OpenVPN Toggle On/Off?

[lowfoon]

Hello, I have had this idea in my head for a long while now and wanted to share it with a more competent group who could tell me if this idea is feasible or not.

The problem I have currently, which is more of a convenience problem, is that for obvious reasons I do not leave my OpenVPN running 24/7 on my router. This mean every time I do want to switch the VPN on, I have to log into the Router UI, enter credentials, navigate to VPN and so on... hopefully you get where I am going with this now.

I would like to implement an on/off toggle that would be able to do this which technically (in my head) doesn't seem too difficult to put together. The idea would most likely rely on a script being executed to trigger this toggle?

What would be really nice, is if I could use a physical switch (controlled by a RPi?) to trigger the VPN on/off script remotely?

Is this concept too far-fetched? Have I overlooked anything?

 

[CaptainSTX]

Just curious what are the reasons you don't leave your VPN running 24/7?

Also if you don't want to sign in to your router and turn off the VPN why don't you use one of the scripts developed by posters on this site that will assign one SSID to the VPN and anothers that will bypass the VPN.

 

[RMerlin]

It's like building this complex contraption just to apply butter on a toast. The amount of time involved in building such a thing would far exceed the time it takes to log through the webui or SSH and toggle it on/off.

 

[john9527]

It's like building this complex contraption just to apply butter on a toast.

Anyone else remember Rube Goldberg?

 

[ColinTaylor]

Anyone else remember Rube Goldberg?

Er, no actually. I had to look it up as it appears to be an American thing, so thanks for the education. I am familiar with the UK equivalent which is Heath Robinson.

 

[lowfoon]

It's like building this complex contraption just to apply butter on a toast. The amount of time involved in building such a thing would far exceed the time it takes to log through the webui or SSH and toggle it on/off.

Ok thats fair enough. How would I toggle via SSH?

 

[lowfoon]

Just curious what are the reasons you don't leave your VPN running 24/7?

Also if you don't want to sign in to your router and turn off the VPN why don't you use one of the scripts developed by posters on this site that will assign one SSID to the VPN and anothers that will bypass the VPN.

I don't leave my VPN running because I can only get download/upload speeds at a fraction of my speeds I get without VPN. Also the likes of Amazon Echo doesn't like functioning when the VPN is turned on and a few other reasons...

Could you kindly point me to some of these scripts? Apologies in advance, noob to this forum (I have ran a search though).

 

[CaptainSTX]

With a router with a 1.4 GHz or better processor you should be able to get 60 - 65 Mbps downloads.

If you are running a router with Merlin's firmware you can setup policy routing so only certain devices use the VPN and other go out using the normal WAN to your local ISP.

Until you setup custom scripts you can always use a simple utility to change the IP of a device so that depending on the IP you assign it either goes local ISP or VPN. This however isn't any faster than logging into the router and changing if an IP goes local or VPN. The writing or even copying script may require skills above and beyond what a noob is comfortable with.

 

[RMerlin]

Anyone else remember Rube Goldberg?

Mythbusters once had an episode where they built their own Rube Goldberg machine. Great episode.

 

[RMerlin]

Ok thats fair enough. How would I toggle via SSH?

service stop_vpnclient1

service start_vpnclient1

 

[JacquesR]

I would like to implement an on/off toggle that would be able to do this which technically (in my head) doesn't seem too difficult to put together. The idea would most likely rely on a script being executed to trigger this toggle?

This app does what you need.

 

[lowfoon]

With a router with a 1.4 GHz or better processor you should be able to get 60 - 65 Mbps downloads.

If you are running a router with Merlin's firmware you can setup policy routing so only certain devices use the VPN and other go out using the normal WAN to your local ISP.

Until you setup custom scripts you can always use a simple utility to change the IP of a device so that depending on the IP you assign it either goes local ISP or VPN. This however isn't any faster than logging into the router and changing if an IP goes local or VPN. The writing or even copying script may require skills above and beyond what a noob is comfortable with.

With my RT-AC3200, I get a maximum of 30Mbps whereas I'm paying for 200Mbps fibre. I was not aware of policy routing and I have set this up and this seems to meet my requirements nicely. Thanks!

 

[Rappy]

I want to do this too. If I add up the amount of time I spend finding a spare laptop, logging into the router, going to VPN, going to OpenVPN settings then toggling the client, then doing the reverse once I need to watch something which is VPN blocked, and repeating this every time one person in my family watches something from BBC iPlayer vs Netflix, I would easily have enough time to resolve pi. I on the other hand, don't care for a physical switch, but instead would make it a smarthome toggle, Alexa, or Homekit.

Unfortunately I am not skilled enough to do it myself. And with the attitude shown by some here, it's almost like they cannot see beyond their own solipsism to comprehend how other people might find some tool EXTREMELY useful when they themselves cannot see any purpose to it.