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25 <H1>L2TPNS Manual
</H1>
27 <LI><A HREF=
"#Overview">Overview
</A></LI>
28 <LI><A HREF=
"#Installation">Installation
</A>
30 <LI><A HREF=
"#Requirements">Requirements
</A></LI>
31 <LI><A HREF=
"#Compile">Compile
</A></LI>
32 <LI><A HREF=
"#Install">Install
</A></LI>
33 <LI><A HREF=
"#Running">Running
</A></LI>
36 <LI><A HREF=
"#Configuration">Configuration
</A>
38 <LI><A HREF=
"#startup-config">startup-config
</A></LI>
39 <LI><A HREF=
"#users">users
</A></LI>
40 <LI><A HREF=
"#ip-pool">ip_pool
</A></LI>
41 <LI><A HREF=
"#build-garden">build-garden
</A></LI>
44 <LI><A HREF=
"#ControllingtheProcess">Controlling the Process
</A>
46 <LI><A HREF=
"#Command-LineInterface">Command-Line Interface
</A></LI>
47 <LI><A HREF=
"#nsctl">nsctl
</A></LI>
48 <LI><A HREF=
"#Signals">Signals
</A></LI>
51 <LI><A HREF=
"#Throttling">Throttling
</A></LI>
52 <LI><A HREF=
"#Interception">Interception
</A></LI>
53 <LI><A HREF=
"#Authentication">Authentication
</A></LI>
54 <LI><A HREF=
"#Plugins">Plugins
</A></LI>
55 <LI><A HREF=
"#WalledGarden">Walled Garden
</A></LI>
56 <LI><A HREF=
"#Filtering">Filtering
</A></LI>
57 <LI><A HREF=
"#Clustering">Clustering
</A></LI>
58 <LI><A HREF=
"#Routing">Routing
</A></LI>
59 <LI><A HREF=
"#Performance">Performance
</A></LI>
62 <H2 ID=
"Overview">Overview
</H2>
63 l2tpns is half of a complete L2TP implementation. It supports only the
64 LNS side of the connection.
<P>
66 L2TP (Layer
2 Tunneling Protocol) is designed to allow any layer
2
67 protocol (e.g. Ethernet, PPP) to be tunneled over an IP connection. l2tpns
68 implements PPP over L2TP only.
<P>
70 There are a couple of other L2TP implementations, of which
<A
71 HREF=
"http://sourceforge.net/projects/l2tpd">l2tpd
</A> is probably the
72 most popular. l2tpd also will handle being either end of a tunnel, and
73 is a lot more configurable than l2tpns. However, due to the way it works,
74 it is nowhere near as scalable.
<P>
76 l2tpns uses the TUN/TAP interface provided by the Linux kernel to receive
77 and send packets. Using some packet manipulation it doesn't require a
78 single interface per connection, as l2tpd does.
<P>
80 This allows it to scale extremely well to very high loads and very high
81 numbers of connections.
<P>
83 It also has a plugin architecture which allows custom code to be run
84 during processing. An example of this is in the walled garden module
88 <EM>Documentation is not my best skill. If you find any problems
89 with this document, or if you wish to contribute, please email
<A
90 HREF=
"mailto:l2tpns-users@lists.sourceforge.net?subject=L2TPNS+Documentation">the mailing list
</A>.
</EM><P>
92 <H2 ID=
"Installation">Installation
</H2>
93 <H3 ID=
"Requirements">Requirements
</H3>
96 <LI>Linux kernel version
2.4 or above, with the Tun/Tap interface either
97 compiled in, or as a module.
</LI>
99 <LI>libcli
1.8.0 or greater.
<BR>You can get this from
<A
100 HREF=
"http://sourceforge.net/projects/libcli">http://sourceforge.net/projects/libcli
</A></LI>
103 <H3 ID=
"Compile">Compile
</H3>
105 You can generally get away with just running
<B>make
</B> from the source
106 directory. This will compile the daemon, associated tools and any modules
107 shipped with the distribution.
<P>
109 <H3 ID=
"Install">Install
</H3>
111 After you have successfully compiled everything, run
<B>make
112 install
</B> to install it. By default, the binaries are installed into
113 <EM>/usr/sbin
</EM>, the configuration into
<EM>/etc/l2tpns
</EM>, and the
114 modules into
<EM>/usr/lib/l2tpns
</EM>.
<P>
116 You will definately need to edit the configuration files before you
117 start. See the
<A HREF=
"#Configuration">Configuration
</A> section for
120 <H3 ID=
"Running">Running
</H3>
122 You only need to run
<B>/usr/sbin/l2tpns
</B> as root to start it. It does
123 not detach to a daemon process, so you should perhaps run it from init.
<P>
125 By default there is no log destination set, so all log messages will go to
128 <H2 ID=
"Configuration">Configuration
</H2>
130 All configuration of the software is done from the files installed into
133 <H3 ID=
"startup-config">startup-config
</H3>
135 This is the main configuration file for l2tpns. The format of the file is a
136 list of commands that can be run through the command-line interface. This
137 file can also be written directly by the l2tpns process if a user runs the
138 <EM>write memory
</EM> command, so any comments will be lost. However if your
139 policy is not to write the config by the program, then feel free to comment
140 the file with a # or ! at the beginning of the line.
