Small tool to make Tortoise auto-connect to VPN

[Leo Davidson]

Hi everyone,

Just want to share a small thing I made for people using Tortoise SVN
(and similar tools) over VPNs (virtual private networks). (It'll also
help with RAS dial-ups, I think.)

It's just a command-line exe that checks if a VPN is connected and, if
not, tells Windows to connect to it and waits for that to finish.

If you access SVN over a VPN it can be a pain to manually connect
first (especially if the VPN disconnects due to inactivity and you're
never sure if it's still connected).

I couldn't find a good one existing solution so I wrote my own. (I
found was RasDial.exe but that prompts via the command-line and asks
for the VPN password even if you're already connected.)

After testing (on Windows 7 x64, FWIW) for a few weeks it seems to
work well. The binary and C++ source are here:

http://www.pretentiousname.com/miscsoft/index.html#ConnectVPN

To use it with Tortoise SVN, first create a .bat file that runs the
tool with the name of your VPN (the connection name in the network
control panel). Then tell Tortoise to run the .bat file as part of its
pre_commit_hook and pre_update_hook. (Set both to wait=true and
show/hide=hide.)

(A .bat file is used because AFAIK you can't specify arbitrary
command-line arguments for hooks in the Tortoise SVN.)

When you commit or update:

- If you're not on the VPN, you'll see the standard Windows VPN/RAS
connection user interface (password prompt, progress windows, etc.).
Once connected the commit/update will continue as normal.

- If you're already connected then nothing extra will happen and
you'll commit/update as normal.

Limitation:

- AFAIK, Tortoise SVN only has hooks for commit and update so there's
no way to run the tool before other events (e.g. log or blame). I've
not found that to be a big deal but it'll depend how you typically use
SVN.

It's a very simple tool but I hope other people find it useful.

Leo

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[Simon Large]

Silly question, but why would you need a VPN to get TortoiseSVN to
work? You're not using file:// access are you?

Simon

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[Andy Levy]

I can only access my repositories when I'm outside the office if I
connect via VPN - our server isn't publicly accessible.

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[Robin Guest]

Same here. Our servers or source code aren't going anywhere near the public internet any time soon, and I develop from home using a VPN.

 

[Robin Guest]

...using svnserve of course!

[Stefan Küng]

I've created an issue for a hook script that runs before a remote
connection:
http://code.google.com/p/tortoisesvn/issues/detail?id=38

would you mind if I include your tool in TSVN?

Stefan

--
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(_,\/ \_/ \ TortoiseSVN
\ \_/_\_/> The coolest Interface to (Sub)Version Control
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[Leo Davidson]

On 8 July 2010 17:33, Stefan Küng <torto...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I've created an issue for a hook script that runs before a remote
> connection:
> http://code.google.com/p/tortoisesvn/issues/detail?id=38

Cool! Thank you.

> would you mind if I include your tool in TSVN?

No problem! Feel free to use/include the tool and/or the source any
way you wish.

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[Leo Davidson]

On 8 July 2010 22:07, Leo Davidson <leonudel...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 8 July 2010 17:33, Stefan Küng <torto...@gmail.com> wrote:

>> would you mind if I include your tool in TSVN?
>
> No problem! Feel free to use/include the tool and/or the source any
> way you wish.

Oops, that compelled me to take another look at the source code and I
spotted a minor typo/bug. I've put a new version up fixing this:

* Now waits for VPN connection to complete if it was in the middle of
connecting.when run. (Was meant to originally but there was a typo in
the source.)

Sorry about that!

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[Alexander Iljin]

Hello!

LD> I couldn't find a good one existing solution so I wrote my own. (I
LD> found was RasDial.exe but that prompts via the command-line and asks
LD> for the VPN password even if you're already connected.)

nircmd rasdial "VPN Connection Name Here"
nircmd rashangup "VPN Connection Name Here"
... and other nice functions.

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.html
Freeware.
Exe file is only 29 Kb.

---=====---
Alexander

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[Leo Davidson]

On 9 July 2010 02:18, Alexander Iljin <ajs...@yandex.ru> wrote:
> Hello!
>
> LD> I couldn't find a good one existing solution so I wrote my own. (I
> LD> found was RasDial.exe but that prompts via the command-line and asks
> LD> for the VPN password even if you're already connected.)
>
>  nircmd rasdial "VPN Connection Name Here"
>  nircmd rashangup "VPN Connection Name Here"
>  ... and other nice functions.
>
>  http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.html
>  Freeware.
>  Exe file is only 29 Kb.

nircmd is a great toolbox but in this case didn't do what I want. Its
rasdial features seem to be a subset of the rasdial.exe that comes
with Windows (probably written at a time when rasdial.exe didn't
exist).

nircmd will not show any user interface when establishing the
connection and, in particular, won't prompt for the VPN username or
password if they are not saved with the connection settings.

(You can specify the password to nircmd via the command line but I
don't want the password stored in a batch file. I also like to see the
connection progress dialogs as it sometimes takes a long time, gets
stuck or fails, so it's useful to see which stage the connection is
at.)

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[Stefan Küng]

On 08.07.2010 23:44, Leo Davidson wrote:
> On 8 July 2010 22:07, Leo Davidson<leonudel...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 8 July 2010 17:33, Stefan Küng<torto...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>> would you mind if I include your tool in TSVN?
>>
>> No problem! Feel free to use/include the tool and/or the source any
>> way you wish.
>
> Oops, that compelled me to take another look at the source code and I
> spotted a minor typo/bug. I've put a new version up fixing this:
>
> * Now waits for VPN connection to complete if it was in the middle of
> connecting.when run. (Was meant to originally but there was a typo in
> the source.)

