Using a VPN (PIA)

I have seen @sam_nazarko give, and myself have previously received, his much-appreciated patient support. I also received the same from @Tom_Doyle, to whom I said thanks and marked his reply as the “solution”.

Contrary to the perception that somehow got generated, I did search both Google and this forum before posting, and then I viewed many of the posts linked by @fzinken (but this was merely a link to a search for “PIA”). The closest posting there was for a Raspberry Pi, and I have no idea if that works the same as a Vero 4K, hence my follow up asking for specific experience.

Until Tom’s reply, and then Sam’s, none of the people who posted spent more than a few seconds to basically state “go fix it yourself”, and when they got called out on it, they decided to attack me rather than address the root issue.

@Tom_Doyle, when I wrote “stay silent” it meant, it’s better to refrain from posting than troll someone who merely needs help. Their negativity and condescension is what “Does not help your community grow.”

The controversy stirred up about this issue, shows there is one.

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Is there still a problem outstanding with VPN for you?

If so – we would be happy to assist.

Let’s focus on the technical issues at hand, and then we can continue the discussion.

But to be honest: the moderators here are doing this in their own time, and they are doing so of their own choice. Even if you disagree with their responses, they deserve respect for doing so.

If you experience problems with your Vero 4K device, which you paid for, then you can always contact me directly, where I would be glad to assist.

Best

Sam

Pretty sure you still need the OpenVPN client for this.
If you can venture on the dangerous side I plan to have a new method for testing in the next month or so.

Sam

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@sam_nazarko : I will try following all of the advice given on the weekend.

Reading the post @Tom_Doyle linked, I found this tutorial to be very helpful:
https://www.backtrails.net/2017/04/30/openvpn-setup-for-private-internet-access-pia-vpn-raspberry-pi-3-osmc/

You commented that the Raspberry PI and the Vero 4K work the same, so the above link seems to be the best solution. Many thanks to Bruce @neurosisone !! That should be a pinned post IMHO.

I use the OpenVPN Addon by Brian Hornsby (OpenVPN for Kodi) with PIA that way I can connect and disconnect from within Kodi without the need to SSH.

I am using a PI vice Vero, but the setup should be the same.

@Tom_Doyle @neurosisone

In both of your posts / guides, one of you used “Sweden.opvn” and the other used “UK London.ovpn”.

How does one get a list of all of them that are valid? I am across the pond and would like to use Toronto or something like that. Non-US though. Is there a complete list? @neurosisone maybe consider adding the full list to your excellent guide.

P.S. is this it …

Hi

cd /etc/openvpn

ls

Assuming you have unzipped https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/openvpn/openvpn.zip, you will get list available. cp which ever US suits to vpn.conf.

I have the following available:

US California.ovpn
US Chicago.ovpn
US East.ovpn
US Florida.ovpn
US Midwest.ovpn
US New York City.ovpn
US Seattle.ovpn
US Silicon Valley.ovpn
US Texas.ovpn
US West.ovpn

Thanks Tom.

Thanks Tom.

Hey @Tom_Doyle I don’t know what “.CP” is. I was asking for a NON-US server (see my previous post). Are you saying I should type

CD /ETC/OPENVPN

and then

LS

?

Hi,

cp is the copy command on the linux command line.

Apologies I skimmed read your last post and only seen US, try:

cp “CA Toronto.ovpn” vpn.conf.

Thanks Tom.

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@sam_nazarko @Tom_Doyle @neurosisone

Trying to follow Bruce’s tutorial linked above (this one)…

(1a) There is a difference between Tom’s shorter post (also linked above) and Bruce’s tutorial. Tom’s states to use the command “sudo apt-get install openvpn unzip” and Bruce’s just has “sudo apt-get install openvpn” (no “unzip”). I used the tutorial, Bruce’s command.

(1b) There is another difference: Tom’s states to add the qualifier “- -no-check-certificate” to the “wget” of the ZIP file. Again I followed Bruce’s version, without that qualifier.

(2) Next, I got as far as the suggested command “sudo apt-get upgrade” …but it triggers a warning:
Running apt-get upgrade on your system can cause adverse effects on your system.
Use apt-get dist-upgrade, which is the proper way to administer a Debian / Ubuntu system.
_For more information about updates, see:

…I don’t fully know what I’m doing so I skipped this, trusting the Vero 4k box to upgrade itself. The command before this one, sudo apt-get update, appeared to run without errors.

(3) the command “unzip openvpn.zip” did not work. I received this message:
Archive: openvpn.zip
unzip: can’t open ‘AU Melbourne.ovpn’: Permission denied

Then I tried
osmc@Vero4k:/etc/openvpn$ ls

And received this:
openvpn.zip (red font) update-resolv-conf (green font)

I took a risk and typed “sudo unzip openvpn.zip” - - success. So the tutorial needs to be corrected for that command line.

(3) Following the rest of the tutorial went more or less OK. I was a little concerned about why the configuration file was named “pia_sweden.conf” but in the start up file, it said to only use “pia_sweden” (without the " .conf ") but that’s what I did and it seems to have worked. {Not that it matters but I used Toronto instead of Sweden.}

Long story short, I’m done.

I fixed the apt-get upgrade to apt-get dist-upgrade. added the sudo command In front of zip sorry for the errors. Normally the sudo command is not necessary to download and extract zip files but you are in /etc

Im certainly holding out for the official OSMC method…

It’s on its way.

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See, that’s how it is done.

I use zomboids vpn manager for openVPN, it has just about all protocals for most VPN services in it and gives a very easy to use in-kodi interface. I also use PIA with it.

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I have a Vero4k running OSMC January 2020 and installed OpenVPN for Kodi 3.0.0 using the zip-install method with default settings.

I set everything up according to this guide, and can confirm that openvpn connects over ssh.
However, when I try to get it to run using Brian Hornsby’s OpenVPN for Kodi I get the following error:

An error has occurred whilst trying to connect OpenVPN
Unable to connect to OpenVPN management interface

One thing I noticed is that the default location in the add-on settings is /usr/bin/openvpn but openvpn wasn’t located there. I found the application under /usr/sbin/openvpn and changed the location thusly. This had no effect on the error message.

Any ideas what’s wrong?

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Did you follow the setup instructions? How To Setup Your VPN Client

Aside from the fact that the directions are for ELEC and Raspbmc, meaning the paths are all different, I was able to figure out what was going on by combing through forum posts for hours; in short, yes.

I can connect via ssh using the config files in ~/.kodi/userdata/addon_data/script.openvpn