<P>
142 A list of the possible configuration directives follows. Each of these
143 should be set by a line like:
<P>
145 set configstring
"value"
146 set ipaddress
192.168.1.1
152 <LI><B>debug
</B> (int)
<BR>
153 Sets the level of messages that will be written to the log file. The value
154 should be between
0 and
5, with
0 being no debugging, and
5 being the
155 highest. A rough description of the levels is:
157 <LI VALUE=
0>Critical Errors - Things are probably broken
</LI>
158 <LI>Errors - Things might have gone wrong, but probably will recover
</LI>
159 <LI>Warnings - Just in case you care what is not quite perfect
</LI>
160 <LI>Information - Parameters of control packets
</LI>
161 <LI>Calls - For tracing the execution of the code
</LI>
162 <LI>Packets - Everything, including a hex dump of all packets processed... probably twice
</LI>
164 Note that the higher you set the debugging level, the slower the program
165 will run. Also, at level
5 a LOT of information will be logged. This should
166 only ever be used for working out why it doesn't work at all.
169 <LI><B>log_file
</B> (string)
<BR>
170 This will be where all logging and debugging information is written
171 to. This may be either a filename, such as
<EM>/var/log/l2tpns
</EM>, or
172 the special magic string
<EM>syslog:facility
</EM>, where
<EM>facility
</EM>
173 is any one of the syslog logging facilities, such as local5.
176 <LI><B>pid_file
</B> (string)
<BR>
177 If set, the process id will be written to the specified file. The
178 value must be an absolute path.
181 <LI><B>l2tp_secret
</B> (string)
<BR>
182 The secret used by l2tpns for authenticating tunnel request. Must be
183 the same as the LAC, or authentication will fail. Only actually be
184 used if the LAC requests authentication.
187 <LI><B>l2tp_mtu
</B> (int)
<BR>
188 MTU of interface for L2TP traffic (default:
1500). Used to set link
189 MRU and adjust TCP MSS.
192 <LI><B>ppp_restart_time
</B> (int)
<BR>
193 <B>ppp_max_configure
</B> (int)
<BR>
194 <B>ppp_max_failure
</B> (int)
<BR>
195 PPP counter and timer values, as described in
§4.1 of
196 <a href=
"ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc1661.txt">RFC1661
</a>.
199 <LI><B>primary_dns
</B> (ip address)
200 <LI><B>secondary_dns
</B> (ip address)
<BR>
201 Whenever a PPP connection is established, DNS servers will be sent to the
202 user, both a primary and a secondary. If either is set to
0.0.0.0, then that
203 one will not be sent.
206 <LI><B>primary_radius
</B> (ip address)
207 <LI><B>secondary_radius
</B> (ip address)
<BR>
208 Sets the RADIUS servers used for both authentication and accounting.
209 If the primary server does not respond, then the secondary RADIUS
210 server will be tried.
<br>
211 <strong>Note:
</strong> in addition to the source IP address and
212 identifier, the RADIUS server
<strong>must
</strong> include the source
213 port when detecting duplicates to supress (in order to cope with a
214 large number of sessions comming on-line simultaneously l2tpns uses a
215 set of udp sockets, each with a seperate identifier).
218 <LI><B>primary_radius_port
</B> (short)
219 <LI><B>secondary_radius_port
</B> (short)
<BR>
220 Sets the authentication ports for the primary and secondary RADIUS
221 servers. The accounting port is one more than the authentication
222 port. If no RADIUS ports are given, the authentication port defaults
223 to
1645, and the accounting port to
1646.
226 <LI><B>radius_accounting
</B> (boolean)
<BR>
227 If set to true, then RADIUS accounting packets will be sent. This
228 means that a Start record will be sent when the session is
229 successfully authenticated, and a Stop record will be sent when the
233 <LI><B>radius_secret
</B> (string)
<BR>
234 This secret will be used in all RADIUS queries. If this is not set then
235 RADIUS queries will fail.
238 <LI><B>radius_authtypes
</B> (string)
</BR>
239 A comma separated list of supported RADIUS authentication methods
240 (
<B>pap
</B> or
<B>chap
</B>), in order of preference (default
<B>pap
</B>).
243 <LI><B>radius_dae_port
</B> (short)
<BR>
244 Port for DAE RADIUS (Packet of Death/Disconnect, Change of Authorization)
245 requests (default:
<B>3799</B>).
248 <LI><B>allow_duplicate_users
</B> (boolean)
</BR>
249 Allow multiple logins with the same username. If false (the default),
250 any prior session with the same username will be dropped when a new
251 session is established.
254 <LI><B>bind_address
</B> (ip address)
<BR>
255 When the tun interface is created, it is assigned the address
256 specified here. If no address is given,
1.1.1.1 is used. Packets
257 containing user traffic should be routed via this address if given,
258 otherwise the primary address of the machine.
