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    Sticky connections not working with dual WAN

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Routing and Multi WAN
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    • TheCableGuy96T
      TheCableGuy96
      last edited by

      I'm not sure what you mean? I'm the only person connecting.

      It took me a few minutes to find those details in the states so that's probably why it shows they connections are closing. But I just grabbed any 2 connections in the logs showing it was using more than 1 WAN. There were many other lines of logs showing connections on both WANs.

      These connections were made over the timeframe of 1 minute and after killing states so shouldn't there only be 1 WAN IP in the logs regardless?

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      • johnpozJ
        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
        last edited by johnpoz

        @Daskew78 said in Sticky connections not working with dual WAN:

        t took me a few minutes to find those details

        You can filter states.. My point was that those states are closed..

        This statement "Once the states for that source expire" means what exactly... If any state, even closed states that are just waiting to time out.. Or does that state have to actually be active?

        This where I thought maybe @Derelict could help..

        Lets look at this scenario... You create a connection to IP X, now that state has been set to be closed.. fin.. and you enter a time_wait state.. Is that state considered expired - so a new session which is what you show there from a different source port would that go out the same wan, or would it round robin to the other wan?

        You could look at it both ways.. Since the the state is just waiting to close, and you have this new session coming fro a different source port maybe I should round robin that connection.. Or you could look at it as hey there is ANY state from IP your rfc1918 address to this public IP 62.3 - so always use that wan? I am not exactly sure how it is looked at?

        I could see both ways being valid ways of looking at.. Hey this client has an active session to x, any new sessions it creates will go out the same wan.. Or hey this session is closed or closing... Since this is a new session "different source port.. Maybe it should go out the other wan to load balance.

        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
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        • TheCableGuy96T
          TheCableGuy96
          last edited by

          @johnpoz said in Sticky connections not working with dual WAN:

          w that state has been set to be closed.. fin.. and you enter a time_wait state.. Is that state considered expired - so a new session which is what you show there from a different source port would that go out the same wan, or would it round robin to the other wan?

          Would you be willing to do a remote session with me and I can show you all the evidence? I really think there's a bug here.

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          • johnpozJ
            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
            last edited by johnpoz

            I am not saying its not a bug or that there isn't a problem - I just don't know which specifics pfsense is using to know keep a connection sticky.. I made a bit of edit addition - on my previous post.

            You can look at it both ways, I don't know exactly what "Once the states for that source expire" means.. Maybe once there has been a fin, that state is no longer looked at - I am not sure..

            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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            • TheCableGuy96T
              TheCableGuy96
              last edited by

              Well I'm at a loss as to what to do next.

              I think it comes down to @Derelict needs to advise what further testing I can do or accept it may be a possible bug?

              I hope he replies!

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              • johnpozJ
                johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                last edited by johnpoz

                I still think is out for a bit, my understand is he wouldn't be back for a few more days... So his check into the thread was a bit unexpected to me..

                We can see if @jimp has any advice as well.. This is just a bit out of my comfort level, since I do not use multiple wans in a load balancing setup.. I don't really see the point to it to be honest ;) If you need to load balance tells me your connections are undersized ;) hehehe

                I have more experience with this sort of thing on fortinet load balancing to servers behind them, and how their sticky connections work.. And even then its not a day to day sort of thing, only get called into consult on issues - normally they give me sniffs to work with and help them figure out what is going wrong ;)

                If you could show state that is clearly active, and then another state being opened - then I would agree that is not how I would understand sticky to work.

                You know who might be good as well would be @stephenw10

                An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                TheCableGuy96T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • TheCableGuy96T
                  TheCableGuy96 @johnpoz
                  last edited by

                  @johnpoz I don't deny my upload is undersized of for my needs... it's the best i can get at the moment though until they upgrade the infrastructure around here. It has many other advantages though such as redundancy.

                  Hopefully one of the people you tagged can chip in :)

                  I do appreciate all the help so far... thanks pal!

