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Configuring Linux Clients

First, copy the appropriate key sets from the server to the /etc/openvpn directory

on each of the clients. If the client machines arent locally available, then make the

transfers via a secure means, such as SFTP. For example, for client 1 copy the

following files:

client1.crt

client1.key

ca.crt

Note: The same ca.crt file gets copied to each client. Be sure that you dont

copy the ca.key file to any clients, or else server security will be compromised.

On each client, copy the client.conf file from the /usr/share/doc/openvpn-2.0.9/sample-config-files/ directory to the /etc/openvpn directory. Open the file

for editing. Scroll down until you find the line:

remote my-server-1 1194

Change the my-server-1 part to the actual IP address of your OpenVPN

server. For example, if the IP address of your servers eth0 interface is

216.33.19.3, then the line will become:

remote 216.33.19.3 1194

Next, scroll down until you find the lines:

ca ca.crt

cert client.crt

key client.keyChange these lines to match the client-key files that you transferred from the

server. For client 1, these would become:

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ca ca.crt

cert client1.crt

key client1.key

Uncomment the line,

;ns-cert-type server

by removing the preceding semi-colon.

Uncomment the

;cipher x

line, and change the x to match the cryptographic method that you set up in the

server configuration. For example, if you chose the Blowfish method in the

server configuration, then change this line to:

cipher BF-CBC

Save the file and exit the text editor. To test, start up OpenVPN on the server, and

then start OpenVPN on the client.

Note: Even on the clients, manually starting OpenVPN from the command-line

requires root privileges. So, for testing, you will either have to have the

appropriate settings made so that you can use sudo, or youll have to have the

root password for the respective client machines.

The command to start the client is:

cd /etc/openvpn

openvpn client.conf

On the client, open a second command-line terminal window, and ping the private

address of the OpenVPN server. In our example, the command would be ping

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10.1.1.1. If the ping is successful, youve achieved coolness. If it isnt, you may

have to reconfigure the clients firewall to allow proper connectivity.

As on the server, youll find that init script have been installed in the appropriate

run-level directories. So, OpenVPN will start automatically, and will

automatically connect to the OpenVPN server, whenever you reboot the computer.