Introduction

ITS requires the use of their Virtual Private Network (VPN) when connecting to many campus resources from off-campus. This includes many of the services the Computer Science Department provides. The VPN makes your off-campus connection appear to be coming from on campus, and in doing so it encrypts the traffic between your computer and the campus network. With the VPN active, you can imagine yourself sitting on the UW–L campus.

macOS and Windows

This process describes how to install Cisco's AnyConnect software and use it to connect to the campus VPN.

Go to https://vpn.uwlax.edu/ and log in with your campus username and password. This will not connect you to the VPN, but rather allows you to download AnyConnect. Find the AnyConnect button in the menu on the left pane of the page. From there you will see a page with a link to Start AnyConnect ... which will prompt you to download and install the AnyConnect software. Follow that prompt.

Once AnyConnect is installed, start the AnyConnect client, and point AnyConnect to connect to vpn.uwlax.edu. AnyConnect will prompt you for your campus username and password, and it might also prompt you for a Duo code. Once connected, your computer will appear to be on the same campus network as campus computers.

When you are done using the campus computer, don’t forget to log out of AnyConnect.

Linux

Depending on your configuration, you might find it possible to configure your computer to use the VPN using the same utility you used to configure your WiFi connection. If this is the case, then remember to use vpn.uwlax.edu as the VPN server, and log in using your campus credentials.

An alternative uses the command-line program openconnect. Due to limitations in the software involved, this is currently a two-step process: (1) authenticate to the VPN using a browser and (2) export the resulting cookie and pass it to openconnect using a command-line argument.

First, connect to https://vpn.uwax.edu/ using your browser. Next, identify the cookie named webvpn, and copy its contents. How you do this will vary, depending on which browser you use. Consult the documentation for your browser.

Next, run the following with root privileges:

openconnect -v -u USERNAME --passwd-on-stdin --useragent="AnyConnect Linux_64 4.10.07073" -C "webvpn=COOKIE-VALUE" https://vpn.uwlax.edu

When run this way, openconnect will expect a password, but it does not prompt for one; simply type the password blindly. Once you type the password, openconnect will continue in an interactive mode. Leave the command running, and complete your work in another terminal.

When you are done using the campus computer, don’t forget to log out of the VPN. With openconnect this is a matter of terminating the program by pressing Ctrl-C.

Support

The Help Desk can help you solve any problems you encounter with the campus VPN.