I've committed your tool in r19873 with some small modifications:
* compiled as win, not console app
* use of our own auto-pointer class
* replaced console output with message boxes

http://code.google.com/p/tortoisesvn/source/browse/#svn/trunk/contrib/hook-scripts/client-side/ConnectVPN

Stefan

--
___
oo // \\ "De Chelonian Mobile"
(_,\/ \_/ \ TortoiseSVN
\ \_/_\_/> The coolest Interface to (Sub)Version Control
/_/ \_\ http://tortoisesvn.net

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[Leo Davidson]

On 11 July 2010 14:32, Stefan Küng <torto...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I've committed your tool in r19873 with some small modifications:
> * compiled as win, not console app
> * use of our own auto-pointer class
> * replaced console output with message boxes
>
> http://code.google.com/p/tortoisesvn/source/browse/#svn/trunk/contrib/hook-scripts/client-side/ConnectVPN

Excellent.

The changes make sense. Not sure why I didn't use win/message boxes
originally. :)

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[Stefan Küng]

On 11.07.2010 18:31, Leo Davidson wrote:
> On 11 July 2010 14:32, Stefan Küng<torto...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I've committed your tool in r19873 with some small modifications:
>> * compiled as win, not console app
>> * use of our own auto-pointer class
>> * replaced console output with message boxes
>>
>> http://code.google.com/p/tortoisesvn/source/browse/#svn/trunk/contrib/hook-scripts/client-side/ConnectVPN
>
> Excellent.
>
> The changes make sense. Not sure why I didn't use win/message boxes
> originally. :)

btw: you don't have to use a bat file to start the tool. Just pass the
parameter as part of the "path to script".

Stefan

--
___
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(_,\/ \_/ \ TortoiseSVN
\ \_/_\_/> The coolest Interface to (Sub)Version Control
/_/ \_\ http://tortoisesvn.net

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[Leo Davidson]

On 11 July 2010 17:35, Stefan Küng <torto...@gmail.com> wrote:

> btw: you don't have to use a bat file to start the tool. Just pass the
> parameter as part of the "path to script".

I couldn't get that to work. I haven't had a chance to investigate
properly but a couple of ideas:

There's a space in the path to the command (I've got it stored below
Program Files) which might complicate things. I tried with and without
quotes around the command path, with the VPN name argument always
unquoted.

Also, if TSVN always sends the normal arguments (PATH DEPTH
MESSAGEFILE CWD) to the command, appended to the string in the config
dialog, I think that will cause my code to reject the command-line for
having too many arguments. (I wrote it like that so people who don't
know to quote arguments get a syntax error if their VPN name contains
a space.)

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[Stefan Küng]

On 11.07.2010 21:13, Leo Davidson wrote:
> On 11 July 2010 17:35, Stefan Küng<torto...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> btw: you don't have to use a bat file to start the tool. Just pass the
>> parameter as part of the "path to script".
>
> I couldn't get that to work. I haven't had a chance to investigate
> properly but a couple of ideas:
>
> There's a space in the path to the command (I've got it stored below
> Program Files) which might complicate things. I tried with and without
> quotes around the command path, with the VPN name argument always
> unquoted.

This works (at least with the new pre-connect hook on trunk) just fine:
put the path to the exe in quotes, add a space and then the parameter.

> Also, if TSVN always sends the normal arguments (PATH DEPTH
> MESSAGEFILE CWD) to the command, appended to the string in the config
> dialog, I think that will cause my code to reject the command-line for
> having too many arguments. (I wrote it like that so people who don't
> know to quote arguments get a syntax error if their VPN name contains
> a space.)

Ok, in that case you're out of luck. The other hooks all pass the
parameters unconditionally so the hook script has to deal with those.

Stefan

--
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[leonudel...@gmail.com]

In case it is useful, I've just published ConnectOpenVPN, which is a similar tool (with C++ source) to my older ConnectVPN, to help connect via the OpenVPN client from things like TortoiseSVN and scripts.

It acts as a command-line wrapper around openvpn-gui.exe, addressing some problems the standard exe has with scripting. In particular, if you ask it to connect it will check if it is connected already and not do anything it nothing is needed (thus avoiding unwanted status windows appearing), and it properly waits for the connection to complete (instead detaching and running in parallel), while returning a success/fail code (so scripts can bail out on failures).

Details are here, and the zip contains both binary and C++ source (can build with VS2017 and VS2019):

https://www.pretentiousname.com/miscsoft/index.html#ConnectOpenVPN

This does not replace the older ConnectVPN tool. The old tool works with the built-in Windows VPN while this new one works with the OpenVPN client. Since the old tool seemed useful to some TSVN users, I thought I'd share this new one in case it is as well.

(On the same page, there's also a slightly newer version of ConnectVPN which includes a 64-bit build. Bitness *shouldn't* matter, but Windows 10 1809 introduced a strange bug where using the 32-bit client on 64-bit Windows connected to the VPN while forcing it as the default gateway. I'm not sure if Microsoft fixed that but it was a huge problem for me a few months ago.)

The TSVN project (and anyone else) is welcome to include or fork the tool, or use the source code, or indeed ignore it entirely, as you wish. :)

All the best,
Leo

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