261 <LI><B>peer_address
</B> (ip address)
<BR>
262 Address to send to clients as the default gateway.
265 <LI><B>send_garp
</B> (boolean)
<BR>
266 Determines whether or not to send a gratuitous ARP for the
267 bind_address when the server is ready to handle traffic (default:
269 This value is ignored if BGP is configured.
272 <LI><B>throttle_speed
</B> (int)
<BR>
273 Sets the default speed (in kbits/s) which sessions will be limited to.
274 If this is set to
0, then throttling will not be used at all. Note:
275 You can set this by the CLI, but changes will not affect currently
279 <LI><B>throttle_buckets
</B> (int)
<BR>
280 Number of token buckets to allocate for throttling. Each throttled
281 session requires two buckets (in and out).
284 <LI><B>accounting_dir
</B> (string)
<BR>
285 If set to a directory, then every
5 minutes the current usage for
286 every connected use will be dumped to a file in this directory. Each
287 file dumped begins with a header, where each line is prefixed by #.
288 Following the header is a single line for every connected user, fields
289 separated by a space.
<BR> The fields are username, ip, qos,
290 uptxoctets, downrxoctets. The qos field is
1 if a standard user, and
291 2 if the user is throttled.
294 <LI><B>setuid
</B> (int)
<BR>
295 After starting up and binding the interface, change UID to this. This
296 doesn't work properly.
299 <LI><B>dump_speed
</B> (boolean)
<BR>
300 If set to true, then the current bandwidth utilization will be logged every
301 second. Even if this is disabled, you can see this information by running
302 the
<EM>uptime
</EM> command on the CLI.
305 <LI><B>multi_read_count
</B> (int)
<BR>
306 Number of packets to read off each of the UDP and TUN fds when
307 returned as readable by select (default:
10). Avoids incurring the
308 unnecessary system call overhead of select on busy servers.
311 <LI><B>scheduler_fifo
</B> (boolean)
<BR>
312 Sets the scheduling policy for the l2tpns process to SCHED_FIFO. This
313 causes the kernel to immediately preempt any currently running SCHED_OTHER
314 (normal) process in favour of l2tpns when it becomes runnable.
315 Ignored on uniprocessor systems.
318 <LI><B>lock_pages
</B> (boolean)
<BR>
319 Keep all pages mapped by the l2tpns process in memory.
322 <LI><B>icmp_rate
</B> (int)
<BR>
323 Maximum number of host unreachable ICMP packets to send per second.
326 <LI><B>packet_limit
</B> (int
><BR>
327 Maximum number of packets of downstream traffic to be handled each
328 tenth of a second per session. If zero, no limit is applied (default:
329 0). Intended as a DoS prevention mechanism and not a general
330 throttling control (packets are dropped, not queued).
333 <LI><B>cluster_address
</B> (ip address)
<BR>
334 Multicast cluster address (default:
239.192.13.13). See the section
335 on
<A HREF=
"#Clustering">Clustering
</A> for more information.
338 <LI><B>cluster_interface
</B> (string)
<BR>
339 Interface for cluster packets (default: eth0).
342 <LI><B>cluster_mcast_ttl
</B> (int)
<BR>
343 TTL for multicast packets (default:
1).
346 <LI><B>cluster_hb_interval
</B> (int)
<BR>
347 Interval in tenths of a second between cluster heartbeat/pings.
350 <LI><B>cluster_hb_timeout
</B> (int)
<BR>
351 Cluster heartbeat timeout in tenths of a second. A new master will be
352 elected when this interval has been passed without seeing a heartbeat
356 <LI><B>cluster_master_min_adv
</B> (int)
<BR>
357 Determines the minumum number of up to date slaves required before the
358 master will drop routes (default:
1).
361 <LI><B>echo_timeout
</B> (int)
<BR>
362 Time between last packet sent and LCP ECHO generation
363 (default:
10 (seconds)).
366 <LI><B>idle_echo_timeout
</B> (int)
<BR>
367 Drop sessions who have not responded within idle_echo_timeout seconds
368 (default:
240 (seconds))
373 <P>BGP routing configuration is entered by the command:
374 The routing configuration section is entered by the command
375 <DL><DD><B>router bgp
</B> <I>as
</I></DL>
376 where
<I>as
</I> specifies the local AS number.
378 <P>Subsequent lines prefixed with
379 <DL><DD><B>neighbour
</B> <I>peer
</I></DL>
380 define the attributes of BGP neighhbours. Valid commands are:
382 <DD><B>neighbour
</B> <I>peer
</I> <B>remote-as
</B> <I>as
</I>
383 <DD><B>neighbout
</B> <I>peer
</I> <B>timers
</B> <I>keepalive hold
</I>
386 Where
<I>peer
</I> specifies the BGP neighbour as either a hostname or
387 IP address,
<I>as
</I> is the remote AS number and
<I>keepalive
</I>,
388 <I>hold
</I> are the timer values in seconds.
