End Goal not yet achieved, assistance appreciated

[Mackie]

I apolagise in advance for the length of this post and also for adding some personal details, but I wanted to be very clear about a couple of details. I am in no way asking for a hand out, or to be spoon fed. I believe in researching answers to questions and hard work to accomplish a goal. This is the best way to learn. I have spent much time reading all the content I could find on OpenVPN and have yet to accomplich my goal.

I am involved in a personal project which will allow my sons and I to continue in a much enjoyed activity now that I have been forced to find alternate living arrangements due to health reasons.

I have a LAN based application which has worked wonderfully for some time now provided all machines running the application are connected to the same internal LAN. (we were all connected to a Linksys E1200 Router, connected to a cable modem, which connected to the internet)

All machines could run the application simultaneously, surf the web, and perform what ever other tasks desired.

My newly relocated and down sized computer lab is now in what would normally be the living room in a small apartment and I have easily duplicated a scaled down version of what I had at home. However, now that we are no longer on the same LAN a solution became necessary.

Looking at OpenVPN, I am confident that the solution has been found and yet after much effort have decided to ask for a bit of help. While studying the documentation for OpenVPN, I came to the conclusion that, based on my scenario, using bridged mode would be necessary.

The LAN based application, the very reason for this entire project, is dependant on the instance of MSSQL also set up on this machine
1) A configuration file associated with this application has a number of references to the machines IP address.
2) The .exe of the application itself also has a reference to the IP address which is "hard coded" in to the application's .exe.
3) This results in a need for the machine IP to remain constant as any change results in the application failing to launch.

The above has been taken care of by employing DHCP Reservation on the Linksys E1200 Router where as the router will always "hand out" the same pre-determined IP Address using the MAC Address of the NIC installed on this machine. It should also be noted that for testing purposes I have currently set DMZ on the router to this machine's IP address.

The problem with this is that when bridged mode is employed, the IP of my primary NIC is altered thus "breaking" the application and it fails. in addition, all accessibility to my web pages associated with my Apache installation is lost. In some instances of my experimentation I have also lost internet connectivity all together.

Ultimate Goal

-Connect remote computers to my local network is such a way that:

a) all computers (both local & remote) can run the "LAN based application"
b) all computers (both local & remote) can still surf the internet, preferably through their own connection and not via the server/host
c) IP address of the "server/host" machine must be recognizable by the config file of the "LAN based application" There for this IP address should remain constant.
d) web pages hosted by my Apache should remain accessible both local and remote.


I have followed the directions found in OpenVPN's web pages best I can and have used the example configs as building blocks. I have also have available, all of my configs as well as system info, router info and any other info I believed related, in hopes that a person willing to assist me can see exactly what I have going on here. Due to level of detail and accuracy of this information, I have uploaded it all to a hidden location on a web site I currently have hosted elsewhere. I'll be more than happy to provide the link to someone serious about helping.

email = csg.mackie@gmail.com
Skype = tac.warfare

Thanks in advance for any help provided

[Mackie]

Please delete this post as I put it in the wrong section

Huge Apolagies