F5 VPN

• Website
• Technical support forum
  • Troubleshooting | BIG-IP Edge Client operations guide

Clients

• CLI-Only Alternatives
  • svpn-login: Last commit 2021-03
  • f5vpn-login: Last commit 2020
• NetworkManager-f5vpn "Now that OpenConnect added support for F5 SSL VPN, this project is obsolete"
• F5 SSL VPN on unsupported Linux distribution (Arch Linux, Manjaro, maybe others)
• CLI-Only Alternatives
  • svpn-login: Last commit 2021-03
  • f5vpn-login: Last commit 2020
• NetworkManager-f5vpn "Now that OpenConnect added support for F5 SSL VPN, this project is obsolete"

go-f5

• GitHub
• Last release 2021
• PR: Parse f5vpn urls
• Config at ~/.gof5/config.yaml

Setup

To make it work with f5-URLs from the browser. Still WIP, not working so far, see this comment

Compile go-f5 from this MR: Parse f5vpn urls #44

git clone https://github.com/fwiesel/gof5
cd gof5
git checkout f5vpn_handler
make build
ln -s $(pwd)/bin/gof5_linux_amd64 ~/bin/download/gof5_linux_amd64

Set capabilities to not run the binary as root:

sudo setcap cap_net_admin,cap_net_bind_service+ep bin/gof5_linux_amd64

Allow modification to systemd-resolved:

sudo mkdir -p /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/
sudo cp org.freedesktop.resolve1.pkla /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/
sudo systemctl restart polkit.service

Create desktop entry in ~/.local/share/applications/gof5.desktop:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=gof5
Exec=/home/varac/bin/download/gof5_linux_amd64 %u
Type=Application
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/f5-vpn;
NoDisplay=true

Add mimetype default:

$ xdg-mime default gof5.desktop x-scheme-handler/f5-vpn
$ xdg-mime query default x-scheme-handler/f5-vpn
gof5.desktop

openconnect

• Openconnect
• GlobalProtect-openconnect A GlobalProtect VPN client (GUI) for Linux, based on OpenConnect and built with Qt5, supports SAML auth mode.
• Docs
• Gitlab issues
• Doesn't work: Support f5-vpn:// URIs
• I couldn't get it to work with openconnect

Start:

openconnect --protocol=f5 --dump -vvv $SERVER

Official F5 client

• Native installation packages only in rpm and deb format
• Docs
  • F5 SSL VPN on unsupported Linux distribution (Arch Linux, Manjaro, maybe others)
• Config at ~/.F5Networks/f5networks.conf
• Log at ~/.F5Networks/vpn.log Also contains some F5 tunnel config details

Debug with export QT_DEBUG_PLUGINS=1

Arch/AUR packages

• AUR package: f5vpn
  • (GUI) VPN client using the Point-to-Point Protocol to connect to F5Networks BIG-IP APM
• AUR package: f5fpc
  • Command-line VPN client using FastPPP to connect to F5Networks BIG-IP APM 13.0

f5vpn

• f5vpn-arch GitHub
• AUR package

Steps:

Install package:

pamac install f5vpn

Add mimetype default:

$ xdg-mime default com.f5.f5vpn.desktop x-scheme-handler/f5-vpn
$ xdg-mime query default x-scheme-handler/f5-vpn
com.f5.f5vpn.desktop

Fix wayland issue where client crashes with qt.qpa.plugin: Could not find the Qt platform plugin "wayland" in "":

Add Exec=/usr/sbin/bash -c "export QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb; /opt/f5/vpn/f5vpn %u" to /usr/share/applications/com.f5.f5vpn.desktop

Official client on Arch

Download official f5-client Debian package, i.e.

wget https://huskyonnet-ns.uw.edu/public/download/linux_f5vpn.x86_64.deb -O ~/projects/vpn/f5-client/native/linux_f5vpn.x86_64.deb

Extract content:

cd ~/projects/vpn/f5-client/native/
ar x linux_f5vpn.x86_64.deb
tar -xzf control.tar.gz
tar -xzf data.tar.gz
sudo cp -a opt/f5 /opt/f5
sudo ./postinst