Attempting manual process; cloned from Git, installed Python, virtualenv, but obviously missing a step or more

Help
1

I am attempting to run letsencrypt locally on my win10 PC. I have successfully installed Git and cloned letsencrypt. I also have Python 2.7 installed and have created virtualenv successfully. But I’m not sure how to make it work now.

When I launch GitBash and run letsencrypt from there, I get the following error:

“sudo” is not available, will use “su” for installation steps…
grep: /etc/os-release: No such file or directory
grep: /etc/issue: No such file or directory
Sorry, I don’t know how to bootstrap Let’s Encrypt on your operating system!

You will need to bootstrap, configure virtualenv, and run a pip install manually
Please see https://letsencrypt.readthedocs.org/en/latest/contributing.html#prerequisites
for more info
Creating virtual environment…

But that last line says I am creating a virtual environment, yet is not executing. What am I missing?

Thanks.

2

The ‘official’ client doesn’t work under windows - see windows link so probably well worth trying one of the third party clients for windows.

3

Okay, then I am misunderstanding the virtual environment – I thought it would be self-contained regardless of platform, allowing letsencrypt to execute.