OpenVPN is a VPN (Virtual Private Network) Software that allows for machines in different physical locations to act as if they are on the same physical network. When implemented on both the server and client machines the client is then able to interact with machines and resources on the server's end as though it were connected to them. Gerenally used for network storage with some small background in network gaming in the free VPN client Hamachi.

OpenVPN can be installed from an rpm package on a linux based machine, installed through aptitude or apt-get, or built from source using the ./configure method.

The following dependencies need to be fulfilled in order to install OpenVPN:

• openssl
• lzo
• pam

Since the LAIR uses s specially numbered local subnet that isn't in any of the more common numbering schemes as 10.0.0.0/24 and 192.168.0.0/24 Configuring the IP settings of the subnets isn't an issue. The things that will need to be done are:

1. Create a Certificate Authority and a certificate/key pair to sign and generate the keys for the server.
   • Preferably the key for the Certificate Authority should be on a system with limited access to users
2. Configure the port and IP information
3. Make sure the port defined for the VPN is allowed on any firewalls.
4. Have each client generate a key and submit a Certificate Signing Request to the machine with the Certificate Authority on it.
5. Make sure the client config files are done properly to connect to the VPN
6. Add the VPN Server to the services that run by default when Lab46 starts up and hopefully everything works.

• OpenVPN Documentation