VPN Client for Win32 and now FreeBSD

[Matthew Grooms]

All,

      I recently released the Shrew Soft Win32 VPN Client 2.0 Beta which 
is designed to work with ipsec tools. This software has seen an immense 
amount of improvement since the 1.1 release and features a completely 
re-worked kernel driver framework, a new direct adapter mode for more 
traditional road warrior setups, simplified configuration, improved 
gateway compatibility using modecfg push or pull mode, a much improved 
debug output application and loads of bug fixes.

      If you are interested in giving it a try, please visit the url 
below to obtain a free download. Any feedback or bug reports are very 
much welcome using the shrew.net mailing lists or web submission form.

http://www.shrew.net

      Along with the improvements to the win32 package, I have ported 
the ike daemon and front end gui applications to FreeBSD under a liberal 
open source license. The ike daemon can be used to support site to site 
or client to gateway communications for ipv4 hosts. While the win32 
client has its own ipsec code, the FreeBSD port uses the existing kernel 
ipsec support with or without Yvans NATT kernel patches. While this 
software should be considered experimental on FreeBSD, I use it on a 
regular basis to connect to a cisco ASA system so it certainly has some 
utility. The best way to describe the software working in a client mode 
would be to put vpnc on steroids and add a gui front end. When using the 
software as a VPN client gateway, it is functionally similar to racoon 
with en emphasis on flexible client based connectivity and a few other 
extras. Please have a look at the build.txt and iked.conf man page for 
more details.

Here is the subversion url if anyone wants to check out the source ...

svn://svn.shrew.net/ike/head

And a few gui screen shots are available here ...

http://www.shrew.net/?page=software

      I also attempted to cobble together a rough port for the software. 
This is my first attempt at writing a port so it could use a lot of 
help. For starters, the software requires bison 2.3 to build properly 
but I couldn't quite figure out how to create the dependency. QT is also 
required for the client front end applications. I tried to create this 
dependency but am not sure if its working either. If both are installed 
in advance, the port builds and works fine.

Here is the url if anyone wants to give it a try ...

http://www.shrew.net/vpn/ike.tgz

Bug reports and feedback are welcome using the shrew.net mailing lists.

-Matthew