OpenVPN Management Interface Notes ---------------------------------- The OpenVPN Management interface allows OpenVPN to be administratively controlled from an external program via a TCP socket. The interface has been specifically designed for GUI developers and those who would like to programmatically or remotely control an OpenVPN daemon. The management interface is implemented using a client/server TCP connection, where OpenVPN will listen on a provided IP address and port for incoming management client connections. The management protocol is currently cleartext without an explicit security layer. For this reason, it is recommended that the management interface either listen on localhost (127.0.0.1) or on the local VPN address. It's possible to remotely connect to the management interface over the VPN itself, though some capabilities will be limited in this mode, such as the ability to provide private key passwords. Future versions of the management interface may allow out-of-band connections (i.e. not over the VPN) and secured with SSL/TLS. The management interface is enabled in the OpenVPN configuration file using the following directives: --management --management-query-passwords --management-log-cache See the man page for documentation on these directives. Once OpenVPN has started with the management layer enabled, you can telnet to the management port (make sure to use a telnet client which understands "raw" mode). Once connected to the management port, you can use the "help" command to list all commands. COMMAND -- echo --------------- The echo capability is used to allow GUI-specific parameters to be either embedded in the OpenVPN config file or pushed to an OpenVPN client from a server. Command examples: echo on -- turn on real-time notification of echo messages echo all -- print the current echo history list echo off -- turn off real-time notification of echo messages echo on all -- atomically enable real-time notification, plus show any messages in history buffer For example, suppose you are developing a OpenVPN GUI and you want to give the OpenVPN server the ability to ask the GUI to forget any saved passwords. In the OpenVPN server config file, add: push "echo forget-passwords" When the OpenVPN client receives its pulled list of directives from the server, the "echo forget-passwords" directive will be in the list, and it will cause the management interface to save the "forget-passwords" string in its list of echo parameters. The management client can use "echo all" to output the full list of echoed parameters, "echo on" to turn on real-time notification of echoed parameters via the ">ECHO:" prefix, or "echo off" to turn off real-time notification. When the GUI connects to the OpenVPN management socket, it can issue an "echo all" command, which would produce output like this: 1101519562,forget-passwords END Essentially the echo command allowed us to pass parameters from the OpenVPN server to the OpenVPN client, and then to the management client (such as a GUI). The large integer is the unix date/time when the echo parameter was received. If the management client had issued the command "echo on", it would have enabled real-time notifications of echo parameters. In this case, our "forget-passwords" message would be output like this: >ECHO:1101519562,forget-passwords Like the log command, the echo command can atomically show history while simultaneously activating real-time updates: echo on all The size of the echo buffer is currently hardcoded to 100 messages. COMMAND -- exit, quit --------------------- Close the managment session, and resume listening on the management port for connections from other clients. Currently, the OpenVPN daemon can at most support a single management client any one time. COMMAND -- help --------------- Print a summary of commands. COMMAND -- hold --------------- The hold command can be used to manipulate the hold flag, or release OpenVPN from a hold state. If the hold flag is set on initial startup or restart, OpenVPN will hibernate prior to initializing the tunnel until the management interface receives a "hold release" command. The --management-hold directive of OpenVPN can be used to start OpenVPN with the hold flag set. The hold flag setting is persistent and will not be reset by restarts. OpenVPN will indicate that it is in a hold state by sending a real-time notification to the management client: >HOLD:Waiting for hold release Command examples: hold -- show current hold flag, 0=off, 1=on. hold on -- turn on hold flag so that future restarts will hold. hold off -- turn off hold flag so that future restarts will not hold. hold release -- leave hold state and start OpenVPN, but do not alter the current hold flag setting. COMMAND -- kill --------------- In server mode, kill a particlar client instance. Command examples: kill Test-Client -- kill the client instance having a common name of "Test-Client". kill 1.2.3.4:4000 -- kill the client instance having a source address and port of 1.2.3.4:4000 Use the "status" command to see which clients are connected. COMMAND -- log -------------- Show the OpenVPN log file. Only the most recent n lines of the log file are cached by the management interface, where n is controlled by the OpenVPN --management-log-cache directive. Command examples: log on -- Enable real-time output of log messages. log all -- Show currently cached log file history. log on all -- Atomically show all currently cached log file history then enable real-time notification of new log file messages. log off -- Turn off real-time notification of log messages. log 20 -- Show the most recent 20 lines of log file history. Real-time notification format: Real-time log messages begin with the ">LOG:" prefix followed by the following comma-separated fields: (a) unix integer date/time, (b) zero or more message flags in a single string: I -- informational F -- fatal error N -- non-fatal error W -- warning D -- debug, and (c) message text. COMMAND -- mute --------------- Change the OpenVPN --mute parameter. The mute parameter is used to silence repeating messages of the same message category. Command examples: mute 40 -- change the mute parameter to 40 mute -- show the current mute setting COMMAND -- net -------------- (Windows Only) Produce output equivalent to the OpenVPN --show-net directive. The output includes OpenVPN's view of the system network adapter list and routing table based on information returned by the Windows IP helper API. COMMAND -- password and username -------------------------------- The password command is used to pass passwords to OpenVPN. If OpenVPN is run with the --management-query-passwords directive, it will query the management interface for RSA private key passwords and