390 <P>Named access-lists are configured using one of the commands:
392 <DD><B>ip access-list standard
</B> <I>name
</I>
393 <DD><B>ip access-list extended
</B> <I>name
</I>
396 <P>Subsequent lines prefixed with
<B>permit
</B> or
<B>deny
</B>
397 define the body of the access-list. Standard access-list syntax:
399 <DD>{
<B>permit
</B>|
<B>deny
</B>}
400 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>source source-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
401 [{
<I>host
</I>|
<I>destination destination-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}]
404 Extended access-lists:
406 <DIV STYLE=
"margin-left: 4em; text-indent: -2em">
407 <P>{
<B>permit
</B>|
<B>deny
</B>}
<B>ip
</B>
408 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>source source-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
409 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>destination destination-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>} [
<B>fragments
</B>]
410 <P>{
<B>permit
</B>|
<B>deny
</B>}
<B>udp
</B>
411 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>source source-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
412 [{
<B>eq
</B>|
<B>neq
</B>|
<B>gt
</B>|
<B>lt
</B>}
<I>port
</I>|
<B>range
</B> <I>from
</I> <I>to
</I>]
413 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>destination destination-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
414 [{
<B>eq
</B>|
<B>neq
</B>|
<B>gt
</B>|
<B>lt
</B>}
<I>port
</I>|
<B>range
</B> <I>from
</I> <I>to
</I>]
416 <P>{
<B>permit
</B>|
<B>deny
</B>}
<B>tcp
</B>
417 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>source source-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
418 [{
<B>eq
</B>|
<B>neq
</B>|
<B>gt
</B>|
<B>lt
</B>}
<I>port
</I>|
<B>range
</B> <I>from
</I> <I>to
</I>]
419 {
<I>host
</I>|
<I>destination destination-wildcard
</I>|
<B>any
</B>}
420 [{
<B>eq
</B>|
<B>neq
</B>|
<B>gt
</B>|
<B>lt
</B>}
<I>port
</I>|
<B>range
</B> <I>from
</I> <I>to
</I>]
421 [{
<B>established
</B>|{
<B>match-any
</B>|
<B>match-all
</B>}
422 {
<B>+
</B>|
<B>-
</B>}{
<B>fin
</B>|
<B>syn
</B>|
<B>rst
</B>|
<B>psh
</B>|
<B>ack
</B>|
<B>urg
</B>}
423 ...|
<B>fragments
</B>]
426 <H3 ID=
"users">users
</H3>
428 Usernames and passwords for the command-line interface are stored in
429 this file. The format is
<I>username
</I><B>:
</B><I>password
</I> where
430 <I>password
</I> may either by plain text, an MD5 digest (prefixed by
431 <B>$
1</B><I>salt
</I><B>$
</B>) or a DES password, distinguished from
432 plain text by the prefix
<B>{crypt}
</B>.
<P>
434 The username
<B>enable
</B> has a special meaning and is used to set
435 the enable password.
<P>
437 <B>Note:
</B> If this file doesn't exist, then anyone who can get to
438 port
23 will be allowed access without a username / password.
<P>
440 <H3 ID=
"ip-pool">ip_pool
</H3>
442 This file is used to configure the IP address pool which user
443 addresses are assigned from. This file should contain either an IP
444 address or a CIDR network per line. e.g.:
<P>
455 Keep in mind that l2tpns can only handle
65535 connections per
456 process, so don't put more than
65535 IP addresses in the
457 configuration file. They will be wasted.
459 <H3 ID=
"build-garden">build-garden
</H3>
461 The garden plugin on startup creates a NAT table called
"garden" then
462 sources the
<B>build-garden
</B> script to populate that table. All
463 packets from gardened users will be sent through this table. Example:
466 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp -m tcp --dport
25 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
467 iptables -t nat -A garden -p udp -m udp --dport
53 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
468 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp -m tcp --dport
53 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
469 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp -m tcp --dport
80 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
470 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp -m tcp --dport
110 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
471 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp -m tcp --dport
443 -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
472 iptables -t nat -A garden -p icmp -m icmp --icmp-type echo-request -j DNAT --to
192.168.1.1
473 iptables -t nat -A garden -p icmp -j ACCEPT
474 iptables -t nat -A garden -j DROP
477 <H2 ID=
"ControllingtheProcess">Controlling the Process
</H2>
479 A running l2tpns process can be controlled in a number of ways. The primary
480 method of control is by the Command-Line Interface (CLI).
<P>
482 You can also remotely send commands to modules via the nsctl client
485 Also, there are a number of signals that l2tpns understands and takes action
486 when it receives them.
488 <H3 ID=
"Command-LineInterface">Command-Line Interface
</H3>
490 You can access the command line interface by telnet'ing to port
23.
491 There is no IP address restriction, so it's a good idea to firewall
492 this port off from anyone who doesn't need access to it. See
493 <A HREF=
"#users">users
</A> for information on restricting access based
494 on a username and password.
<P>
496 The CLI gives you real-time control over almost everything in
497 the process. The interface is designed to look like a Cisco
498 device, and supports things like command history, line editing and
499 context sensitive help. This is provided by linking with the
500 <A HREF=
"http://sourceforge.net/projects/libcli">libcli
</A>
501 library. Some general documentation of the interface is
502 <A HREF=
"http://sourceforge.net/docman/display_doc.php?docid=20501&group_id=79019">
505 After you have connected to the telnet port (and perhaps logged in), you
506 will be presented with a
<I>hostname
</I><B>></B> prompt.
