Transmission+ PIA VPN, reach from outside?

ZodiacUHD

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Aug 28, 2015
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Hello there, i set up transmission to use PIA as VPN. Everything works smoothly and i'm very happy to have it but, now i can't use a dns to connect to it when i'm not on my local network. I use no-ip to connect to couch potato and sickrage without any issue at all. Only transmission can't be accesed. I'm a total noob in this field, so if you have any suggestion, try to speak as you would do to a child.

Thanks in advance!
 

jgreco

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May 29, 2011
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It isn't clear what your problem is. Are you maybe using a NAT gateway ("router") and port forwarding? If so, do you have the necessary ports forwarded?
 

ZodiacUHD

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Let me try to explain: I have a dns which we'll call "zodiacnas.com". I set up my router to bind my IP (dynamic) to zodiacnas.com so it refreshes every 30 mins to make sure it' always ok.
Now sickrage has a local ip of 192.168.1.3 and its internal port is 8000. I did port forward the port 8000 to an external 11111 on 192.168.1.3 so now that i type zodiacnas.com:11111 it connects to my sickrage page.
Since transmission has a vpn and connects to a swiss server, even if i port forward the local ip, it just doesen't connect if i type zodiacnas.net:xxxx

It did work before setting up openvpn+PIA and it work if i stop it.

I know it may sound confusing. But i'm trying my best to explain my self :/
 

jgreco

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mod note: has nothing to do with FreeNAS, moved to offtopic
 

jgreco

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Okay, so you have a domain name. You're using a dynamic DNS service of some type to bind that name to your dynamic home IP address.

Now you'd like to be able to connect to your VPN IP address. Okay, here's the easy answer, you cannot do that using the same domain name. Domain names resolve to IP addresses. Your home IP address is different than your VPN service IP address. Therefore they cannot share a name.

What you CAN do - maybe, depending on the competence of the dynamic DNS provider - is to create a zone within "zodiacnas.com" such as "transmission.zodiacnas.com", and then run a dynamic DNS client within the transmission jail in order to register that. There are other more complicated things that could be done as well.
 

ZodiacUHD

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Thank you very much for your answer, i think it goes beyond my knowledge to do any of that. I think i'll keep searching for a guide or a tutorial :)
 

tumpanaios

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Dec 7, 2018
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Thank you very much for your answer, i think it goes beyond my knowledge to do any of that. I think i'll keep searching for a guide or a tutorial :)

You have to add the static routes of the other networks you want to reach the jail.
You can do that by adding these lines on the jail /etc/rc.conf for example if you have vpn network

Code:
static_routes="vpnnet"

route_vpnnet="-net 10.0.8.0/24 192.168.1.1"


assuming 10.0.8.0/24 is your vpn subnet and 192.168.1.1 the gateway for going back to that network .
Also the transmission web gui deamon should listen on the local ip and if you have ipfw configured to the jail to allow incoming connections to the port usually 9091 .

That method does not require port forwarding .
If you want port forwarding to work you have to do it as jgreco said or use a reverse proxy like nginx from another jail and port forward to that .
 
Last edited:
Joined
Dec 2, 2015
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730
You have to add the static routes of the other networks you want to reach the jail.
You can do that by adding these lines on the jail /etc/rc.conf for example if you have vpn network

Code:
static_routes="vpnnet"

route_vpnnet="-net 10.0.8.0/24 192.168.1.1"


assuming 10.0.8.0/24 is your vpn subnet and 192.168.1.1 the gateway for going back to that network .
Also the transmission web gui deamon should listen on the local IP and if you have ipfw configured to the jail to allow incoming connections to the port usually 9091 .

That method does not require port forwarding .
If you want port forwarding to work you have to do it as jgreco said or use a reverse proxy like nginx from another jail and port forward to that .
This problem was from 2015. I'm betting the original poster has solved their problem by now, or moved on to another storage solution
 
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