what is $use_local_certs ?

[dmikester1]

I am working on implementing IPN on my site.  I downloaded the sample code for PHP from https://github.com/paypal/ipn-code-samples.  Now I don't understand the variable:

private $use_local_certs = true;

The documentation describing this is not very clear to me.  What should this be set to for testing vs production?  Should I be using the cert folder in production or is that only for testing?

Thanks

Mike