<P>
508 Enter
<EM>help
</EM> to get a list of possible commands. A brief
509 overview of the more important commands follows:
512 <LI><B>show session
</B><BR>
513 Without specifying a session ID, this will list all tunnels currently
514 connected. If you specify a session ID, you will be given all
515 information on a single tunnel. Note that the full session list can
516 be around
185 columns wide, so you should probably use a wide terminal
517 to see the list properly.
<P>
518 The columns listed in the overview are:
520 <TR><TD><B>SID
</B></TD><TD>Session ID
</TD></TR>
521 <TR><TD><B>TID
</B></TD><TD>Tunnel ID - Use with
<EM>show tunnel tid
</EM></TD></TR>
522 <TR><TD><B>Username
</B></TD><TD>The username given in the PPP
523 authentication. If this is *, then LCP authentication has not
525 <TR><TD><B>IP
</B></TD><TD>The IP address given to the session. If
526 this is
0.0.0.0, LCP negotiation has not completed.
</TD></TR>
527 <TR><TD><B>I
</B></TD><TD>Intercept - Y or N depending on whether the
528 session is being snooped. See
<EM>snoop
</EM>.
</TD></TR>
529 <TR><TD><B>T
</B></TD><TD>Throttled - Y or N if the session is
530 currently throttled. See
<EM>throttle
</EM>.
</TD></TR>
531 <TR><TD><B>G
</B></TD><TD>Walled Garden - Y or N if the user is
532 trapped in the walled garden. This field is present even if the
533 garden module is not loaded.
</TD></TR>
534 <TR><TD><B>opened
</B></TD><TD>The number of seconds since the
535 session started
</TD></TR>
536 <TR><TD><B>downloaded
</B></TD><TD>Number of bytes downloaded by the user
</TD></TR>
537 <TR><TD><B>uploaded
</B></TD><TD>Number of bytes uploaded by the user
</TD></TR>
538 <TR><TD><B>idle
</B></TD><TD>The number of seconds since traffic was
539 detected on the session
</TD></TR>
540 <TR><TD><B>LAC
</B></TD><TD>The IP address of the LAC the session is
541 connected to.
</TD></TR>
542 <TR><TD><B>CLI
</B></TD><TD>The Calling-Line-Identification field
543 provided during the session setup. This field is generated by the
549 <LI><B>show users
</B><BR>
550 With no arguments, display a list of currently connected users. If an
551 argument is given, the session details for the given username are
555 <LI><B>show tunnel
</B><BR>
556 This will show all the open tunnels in a summary, or detail on a single
557 tunnel if you give a tunnel id.
<P>
558 The columns listed in the overview are:
560 <TR><TD><B>TID
</B></TD><TD>Tunnel ID
</TD></TR>
561 <TR><TD><B>Hostname
</B></TD><TD>The hostname for the tunnel as
562 provided by the LAC. This has no relation to DNS, it is just
563 a text field.
</TD></TR>
564 <TR><TD><B>IP
</B></TD><TD>The IP address of the LAC
</TD></TR>
565 <TR><TD><B>State
</B></TD><TD>Tunnel state - Free, Open, Dieing,
567 <TR><TD><B>Sessions
</B></TD><TD>The number of open sessions on the
573 <LI><B>show pool
</B><BR>
574 Displays the current IP address pool allocation. This will only display
575 addresses that are in use, or are reserved for re-allocation to a
576 disconnected user.
<P>
577 If an address is not currently in use, but has been used, then in the User
578 column the username will be shown in square brackets, followed by the time
579 since the address was used:
581 IP Address Used Session User
582 192.168.100.6 N [joe.user]
1548s
587 <LI><B>show radius
</B><BR>
588 Show a summary of the in-use RADIUS sessions. This list should not be very
589 long, as RADIUS sessions should be cleaned up as soon as they are used. The
592 <TR><TD><B>Radius
</B></TD><TD>The ID of the RADIUS request. This is
593 sent in the packet to the RADIUS server for identification.
</TD></TR>
594 <TR><TD><B>State
</B></TD><TD>The state of the request - WAIT, CHAP,
595 AUTH, IPCP, START, STOP, NULL.
</TD></TR>
596 <TR><TD><B>Session
</B></TD><TD>The session ID that this RADIUS
597 request is associated with
</TD></TR>
598 <TR><TD><B>Retry
</B></TD><TD>If a response does not appear to the
599 request, it will retry at this time. This is a unix timestamp.
</TD></TR>
600 <TR><TD><B>Try
</B></TD><TD>Retry count. The RADIUS request is
601 discarded after
3 retries.
</TD></TR>
606 <LI><B>show running-config
</B><BR>
607 This will list the current running configuration. This is in a format that
608 can either be pasted into the configuration file, or run directly at the
613 <LI><B>show counters
</B><BR>
614 Internally, counters are kept of key values, such as bytes and packets
615 transferred, as well as function call counters. This function displays all
616 these counters, and is probably only useful for debugging.
<P>
617 You can reset these counters by running
<EM>clear counters
</EM>.
621 <LI><B>show cluster
</B><BR>
622 Show cluster status. Shows the cluster state for this server
623 (Master/Slave), information about known peers and (for slaves) the
624 master IP address, last packet seen and up-to-date status.
<P>
625 See
<A HREF=
"#Clustering">Clustering
</A> for more information.
