OPNsense with Express VPN - Instructions?

[jlhollowell]

Dear all,

I've been using OPNSense for a few months now on a dedicated network appliance (Hunsn RFOF5, an 'off brand' product from China - 6 x Intel 2.5GbE, Pentium N6005 @ 2.0 GHz (4 cores, 4 threads). It is stable and runs OPNsense without issue. I am currently running OPNsense 23.1.11_1-amd64

My problem is that I cannot seem to find a manual, instruction set etc., anywhere for setting up Express VPN with OPNSense. I'm reluctant to make my first post on the forums here a complaint but wonder why every manual I find points to setting up Express VPN on pfSense? :-(  I understand that they are very similar with OPNSense being a fork of the other but...they are not the same...especially to a relevant newbie. The terminology used is slightly different and settings, in some places, different enough that pfsense manuals for something are not sufficient for setting said something up on OPNsense.

Sorry for the mini rant...it's not meant to be simply a complaint. It could very likely be the case that I've simply missed something that is right in front of my face. That happens more often than I would like to admit. 

Can anyone provide a link or details about how to get Express VPN working on OPNSense? I was working off of the details provided here --> https://www.expressvpn.com/support/vpn-setup/pfsense-with-expressvpn-openvpn/ but as I've just explained, they are not sufficient given the different settings required for OPNSense. :-(

For example, the instructions for setting up a Firewall alias for pfsense do not include any information about "Categories " or "Content" and instead include a "Network" setting that does not exist on OPNSense. And the help menus for those settings on OPNSense contain no content so I'm left to scratch my head and experiment in the hopes that I'll stumble onto the right setting...which, unfortunately, I haven't been successful at yet. :-(

Any help will be greatly appreciated and I will commit to documenting my setup here for subsequent users who may find themselves in the same position.

Regards
Jason

[jlhollowell]

Replying to myself here with some additional information.

1. I have an Express VPN account and am able to use it without issue via the download app.

2. Following an old but useful post here (https://forum.opnsense.org/index.php?topic=4979) but am unable to get the VPN "Connection Status" to confirm that I am connected...with a "Wait" status. The post (linked above) is exactly what I was looking for but is, unfortunately, a bit old...2017. I will happily update it if I'm successful in getting things working.

3. Log file shows the following error: event_wait : Interrupted system call (fd=-1,code=4)

I cannot figure out what this error means but am assuming it is related to my inability to connect.

Will followup here with additional information as it becomes available.

[jlhollowell]

Another quick bit of information. I overlooked the fact that I needed to update OPNsense.

I'm now running version 23.7.1_3 ;-)

Subsequently updated all packages as well...including openvpn.

Still having the same problem in terms of error in the Log File but...now I see an entirely new OpenVPN setting called "Instances[new]". Hmm, maybe I'm missing a setting...?

[newsense]

One more upgrade required, latest is 23.7.3

[jlhollowell]

Thanks, got it. All updated now and, surprisingly, my VPN situation (status and errors) has changed. The error has disappeared! I have a bunch of warnings in the log but am pretty sure I can deal with those via various settings. I have a "connected" message under "Connected since" and "reconnecting" under status. Reconnecting appears to not change but I feel like I've made a bit of progress by simply updating to the most recent version of OPNSense. I'll bang away a bit more and see if I can figure out how to finish this off. Thanks :-)

Oops, I guess I wrote too soon..."reconnecting" eventually switched to "wait". So, it looks like I'm still not connected...?