# Setup Fortinet VPN Client In CentOS 7

My applications need to access services in client's private network. I am using [openfortivpn](https://github.com/adrienverge/openfortivpn) to connect to Fortigate SSL VPN server. It should work for PPP VPN too.

# Installation

Checkout https://github.com/adrienverge/openfortivpn#installing for installation instruction. Check if there is already a package for your Linux distro before heading for manual build & install method.

```bash
sudo yum install openfortivpn
```

The systemd template file is provided in Github but not included in YUM package. So we have to create it manually with some *modifications*.

Create */usr/lib/systemd/system/openfortivpn@.service*

```ini
[Unit]
Description=OpenFortiVPN for %I
After=network-online.target
Documentation=man:openfortivpn(1)
 
# Available from v230 onward. Ref: https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/464098
#StartLimitIntervalSec=500
#StartLimitBurst=5
 
[Service]
Type=simple
PrivateTmp=true
ExecStart=/usr/bin/openfortivpn -c /etc/openfortivpn/%I.conf
OOMScoreAdjust=-100
 
# Auto restart when it gets disconnected.
Restart=always
RestartSec=500ms
 
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
```

Reload systemd config.

```bash
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
```

# Setup

Create a copy of “config” in */etc/openfortivpn/* and name it “example.conf”.

**WARNING** Make sure it has a **.conf** extension and filename matches the instance name in systemd service file.

```bash
cd /etc/openfortivpn
sudo cp config example.conf
sudo chmod 600 example.conf
```

Edit the VPN configuration. The configuration may contain password, therefore file permission should be set to “600”.

Enabled this service.

```bash
sudo systemctl enable openfortivpn@example
```

Note that instance name is the part between “@” and “.service”. Instance name must match openfortivpn config filename, excluding file extension.

# Start VPN Service

```bash
sudo systemctl start openfortivpn@example
```

# Maintaining Persistent Connection

My client's VPN server is configured to disconnect client after 5 minutes of inactivity. I have configured systemd to automatically restart the service upon disconnection. After some time, I discovered that openfortivpn service is running, but I am unable to access the private network. As a workaround, I created a cron job to ping 1 of the IPs in the private network at 4 minutes interval. This creates network activity and prevent forced disconnection.