How to use the RPN VPN with your Dedibox Servers

Reviewed on 12 August 2024 • Published on 07 October 2021

The RPN VPN service allows you to access machines inside your RPN from an external connection or from a Dedibox server that does not have an RPN interface.

The feature is based on OpenVPN and you can add the RPN VPN to your RPNv1 group like any other server.

The RPN VPN service allows you to:

Connect from anywhere in your totally secure and private network.
Connect servers which do not have an RPN interface to the RPN.

Before you start

To complete the actions presented below, you must have:

A Dedibox account logged into the console
An RPN-compatible Dedibox dedicated server
Installed an OpenVPN client on your local computer

How to download the RPN VPN configuration

Click Storage > RPN VPN in the top menu of the Dedibox console. A summary of your RPN VPN services displays.
Click Configure next to the RPN VPN service you want to configure. The RPN VPN information displays.

Tip
If you do not have any RPN VPN services yet, you can click Order RPN VPN directly on the page.
Download the certificate files for your RPN VPN. Click Show Password to display the password associated with your RPN VPN.

Note
To use your RPN VPN in your RPNv1 group, you must add it to your group as an RPN server. For more information, follow our RPN documentation.

How to configure the RPN VPN client

Requirements

To complete the following steps, you must have the following information available on the client:

IP of the RPN VPN server
CA Certificate
Client Certificate
.key Certificate
RPN VPN Password

How to configure the Linux client

Launch the installation of OpenVPN using the following command.
```
root@<your-server-ip>:~# apt install openvpn
```

Edit the client configuration file /etc/openvpn/client.conf in a text editor. For example with nano:

root@<your-server-ip>:~# nano /etc/openvpn/client.conf

The configuration file looks like the following example:

client
dev tun
;proto tcp
proto udp
float
remote <IP of the RPN VPN server> 1194
nobind
persist-key
persist-tun
ca <ca.crt>
cert <cert.crt>
key <cert.key>
askpass <password file>
ns-cert-type server
comp-lzo
verb 3

Set the following values in the configuration file:

<IP of the RPN VPN server>: IP of the RPN VPN server
<ca.crt>: Path to ca.crt
<cert.crt>: Path to the client .crt
<cert.key>: Path to the client .key
<password file>: Path to the file containing your password

Then save the file and exit the text editor.

To start the VPN automatically during the boot process of the server, edit the file /etc/default/openvpn and insert the following line:
```
AUTOSTART="client"
```
This line allows OpenVPN to start automatically with the configuration file located at /etc/openvpn/client.conf.

Once the connection to the RPN VPN server is established, you can use your RPN VPN IP to check whether a new interface displays:
```
root@mydedibox:/etc/default# ifconfig tun0
tun0      Link encap:UNSPEC  HWaddr 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00
        inet addr:10.90.250.25  P-t-P:10.90.250.26  Mask:255.255.255.255
```
You can also check if the routes for the RPN network were set:
```
root@mydedibox:/etc/default# route -n | grep 10.90
10.90.0.0       10.90.250.26    255.255.0.0     UG    0      0        0 tun0
10.90.250.1     10.90.250.26    255.255.255.255 UGH   0      0        0 tun0
10.90.250.26    0.0.0.0         255.255.255.255 UH    0      0        0 tun0
```
Now you can configure your server in your RPN group.