This book is a comprehensive guide to using OpenVPN for building both secure VPNs. The book is written in a very friendly style that makes this complex topic easy and a joy to read. It first covers basic VPN concepts, then moves to introduce basic OpenVPN configurations, before covering advanced uses of OpenVPN. This book is for both experienced and new OpenVPN users.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 6 Ratings

Wrong title, OpenVPN for dummies? - 2006-11-07
Reviewer Rating:
This book should be titled OpenVPN for Dummies. It's a very simplified description of the OpenVPN tool, giving simple examples which could easily be found on the internet. The book content is almost half screen shots and listing with limited descriptions. It's missing any sort of detail on the complex issues of using OpenVPN. I hate to be so blunt, but I was severely disappointed. My advice is to pass on the book read the HOWTO on the OpenVPN web site.

OpenVPN is great.. but this book is windowand GUI centric - 2007-03-19
Reviewer Rating:
This book is 'okay' at best. It seems very simplified. They focus on testing and deploying OpenVPN with with windows clients.. then they have a whole chaper on using webmin to configure your firewall etc. I mean.. come on. If I am setting up my own VPN .. i probably am not using webmin... and if i was.. this isn't supposed to be a book about webmin.

I would suggest taking a look at some gentoo wiki pages on using openvpn. They are quick and strait foward. This book could have been cut down to about 3 or 4 chapters.. the rest is fluff.. and worthless fluff at that.

Good to get started, not recommeded for complex issues. - 2007-02-19
Reviewer Rating:
OpenVPN is an easy-to deploy system to get VPNs running. it Uses SSL to secure the data you are about to send over the net. OpenVPN is an all userland thing and therefore is easy to maintin. The book describes in detail how to get started with openVPN using a number of different platforms. It has an ease followable roadmap to get your VPN up and running in most cases. But it lacks imho the details on specific more complex cases. Also the book touches briefly on version 2.1 but does not address some of the interesting details of it and how to handle them. The book has a number of screenshots that describe how to handle things on different platforms (windows, unix). THe appendix is a valuable tool to find more resources on the net, once you get started.

In short: good beginners book, but when it comes to complex setups do not expect that much from this book.

Not for a novice - 2008-03-09
Reviewer Rating:
OpenVPN by Markus Feilner is a comprehensive reference of the excellent OpenVPN software. The book's subtitle, Building and Integrating Virtual Private Networks does it justice.

In 11 Chapters, the author introduces VPN and VPN security, shows you how to install OpenVPN on a number of different platforms (incl. Linux, MacOSX and Windows), and runs the reader through configuring OpenVPN as a server and/or as a client.

Securing OpenVPN with X.509 Certificates is well covered, including creating certificates with some special (GUI) tools. The OpenVPN configurations are well covered and the book closes with a chapter on Advanced configuration (tunnels, scripting, authentication, etc.) and Troubleshooting.

All in all, the book is for advanced users. The introduction is a bit quick for a novice.

The book lacks diagrams of what the author is showing us when he builds tunnels and discusses possibilities. Without a great deal of imagination (or experience), it is hard to follow without network diagrams.

Apart from that, I recommend the book to anybody who has to set up OpenVPN, and it is good that Feilner shows very clearly what you do if yo are on Windows XP.

Useful, could be better - 2009-06-04
Reviewer Rating:
If you are willing to search around the internet for the same info, you will most likely find it. I just don't have the time to do it.

That said, the book helped me a lot when dealing with certificates and the reason for TSL-Auth. I would have liked to have seen more diagrams and "cook book" examples. Overall it was worth the price to me, I really needed OpenVPN to work for my company and the book had just enough info to help me.

Again, I would like to see more advanced examples presented, like bridging multiple networks together.

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