VPS and on-premise nodes behind FritzBox 7590 AX not communicating

Support
1

I am trying to setup a distributed NethServer8 cluster where I want the leader to run on premise and a vps node in the cloud (the latter should host mailserver for instance).

My on-premise node runs behind a FritzBox 7590 AX where it is very restricted to setup WireGuard VPN as most settings are dictated by the FritzBox and there is no way of setting parameters.

The only way I have found is by importing a (modified) configuration when setting up network to network configuration. It is not even possible to pre-configure the port thw WG service is running on on the FB. :frowning:

With all the efforts I have been able to add the remote VPS node to the cluster but it consistently seems to be offline.

Am I chasing the impossible perhaps? Or do I miss something when setting up my VPN tunnel?

2

Hi and welcome to NethServer community.

I think you just need to setup port forwarding on the Fritzbox to the NethServer leader for following ports:

  • 443/tcp
  • 55820/udp

See also System requirements — NS8 documentation

In the Fritzbox manual it’s explained under port sharing on page 106.

It’s also possible to change the VPN port on the NethServer, see VPN Custom Setup — NS8 documentation

EDIT:

If nothing works you could use the VPS as leader node.

3

I already had the suggested port forwards in place.

I don’t know what caused the mishap, but I started from scratch.

I have reset all my nodes a. Removed all VPN configuration on my FritzBox and started from scratch:

  1. Setup my dyndns configuration in FritzBox
  2. Create site to site VPN
  3. Installed on-premise node as master with default VPN settings
  4. Generated TLS certificate for my on-premise node matching the FQDN setup for it
  5. Installed the VPS node
  6. Joined the VPS node to the master through web UI with join code (could not get it to work through command line)

After that w/o any issues the VPS node appeared as a worker on the on-premise leader. Now off to setup applications and migrate my existing services to NethServer on-premise/VPS tandem.