629 <LI><B>write memory
</B><BR>
630 This will write the current running configuration to the config file
631 <B>startup-config
</B>, which will be run on a restart.
636 You must specify a username, IP address and port. All packets for the
637 current session for that username will be forwarded to the given
638 host/port. Specify
<EM>no snoop username
</EM> to disable interception
641 If you want interception to be permanent, you will have to modify the RADIUS
642 response for the user. See
<A HREF=
"#Interception">Interception
</A>.
646 <LI><B>throttle
</B><BR>
647 You must specify a username, which will be throttled for the current
648 session. Specify
<EM>no throttle username
</EM> to disable throttling
649 for the current session.
<P>
651 If you want throttling to be permanent, you will have to modify the
652 RADIUS response for the user. See
<A HREF=
"#Throttling">Throttling
</A>.
656 <LI><B>drop session
</B><BR>
657 This will cleanly disconnect a session. You must specify a session id, which
658 you can get from
<EM>show session
</EM>. This will send a disconnect message
663 <LI><B>drop tunnel
</B><BR>
664 This will cleanly disconnect a tunnel, as well as all sessions on that
665 tunnel. It will send a disconnect message for each session individually, and
666 after
10 seconds it will send a tunnel disconnect message.
670 <LI><B>uptime
</B><BR>
671 This will show how long the l2tpns process has been running, and the current
672 bandwidth utilization:
674 17:
10:
35 up
8 days,
2212 users, load average:
0.21,
0.17,
0.16
675 Bandwidth: UDP-ETH:
6/
6 ETH-UDP:
13/
13 TOTAL:
37.6 IN:
3033 OUT:
2569
677 The bandwidth line contains
4 sets of values.
<BR>
678 UDP-ETH is the current bandwidth going from the LAC to the ethernet
679 (user uploads), in mbits/sec.
<BR>
680 ETH-UDP is the current bandwidth going from ethernet to the LAC (user
682 TOTAL is the total aggregate bandwidth in mbits/s.
<BR>
683 IN and OUT are packets/per-second going between UDP-ETH and ETH-UDP.
685 These counters are updated every second.
689 <LI><B>configure terminal
</B><BR>
690 Enter configuration mode. Use
<EM>exit
</EM> or ^Z to exit this mode.
691 The following commands are valid in this mode:
<P>
694 <LI><B>load plugin
</B><BR>
695 Load a plugin. You must specify the plugin name, and it will search in
696 /usr/lib/l2tpns for
<EM>plugin
</EM>.so. You can unload a loaded plugin with
697 <EM>remove plugin
</EM>.
702 Set a configuration variable. You must specify the variable name, and
703 the value. If the value contains any spaces, you should quote the
704 value with double (
") or single (') quotes.<P>
706 You can set any <A HREF="#startup-config
">startup-config</A> value in
707 this way, although some may require a restart to take effect.<P>
711 <H3 ID="nsctl
">nsctl</H3>
713 nsctl allows messages to be passed to plugins.<P>
715 Arguments are <EM>command</EM> and optional <EM>args</EM>. See
716 <STRONG>nsctl</STRONG>(8) for more details.<P>
718 Built-in command are <EM>load_plugin</EM>, <EM>unload_plugin</EM> and
719 <EM>help</EM>. Any other commands are passed to plugins for processing.
721 <H3 ID="Signals
">Signals</H3>
723 While the process is running, you can send it a few different signals, using
729 The signals understood are:
731 <DT>SIGHUP</DT><DD>Reload the config from disk and re-open log file.</DD>
732 <DT>SIGTERM, SIGINT</DT><DD>Stop process. Tunnels and sessions are not
733 terminated. This signal should be used to stop l2tpns on a
734 <A HREF="#Clustering
">cluster node</A> where there are other machines to
735 continue handling traffic.</DD>
736 <DT>SIGQUIT</DT><DD>Shut down tunnels and sessions, exit process when
740 <H2 ID="Throttling
">Throttling</H2>
742 l2tpns contains support for slowing down user sessions to whatever speed you
743 desire. You must first enable the global setting <EM>throttle_speed</EM>
744 before this will be activated.<P>
746 If you wish a session to be throttled permanently, you should set the
747 Vendor-Specific RADIUS value <B>Cisco-Avpair="throttle=yes
"</B>, which
748 will be handled by the <EM>autothrottle</EM> module.<P>
750 Otherwise, you can enable and disable throttling an active session using
751 the <EM>throttle</EM> CLI command.<P>
753 <H2 ID="Interception
">Interception</H2>
755 You may have to deal with legal requirements to be able to intercept a
756 user's traffic at any time. l2tpns allows you to begin and end interception
757 on the fly, as well as at authentication time.<P>
759 When a user is being intercepted, a copy of every packet they send and
760 receive will be sent wrapped in a UDP packet to the IP address and port set
761 in the <EM>snoop_host</EM> and <EM>snoop_port</EM> configuration
764 The UDP packet contains just the raw IP frame, with no extra headers.<P>
766 To enable interception on a connected user, use the <EM>snoop username</EM>
767 and <EM>no snoop username</EM> CLI commands. These will enable interception
770 If you wish the user to be intercepted whenever they reconnect, you will
771 need to modify the RADIUS response to include the Vendor-Specific value
772 <B>Cisco-Avpair="intercept=yes
"</B>. For this feature to be enabled,
773 you need to have the <EM>autosnoop</EM> module loaded.<P>
