This page explains how to use the BFH VPN without having to use NetworkManager or any GUI application.

You'll need to have the vpnc software installed. It can be found in the repositories of most Linux distributions. On Debian like distributions (Ubuntu, Mint,…) you can use this command to install vpnc:

sudo apt-get install vpnc

You'll also need the correct config file. Here it is: bfh.conf.gz

Once you've downloaded that, you need to uncompress it (wiki did not let me upload it in uncompressed form, so go figure)

cd ~/Downloads
gunzip bfh.conf.gz

First, make sure you're in the directory you downloaded and extracted the config file to:

cd ~/Downloads

Now, edit the file with an editor of your selection. You need to uncomment the last two lines of the file and put in your username and password for the “<your username>” and “<your password>” placeholder.

vim bfh.conf
# or
gedit bfh.conf

Now, move the file to the correct location on the disk. You need to be root for that.

# just to make sure the target directory does actually exist
sudo mkdir /etc/vpnc
sudo mv bfh.conf /etc/vpnc/

Since the file contains your username and password, you should protect it

sudo chmod 600 /etc/vpnc/bfh.conf

Once the config files is in place, it's really easy to start and stop the VPN. You'll need root privileges for that as well.

sudo vpnc bfh.conf

Since we've copied the file to the correct location, vpnc should find it no matter what your current directory is. If it does not, just pass the full path to the file manually like so:

sudo vpnc /etc/vpnc/bfh.conf

To stop the VPN again, just run

sudo vpnc-disconnect