Clarification Needed on VPN Bridge Setup on Windows Clients

[jerryzak]

Hello

Please take a look at the Wiki page for the VPN Bridging --> http://wiki.amahi.org/index.php/VPNBridge
The section that needs revising is at the very bottom and concerns specifying static IP for the client.

I have an older laptop with fresh install of Win XP SP3. As I am getting ready to take it on the road I decided to setup VPN connection to home HDA.

I went through the main Wiki page for VPN at http://wiki.amahi.org/index.php/VPN -- straightforward and not much here anyway.
Then I went through the Wiki page for the VPN Bridging instructions at http://wiki.amahi.org/index.php/VPNBridge -- again, everything went fairly smoothly.
[Would it be possible to create a canned script so noobs like me wouldn't have to worry about mistyping or copy & pasting wrong?]

In any case, after I was done I went across the street to my wife's office to try to connect.

Well, it didn't work and I got following response:
Options error: Unrecognized option or missing parameter(s) in HomeHDA.ovpn:16: ipconfig (2.1_rc15)
Use --help for more information.

After coming home it hit me -- being on a Windows machines I instinctively typed (or mistyped) ipconfig, which is useless for assigning IPs.

===

After little deliberation I decided to remove the ipconfig (mistyped ifconfig) line completely and see what happens.
Well... it went out and returned with a connection and a new dynamic IP lease.
Being on the inside of my home network I cannot tell (yet) whether I can "test" my connection (which I will within next day or two as I will take my laptop on the road).

At this point my impression is that the Wiki page on VPN Bridging will have to be clarified as to allow for Windows inadequacy in IP setting area.
I guess a note stating that the very last step is not intended for Windows clients will do.
Can anybody see any problems with letting HDA assign IPs dynamically for bridged VPN connections?

===

Last but not least... I used netsh utility to force static IP:
netsh interface ip set address name="Local Area Connection X" static 192.168.1.110 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.7 1
It worked as intended from client machine console/DOS command window (however due to my specific circumstances I couldn't test the connection).
Plugging the same line into Amahi HDAConnect config / settings did not do the trick.

Which brings me to the point that perhaps it might be easier (at least on a Windows client) to assign static IP through the HDA Setup, Networking, Static IPs, New Static IP form.
It is fairly trivial to list MAC Address (Physical Address) for the TAP-Win32 virtual adapter by using ipconfig /all command.
Additionally it creates proper entry in the DNS records.

[jerryzak]

Can anybody see any problems with letting HDA assign IPs dynamically for bridged VPN connections?

Ok... I tested getting dynamically assigned IP from Amahi server via bridged VPN connection and it worked just fine. The Wiki page will need to be noted accordingly.

[jerryzak]

Two more issues:

1. Following the OS installation it is unlikely that the newly created user will be on the sudoers list. In such light it might be a bit confusing for those new to Linux to be presented with an error message after entering command lines starting with sudo.

Do you think it is advisable to put a note at the very top explaining just how to get root / administrative rights? I guess an extra line about entering su and a root password might suffice...

2. Toward the bottom of the document we have following lines:

* sudo chmod +x /etc/openvpn/openvpn-shutdown
* sudo nano /etc/openvpn/amahi.conf
Remove the line that contains: dev tun and replace it with this:
mode server
tls-server
dev tap0
And remove (or comment out) the lines that start with server and ifconfig-pool-persist.
* Repeat the last step with /etc/openvpn/amahi-dup-cn.conf

The very last instruction "Repeat the last step with /etc/openvpn/amahi-dup-cn.conf" was ambiguous to me, as there are two possibilities:
a) Is "And remove (or comment out) the lines that start with server and ifconfig-pool-persist." the LAST step, or
b) should I count the whole
"Remove the line that contains: dev tun and replace it with this:
mode server
tls-server
dev tap0
And remove (or comment out) the lines that start with server and ifconfig-pool-persist." as the last step?

It gets tough to decide as in my case the /etc/openvpn/amahi-dup-cn.conf was either empty or did not exist.

Please advise

Edit --> typo

[cpg]

Can anybody see any problems with letting HDA assign IPs dynamically for bridged VPN connections?

Ok... I tested getting dynamically assigned IP from Amahi server via bridged VPN connection and it worked just fine. The Wiki page will need to be noted accordingly.

i think that probably should be fine, except everything external will be slow in responding.

aside from that, any local machines in the network where the client is VPNing in from may not be visible. but that's really bridging.