775 <H2 ID="Authentication
">Authentication</H2>
777 Whenever a session connects, it is not fully set up until authentication is
778 completed. The remote end must send a PPP CHAP or PPP PAP authentication
779 request to l2tpns.<P>
781 This request is sent to the RADIUS server, which will hopefully respond with
782 Auth-Accept or Auth-Reject.<P>
784 If Auth-Accept is received, the session is set up and an IP address is
785 assigned. The RADIUS server can include a Framed-IP-Address field in the
786 reply, and that address will be assigned to the client. It can also include
787 specific DNS servers, and a Framed-Route if that is required.<P>
789 If Auth-Reject is received, then the client is sent a PPP AUTHNAK packet,
790 at which point they should disconnect. The exception to this is when the
791 walled garden module is loaded, in which case the user still receives the
792 PPP AUTHACK, but their session is flagged as being a garden'd user, and they
793 should not receive any service.<P>
795 The RADIUS reply can also contain a Vendor-Specific attribute called
796 Cisco-Avpair. This field is a freeform text field that most Cisco
797 devices understand to contain configuration instructions for the session. In
798 the case of l2tpns it is expected to be of the form
800 key=value,key2=value2,key3=value3,key<EM>n</EM>=<EM>value</EM>
803 Each key-value pair is separated and passed to any modules loaded. The
804 <EM>autosnoop</EM> and <EM>autothrottle</EM> understand the keys
805 <EM>intercept</EM> and <EM>throttle</EM> respectively. For example, to have
806 a user who is to be throttled and intercepted, the Cisco-Avpair value should
809 intercept=yes,throttle=yes
812 <H2 ID="Plugins
">Plugins</H2>
814 So as to make l2tpns as flexible as possible (I know the core code is pretty
815 difficult to understand), it includes a plugin API, which you can use to
816 hook into certain events.<P>
818 There are a few example modules included - autosnoop, autothrottle and
821 When an event happens that has a hook, l2tpns looks for a predefined
822 function name in every loaded module, and runs them in the order the modules
825 The function should return <B>PLUGIN_RET_OK</B> if it is all OK. If it returns
826 <B>PLUGIN_RET_STOP</B>, then it is assumed to have worked, but that no further
827 modules should be run for this event.<P>
828 A return of <B>PLUGIN_RET_ERROR</B> means that this module failed, and
829 no further processing should be done for this event. <EM>Use this with care.</EM>
831 Every event function called takes a specific structure named
832 param_<EM>event</EM>, which varies in content with each event. The
833 function name for each event will be <B>plugin_<EM>event</EM></B>,
834 so for the event <EM>timer</EM>, the function declaration should look like:
836 int plugin_timer(struct param_timer *data);
839 A list of the available events follows, with a list of all the fields in the
841 <TABLE CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0><TR BGCOLOR=LIGHTGREEN><TD>
842 <TABLE CELLSPACING=1 CELLPADDING=3>
843 <TR BGCOLOR=LIGHTGREEN><TH><B>Event</B></TH><TH><B>Description</B></TH><TH><B>Parameters</B></TH></TR>
844 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>pre_auth</B></TD>
845 <TD>This is called after a RADIUS response has been
846 received, but before it has been processed by the
847 code. This will allow you to modify the response in
856 <DT>protocol<DD>0xC023 for PAP, 0xC223 for CHAP
857 <DT>continue_auth<DD>Set to 0 to stop processing authentication modules
861 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>post_auth</B></TD>
862 <TD>This is called after a RADIUS response has been
863 received, and the basic checks have been performed. This
864 is what the garden module uses to force authentication
872 <DT>auth_allowed<DD>This is already set to true or
873 false depending on whether authentication has been
874 allowed so far. You can set this to 1 or 0 to force
875 allow or disallow authentication
876 <DT>protocol<DD>0xC023 for PAP, 0xC223 for CHAP
880 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>packet_rx</B></TD>
881 <TD>This is called whenever a session receives a
882 packet. <FONT COLOR=RED>Use this sparingly, as this will
883 seriously slow down the system.</FONT>
889 <DT>buf<DD>The raw packet data
890 <DT>len<DD>The length of buf
894 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>packet_tx</B></TD>
895 <TD>This is called whenever a session sends a
896 packet. <FONT COLOR=RED>Use this sparingly, as this will
897 seriously slow down the system.</FONT>
903 <DT>buf<DD>The raw packet data
904 <DT>len<DD>The length of buf
908 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>timer</B></TD>
909 <TD>This is run every second, no matter what is happening.
910 This is called from a signal handler, so make sure anything
915 <DT>time_now<DD>The current unix timestamp
919 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>new_session</B></TD>
920 <TD>This is called after a session is fully set up. The
921 session is now ready to handle traffic.
930 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>kill_session</B></TD>
931 <TD>This is called when a session is about to be shut down.
