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Bug 790770 - [RFE] improve failure message when importing VPN connection in NetworkManager
[RFE] improve failure message when importing VPN connection in NetworkManager
Status: RESOLVED OBSOLETE
Product: NetworkManager
Classification: Platform
Component: VPN (general)
unspecified
Other Linux
: Normal normal
: ---
Assigned To: NetworkManager maintainer(s)
NetworkManager maintainer(s)
: 595583 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
 
Reported: 2017-11-23 21:06 UTC by Stuart Axon
Modified: 2020-11-12 14:26 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: ---



Description Stuart Axon 2017-11-23 21:06:45 UTC
I had a .ovpn file with an unsupported protocol (see bug 790769).

In the GUI there was a generic error message.

Eventually I worked out how to try and import from the cli and it told me exactly which line number it didn't like and the content.

It would be great if there was some way to see this message, even if it was behind an "advanced" button, at the moment the message says something about plugin can't import.
Comment 1 Thomas Haller 2017-11-23 22:03:50 UTC
the unhelpful message is because nm-connection-editor asks each VPN plugin to import the file. As they all fail and report an error, it prints the error message of the last plugin (which is arbitrary).

Since nm-connection-editor does not ask the user which VPN type this is, it doesn't know which is the right plugin (and the best failure message to show).

That should be fixed by expanding the plugin API so that during import the plugins can give a confidence whether the file was in their recognized format, or totally foreign. So that, if multiple plugins fail (as commonly happens), the best failure reason can be chosen.
Similarly, in the unusual case, where multiple plugins would be able to import the connection, to choose the one that has the best confidence. Currently that is solved by letting plugins require a particular file extension, like (.ovpn, etc)
Comment 2 Thomas Haller 2018-02-15 13:41:22 UTC
*** Bug 595583 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 3 Thomas Haller 2018-05-25 12:54:19 UTC
a better approach could be, when the user selects to import, he is presented a list of available VPN types to try.

 (1) "Import a saved VPN connection with type..."

for convenience, still also allow the current option

 (2) "Import a saved VPN connection..."

which continues trying to guess the VPN type. It works like trying all plugins. If there was not exaclty one plugin able to import the file, fallback to ask for the VPN type (1).
Comment 4 André Klapper 2020-11-12 14:26:43 UTC
bugzilla.gnome.org is being shut down in favor of a GitLab instance. 
We are closing all old bug reports and feature requests in GNOME Bugzilla which have not seen updates for a long time.

If you still use NetworkManager and if you still see this bug / want this feature in a recent and supported version of NetworkManager, then please feel free to report it at https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/NetworkManager/NetworkManager/-/issues/

Thank you for creating this report and we are sorry it could not be implemented (workforce and time is unfortunately limited).