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