the --auth-user-pass username/password. When OpenVPN needs a password from the management interface, it will produce a real-time ">PASSWORD:" message. Example 1: >PASSWORD:Need 'Private Key' password OpenVPN is indicating that it needs a password of type "Private Key". The management client should respond to this query as follows: password "Private Key" foo Example 2: >PASSWORD:Need 'Auth' username/password OpenVPN needs a --auth-user-pass password. The management client should respond: username "Auth" foo password "Auth" bar The username/password itself can be in quotes, and special characters such as double quote or backslash must be escaped, for example, password "Private Key" "foo\"bar" The escaping rules are the same as for the config file. See the "Command Parsing" section below for more info. The PASSWORD real-time message type can also be used to indicate password or other types of authentication failure: Example 3: The private key password is incorrect and OpenVPN is exiting: >PASSWORD:Verification Failed: 'Private Key' Example 4: The --auth-user-pass username/password failed, and OpenVPN is exiting: >PASSWORD:Verification Failed: 'Auth' COMMAND -- signal ----------------- The signal command will send a signal to the OpenVPN daemon. The signal can be one of SIGHUP, SIGTERM, SIGUSR1, or SIGUSR2. Command example: signal SIGUSR1 -- send a SIGUSR1 signal to daemon COMMAND -- state ---------------- Show the current OpenVPN state, show state history, or enable real-time notification of state changes. These are the OpenVPN states: CONNECTING -- OpenVPN's initial state. WAIT -- (Client only) Waiting for initial response from server. AUTH -- (Client only) Authenticating with server. GET_CONFIG -- (Client only) Downloading configuration options from server. ASSIGN_IP -- Assigning IP address to virtual network interface. ADD_ROUTES -- Adding routes to system. CONNECTED -- Initialization Sequence Completed. RECONNECTING -- A restart has occurred. EXITING -- A graceful exit is in progress. Command examples: state -- Print current OpenVPN state. state on -- Enable real-time notification of state changes. state off -- Disable real-time notification of state changes. state all -- Print current state history. state 3 -- Print the 3 most recent state transitions. state on all -- Atomically show state history while at the same time enable real-time state notification of future state transitions. The output format consists of 4 comma-separated parameters: (a) the integer unix date/time, (b) the state name, (c) optional descriptive string (used mostly on RECONNECTING and EXITING to show the reason for the disconnect), (d) optional TUN/TAP local IP address (shown for ASSIGN_IP and CONNECTED), and (e) optional address of remote server (OpenVPN 2.1 or higher). Real-time state notifications will have a ">STATE:" prefix prepended to them. COMMAND -- status ----------------- Show current daemon status information, in the same format as that produced by the OpenVPN --status directive. Command examples: status -- Show status information using the default status format version. status 2 -- Show status information using status format version 2. COMMAND -- username ------------------- See the "password" section above. COMMAND -- verb --------------- Change the OpenVPN --verb parameter. The verb parameter controls the output verbosity, and may range from 0 (no output) to 15 (maximum output). See the OpenVPN man page for additional info on verbosity levels. Command examples: verb 4 -- change the verb parameter to 4 mute -- show the current verb setting COMMAND -- version ------------------ Show the current OpenVPN and Management Interface versions. COMMAND -- auth-retry --------------------- Set the --auth-retry setting to control how OpenVPN responds to username/password authentication errors. See the manual page for more info. Command examples: auth-retry interact -- Don't exit when bad username/passwords are entered. Query for new input and retry. COMMAND -- needok (OpenVPN 2.1 or higher) -------------------------------------- Confirm a ">NEED-OK" real-time notification, normally used by OpenVPN to block while waiting for a specific user action. Example: OpenVPN needs the user to insert a cryptographic token, so it sends a real-time notification: >NEED-OK:Need 'token-insertion-request' confirmation MSG:Please insert your cryptographic token The management client, if it is a GUI, can flash a dialog box containing the text after the "MSG:" marker to the user. When the user acknowledges the dialog box, the management client can issue this command: needok token-insertion-request ok or needok token-insertion-request cancel OUTPUT FORMAT ------------- (1) Command success/failure indicated by "SUCCESS: [text]" or "ERROR: [text]". (2) For commands which print multiple lines of output, the last line will be "END". (3) Real-time messages will be in the form ">[source]:[text]", where source is "ECHO", "FATAL", "HOLD", "INFO", "LOG", "NEED-OK", "PASSWORD", or "STATE". REAL-TIME MESSAGE FORMAT ------------------------ The OpenVPN management interface produces two kinds of output: (a) output from a command, or (b) asynchronous, real-time output which can be generated at any time. Real-time messages start with a '>' character in the first column and are immediately followed by a type keyword indicating the type of real-time message. The following types are currently defined: ECHO -- Echo messages as controlled by the "echo" command. FATAL -- A fatal error which is output to the log file just prior to OpenVPN exiting. HOLD -- Used to indicate that OpenVPN is in a holding state and will not start until it receives a "hold release" command. INFO -- Informational messages such as the welcome message. LOG -- Log message output as controlled by the "log" command. NEED-OK -- OpenVPN needs the end user to do something, such as insert a cryptographic token. The "needok" command can be used to tell OpenVPN to continue. PASSWORD -- Used to tell the management client that OpenVPN needs a password, also to indicate password verification failure. STATE -- Shows the current OpenVPN state, as controlled by the "state" command. Command Parsing --------------- The management interface uses the same command line lexical analyzer as is used by the OpenVPN config file parser. Whitespace is a parameter separator. Double quotation characters ("") can be used to enclose parameters containing whitespace. Backslash-based shell escaping is performed, using the following mappings: \\ Maps to a single backslash character (\). \" Pass a literal doublequote character ("), don't interpret it as enclosing a parameter. \[SPACE] Pass a literal space or tab character, don't interpret it as a parameter delimiter.