Bounty: $2000 for OpenMPTCProuter-like Functionality in pfSense
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@Cool_Corona It's not really the VPS, but the point of true packet level bonding/aggregation, which the VPS helps aid in. In the sense, say you have 3 WAN's. for this example, lets take Starlink, maybe a cable provider, and a local WISP, with load balancing, you would not get the benefit of all of them, with true bonding, you are able to utilize the speed of all them, and use the VPS as the outgoing communication as that is where all the traffic comes to and from. OpenMPTCProuter has this function built in, but to have something like it, could really offer pfsense as a whole, a whole new world of capability in this area. Having this feature could unlock pfsense to be used in more applications and cement it further into enterprise and rural environments alike with little downside, as many people have dual WAN's and I am sure would love to utilize both of them effectively.
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@MXNPD11 But you would need a server/router in a DC that handles outbound traffic as well?
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@Cool_Corona In this aspect yes, that is required to make MPTCP work, in this implementation, this could be another pfsense box running this functionality if implemented. Wouldn't have to be a DC necessarily, just a place where the sum of bandwidth is greater than that of what is being aggregated, could be someones house, a VPS, a dedicated server, router, etc, so long as it can run pfsense.
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@MXNPD11 Sorry for waking an old post, but this is exactly what I am looking for. We have a remote truck that we have starlink and multiple cellular modems onboard. We also have the ability to hardwire and use wifi on location if required. Sometimes we have good bandwidth on one of the services but non on the other, but if we need to get something back to the base for edits or to stream content, sometimes we need all the bandwidth and so being able to push across all available routes to a single point would be amazing. In this case we don't need a DC as we have multiple gbps at our main site. I was thinking of ways to make it happen over a VPN tunnel, but it seems OpenMPTCP is the only route without using something like a Peplink or the like. I assume from scouring the internet nothing has really progressed with this.
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@sweetapollo OpenMPTCP router is so fantastic that I would never even consider pfSense anymore. It does everything pfSense does and so much more the latest release 0.61 has everything you need and is extremely stable.
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@sweetapollo My current plan is to use Speedify, they have said they are working on the ability to self host the server yourself, you can already use the app on OpenWRT. My plan is to pipe Speedify into pfsense eventually. Just waiting for the moment to deploy it
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@winkmichael Would you say it is stable enough to run at a 0 point release? We currently have 3 sites that we interlink with PFSesnes, so it isn't exactly a quick switch out to just move over. I am very willing to do it but we obviously already have active sites, so would take some planning.
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@sweetapollo I'm not quite sure what you mean by 0 point release, but if you check out the github for openmptcp you will find people using it a wide variety of ways with great success. I run it only for three deployments, and it has never once failed me in 3 years - that being said I have upgraded with each new release so I reboot every 8 - 9 months on average. Under the hood OpenMPTCP is just running OpenVPN or Wireguard and using the linux kernel's built in MPTCP functionality, so you are riding on top of very stable tech. OpenMPTCP is just a nice gui to facilitate it all.
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@sweetapollo I should note, sponsoring the project for $20 - 30 a month goes a long ways too. The maintainer is very active and helps everyone out pretty fast, its got a pretty active community too.
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@winkmichael Thanks so much. I'll look into it some more, but you were a great help. What I meant by a 0 point release is that is it basically an alpha or beta version until it reaches version 1.x This to me has historically been an indication that it shouldn't be deployed in mission critical spaces or commercial spaces, but good to hear it is very active and very reliable. thanks again