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                  • johnpozJ
                    johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                    last edited by johnpoz

                    Sure failover I get. but that wouldn't need to be a in load balancing setup to do that ;) heheh

                    What I would suggest is try and validate if this other connection is being created after original state is closed.. You could just sniff on your client.. Do you see or send a fin at any time?

                    And that is when the wan changes.

                    An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                    If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                    Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                    SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                    TheCableGuy96T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • TheCableGuy96T
                      TheCableGuy96 @johnpoz
                      last edited by

                      It's getting a bit above me this now which is why I was hoping I could let you teamviewer in and maybe take a look?

                      You'd have all the answers in 5 minutes rather than going back and forth through this monkey ;)

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                      • N
                        netblues @TheCableGuy96
                        last edited by

                        @Daskew78 You shouldnt really care about states being closed when you have a stickiness of 1200.

                        As documentation says, if you have stickiness 0, then load balancing path is re evaluated when connectios are closed. (and we could discuss if this means fin wait etc)
                        But stickiness of 1200 Means 1200 seconds AFTER connections is closed, if a new request comes from the same ip to the same host it will leave from the same gateway.

                        I insist. stickiness works fine on multiwan ssl load balancing scenario.
                        And consider this workaround too
                        https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/6025

                        quoting
                        Also of note, when the weights differ, even though the gateways have a specific order with repetition in the rule, pf seems to still flip back and forth, though the general ratio of the weights is respected. For example with WAN1=3, WAN2=2:

                        I had the same issues as you do until I made 2 the default weight on both load balancing connections.

                        Deeper issues are suspected, as redmine says.
                        Please consider testing the workaround.

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                        • johnpozJ
                          johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                          last edited by

                          Yeah sure seems that issue is exactly what your seeing... I would do what @netblues says and that should fix up your issue I would hope.

                          An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                          If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                          Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                          SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                          • TheCableGuy96T
                            TheCableGuy96
                            last edited by

                            @netblues @johnpoz

                            Thanks guys... I've had a read through but it's all a little confusing to me.

                            Can you just clarify you are suggesting setting both connections to "Tier 2" instead of "Tier 1" on the LoadBalancing profile?

                            Cheers.

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                            • johnpozJ
                              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                              last edited by

                              Yup..

                              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                              If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                              Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                              SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                              • TheCableGuy96T
                                TheCableGuy96
                                last edited by

                                Well if that's the case it is a bug then. But at least there appears to be a workaround.

                                I'll test it now, cheers again :)

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                                • N
                                  netblues @TheCableGuy96
                                  last edited by

                                  @Daskew78 nope
                                  We suggest to put a weight of 2 on both gateways and load balance them as both tier 1.
                                  with a stickiness of 2500

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                                  • johnpozJ
                                    johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                                    last edited by johnpoz

                                    As you see yes there is a redmine on it ;)

                                    Currently targeted at 2.5 - but its been pushed many times already.. So wouldn't expect... This thread could get added to that redmine I would think.. Might put a bit more weight on looking into it.

                                    An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                    If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                    Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                    SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                    • TheCableGuy96T
                                      TheCableGuy96
                                      last edited by

                                      Sorry I spoke a little too soon.... should I also set the sticky connections back to "0"?

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                                      • N
                                        netblues @TheCableGuy96
                                        last edited by netblues

                                        @Daskew78 NO, it won't work on web banking sites

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                                        • TheCableGuy96T
                                          TheCableGuy96
                                          last edited by

                                          Sorry I was replying too fast and missed your update about setting the states to 2500.

                                          I have set it to 2500 and set each gateway to Tier 1 but I can't see where I set a weight of 2? Where is the weight setting?

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                                          • RicoR
                                            Rico LAYER 8 Rebel Alliance
                                            last edited by

                                            System > Routing > Edit Gateway > Display Advanced > Weight

                                            -Rico

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