Hello, I'm trying to set up an openvpn server on a dedicated server with fedora, and setting it up to work with the failover IP (eth0:0) of my server.
(an apache server is already running successfully through the failover IP)

cat /etc/openvpn/server.conf
openvpn --version
is "unknown-linux" normal?

I tried to launch openvpn

service openvpn start
cat /var/log/openvpn.log
I don't understand how openvpn has to be configured to start properly.

Openvpn server can be setup in two ways.

1. Static key based
2. Certificate based

To get help for simple static key based setup (server configuration file) click OpenVpn HOWTO

you can set variable verb to 9 for diagnostic purpose. Also check the log file for errors. You are using port 443 in server configuration. Make sure it is correct because if Apache is using the same 443 port as SSL it may not start

My server has to be certificate based, 3-4 users will be connected simultaneously, i followed a tutorial to make a first certificate, but the problem is not a connection problem right now, the server don't even starts.
What means: Unrecognized option or missing parameter(s) in [CMD-LINE]:1: script-security ?
where do i have to add a parameter? what parameter?

And the most disturbing:
Cannot open dh1024.pem for DH parameters: error:02001002:system library:fopen:No such file or directory: error:2006D080:BIO routines:BIO_new_file:no such file

dh1024.pem is in the /etc/openvpn folder, i rebuilt it to be sure, the error is still there.

About apache, there are just simple php tests, i'm learning web programming, i don't think apache uses 443 port.
And i'm forced to use the 443 for openvpn, most of the other ports are blocked in my student room. (that's why i use a vpn)

Thanks for your answers and patience, i'm new on linux.

According to me the error message says [CMD-LINE]:1:. Can you try by commenting out the line 1 (mode server). or make sure it is correct.


for the dh1024.pem error give a full path there e.g. /etc/openvpn/dh1024.pem

replace verb 3 with verb 9. It will give your more detail about error message you can check the error log for more info. Hope it may help

I tried everything you suggested, and nothing changed in the logs, i concluded that openvpn don't use my server.conf, then i tried launching openvpn that way:

openvpn --config /etc/openvpn/server.conf

It worked, and i can connect to the server with my openvpn client.
Everything is fine and works well, I think I will let openvpn work that way now.

You've been really helpful, thanks !
(By the way, if you have some advices to improve how my openvpn server is working, i'm listening)