tinc - Nov 2006 - 4 questions about tinc's VPN

Hi there!

I'm totally new to the concept 'self-made VPNs' :P
I've discovered tinc and I think it's not as easy as hamachi, but not so
hard as OpenVPN :D

Now: I've got 4 questions:

question n.1: I'm behind a router. This router is configurable, but I'm 
also behind a provider's NAT (private IPs with a common public IP). Will 
tinc work, or it will do as hamachi does (problems connecting to me)? 
(in hamachi there is a 'yellow' indicator on me for users of the same 
provider [passages: |private IP| -> |public IP| -> |hamachi server| -> 
|public IP| -> |private IP| -> |router's private IP|])
question n.2: a tinc VPN uses the server's bandwidth (so all the 
transmissions pass from the server) or is a P2P system (the server only 
re-addresses the connections)?
question n.3: if a client enters a server, does the client 'see' all the
others connected to the server?
question n.4: what about the public and private keys? What to give to 
the clients? What the clients must generate?

Thanks ^^

On Fri, Nov 24, 2006 at 12:05:23PM +0100, EleGoS wrote:
> I'm totally new to the concept 'self-made VPNs' :P
What do you mean by "self-made"?
> question n.1: I'm behind a router. This router is configurable, but
I'm
> also behind a provider's NAT (private IPs with a common public IP).
Will
> tinc work, or it will do as hamachi does (problems connecting to me)? 
> (in hamachi there is a 'yellow' indicator on me for users of the
same
> provider [passages: |private IP| -> |public IP| -> |hamachi server|
->
> |public IP| -> |private IP| -> |router's private IP|])
If you are behind a NAT, you should probably add "TCPOnly = yes" to
your
tinc.conf. Once a tinc daemon behind a NAT makes a connection to another
tinc daemon, packets can go both ways.
> question n.2: a tinc VPN uses the server's bandwidth (so all the 
> transmissions pass from the server) or is a P2P system (the server only 
> re-addresses the connections)?
It's peer-to-peer. There is no central server with tinc. Tinc also does
not make a distinction between "client" and "server".
> question n.3: if a client enters a server, does the client 'see'
all the
> others connected to the server?
Yes, each tinc daemon knows about all other tinc daemons in the same
VPN.
> question n.4: what about the public and private keys? What to give to 
> the clients? What the clients must generate?
You typically let every tinc daemon generate its own public/private
keypair. You then exchange public keys with those other tinc daemons for
which you have a ConnectTo line in your tinc.conf. You don't have to
ConnectTo all other daemons in the VPN, just a few is enough, tinc will
create a full mesh network itself from there on.

-- 
Met vriendelijke groet / with kind regards,
     Guus Sliepen <guus@tinc-vpn.org>
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