Thanks to the Appearance tab, you can switch between the standard and the monochrome status bar icon and place it next to the Spotlight icon. Notification Center integration and powerful built-in utilities From the Preferences tab you can reassign the keyboard shortcut, set the maximum log display size and check for updates. What is more, Tunnelblick is capable to use sound notifications when the connection is established or when the connects is interrupted. Additionally, you can connect or disconnect from a server and copy the log to your Mac’s clipboard. The Configurations tab helps you view all existing configurations, check their log and change their settings. The great thing about Tunnelblick is that you can install OpenVPN or Tunnelblick VPN configuration files with just a few mouse clicks. Intuitive and easy to use user interfaceīy accessing Tunnelblick’s status bar menu, you can easily view all active connections, disconnect or connect to the desired network, add a new VPN, quit the app and open Tunnelblick’s main window. It is worth mentioning that you also need access to a VPN server since your Mac is at one end of the tunnel and the VPN server is at the other end. To start using Tunnelblick you just need to add your configuration and encryption information. Hence, you are not required to install any additional binaries or drivers. The Tunnelblick utility comes with all the necessary binaries and drivers, including OpenVP, tun/tap drivers and easy-rsa. Complete package to connect to a VPN server from your Mac But having gotten that far, I’m at least glad that it wasn’t all for nothing.Tunnelblick is a user-friendly and unobtrusive macOS application that enables you to take control over the OpenVPN client and server connections from within a simple and clean interface. Setting up your own VPN server requires more than a little bit of know-how, and it’s not for the faint of heart. But it gets the job done, and it mostly does so without getting in the way. Plus, when configurations go awry, it can take a bit of tweaking to get things working again. And it has its own shortcomings-for example, I notice that it only seems to check for updates on a restart, and I don’t restart my Macs very often, so I’m perennially a version or two behind. To do that with macOS’s built-in VPN client, you generally need to visit a website or use another utility. For one, it lets you quickly check your external IP in the menu bar, to ensure that traffic is going through your encrypted connection. While it may not be the most user friendly software (in particular, there’s a conflict with High Sierra that requires an annoying workaround, once you get Tunnelblick up and running, it works as smoothly as the Mac’s own VPN client, and it has a few extra features that in some cases make it preferable. Like the Mac’s built-in VPN features, Tunnelblic presents as a menu bar icon where you can connect or disconnect from your VPN. But once I got over the hurdle of setting it all up, I ran into an issue closer to home: macOS’s built-in VPN client doesn’t support the server that I’d used, OpenVPN.įortunately, there’s an alternative in the form of the free open-source VPN client Tunnelblick, which is designed for use with OpenVPN. One of the first attempts I made was setting up a VPN server, which I installed with the help of one of Linode’s handy guides. I enjoy the challenge of trying to navigate the arcane command line and install and configure various services that I think might be handy to have access to. (Full disclosure: Linode does regularly sponsor my podcast Clockwise, but we don’t get any special deals beyond what we offer to all listeners of the show.) It may have been well over a decade since I was last employed as a technology professional, but one of the ways I like to keep my hand in is by running my own Linux server, which I host over at Linode.
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