932 This may be called multiple times for the same session.
941 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>radius_response</B></TD>
942 <TD>This is called whenever a RADIUS response includes a
943 Cisco-Avpair value. The value is split up into
944 <EM>key=value</EM> pairs, and each is processed through all
956 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>radius_reset</B></TD>
957 <TD>This is called whenever a RADIUS CoA request is
958 received to reset any options to default values before
959 the new values are applied.
968 <TR VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=WHITE><TD><B>control</B></TD>
969 <TD>This is called in whenever a nsctl packet is received.
970 This should handle the packet and form a response if
975 <DT>iam_master<DD>Cluster master status
976 <DT>argc<DD>The number of arguments
977 <DT>argv<DD>Arguments
978 <DT>response<DD>Return value: NSCTL_RES_OK or NSCTL_RES_ERR
979 <DT>additional<DD>Extended response text
986 <H2 ID="WalledGarden
">Walled Garden</H2>
988 Walled Garden is implemented so that you can provide perhaps limited service
989 to sessions that incorrectly authenticate.<P>
991 Whenever a session provides incorrect authentication, and the
992 RADIUS server responds with Auth-Reject, the walled garden module
993 (if loaded) will force authentication to succeed, but set the flag
994 <EM>garden</EM> in the session structure, and adds an iptables rule to
995 the <B>garden_users</B> chain to force all packets for the session's IP
996 address to traverse the <B>garden</B> chain.<P>
998 This doesn't <EM>just work</EM>. To set this all up, you will to
999 setup the <B>garden</B> nat table with the
1000 <A HREF="#build-garden
">build-garden</A> script with rules to limit
1001 user's traffic. For example, to force all traffic except DNS to be
1002 forwarded to 192.168.1.1, add these entries to your
1003 <EM>build-garden</EM>:
1005 iptables -t nat -A garden -p tcp --dport ! 53 -j DNAT --to 192.168.1.1
1006 iptables -t nat -A garden -p udp --dport ! 53 -j DNAT --to 192.168.1.1
1009 l2tpns will add entries to the garden_users chain as appropriate.<P>
1011 You can check the amount of traffic being captured using the following
1014 iptables -t nat -L garden -nvx
1017 <H2 ID="Filtering
">Filtering</H2>
1019 Sessions may be filtered by specifying <B>Filter-Id</B> attributes in
1020 the RADIUS reply. <I>filter</I>.<B>in</B> specifies that the named
1021 access-list <I>filter</I> should be applied to traffic from the
1022 customer, <I>filter</I>.<B>out</B> specifies a list for traffic to the
1025 <H2 ID="Clustering
">Clustering</H2>
1027 An l2tpns cluster consists of of one* or more servers configured with
1028 the same configuration, notably the multicast <B>cluster_address</B>.<P>
1030 *A stand-alone server is simply a degraded cluster.<P>
1032 Initially servers come up as cluster slaves, and periodically (every
1033 <B>cluster_hb_interval</B>/10 seconds) send out ping packets
1034 containing the start time of the process to the multicast
1035 <B>cluster_address</B>.<P>
1037 A cluster master sends heartbeat rather than ping packets, which
1038 contain those session and tunnel changes since the last heartbeat.<P>
1040 When a slave has not seen a heartbeat within
1041 <B>cluster_hb_timeout</B>/10 seconds it "elects
" a new master by
1042 examining the list of peers it has seen pings from and determines
1043 which of these and itself is the "best
" candidate to be master.
1044 "Best
" in this context means the server with the highest uptime (the
1045 highest IP address is used as a tie-breaker in the case of equal
1048 After discovering a master, and determining that it is up-to-date (has
1049 seen an update for all in-use sessions and tunnels from heartbeat
1050 packets) will raise a route (see <A HREF="#Routing
">Routing</A>) for
1051 the <B>bind_address</B> and for all addresses/networks in
1052 <B>ip_pool</B>. Any packets recieved by the slave which would alter
1053 the session state, as well as packets for throttled or gardened
1054 sessions are forwarded to the master for handling. In addition, byte
1055 counters for session traffic are periodically forwarded.<P>
1057 A master, when determining that it has at least one up-to-date slave
1058 will drop all routes (raising them again if all slaves disappear) and
1059 subsequently handle only packets forwarded to it by the slaves.<P>
1061 <H2 ID="Routing
">Routing</H2>
1062 If you are running a single instance, you may simply statically route
1063 the IP pools to the <B>bind_address</B> (l2tpns will send a gratuitous
1066 For a cluster, configure the members as BGP neighbours on your router
1067 and configure multi-path load-balancing. Cisco uses "maximum-paths
1068 ibgp
" for IBGP. If this is not supported by your IOS revision, you
1069 can use "maximum-paths
" (which works for EBGP) and set
1070 <B>as_number</B> to a private value such as 64512.<P>
1072 <H2 ID="Performance
">Performance</H2>
1074 Performance is great.<P>
1076 I'd like to include some pretty graphs here that show a linear performance
1077 increase, with no impact by number of connected sessions.<P>
1079 That's really what it looks like.<P>
1083 <A HREF="mailto:l2tpns-users@lists.sourceforge.net?subject=L2TPNS%
20Documentation
">l2tpns-users@lists.sourceforge.net</A>