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I have a Macbook Pro and I'm trying to get VPN from home to work. It refuse to work. I have turned on verbose logging, but how can I read the log ?

Roland Bengtsson
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2 Answers2

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Whether you choose L2TP over IPSec or PPTP for your settings, the log file is located at:

/var/log/ppp.log

If you want use terminal to view your log file you can do following:

vim /var/log/ppp.log

tail -f /var/log/ppp.log (if you want see end of file)

less /var/log/ppp.log (if your log file was huge and want to see page by page)

Am1rr3zA
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    For additional information on IPSec, use the built-in "syslog" command to query all logs for messages from the racoon key management daemon: syslog -k Facility -k Sender racoon – Asmus Feb 07 '11 at 14:54
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    This answer no longer seems relevant: on OS X El Capitan, there is no /var/log/ppp.log. There is a /var/log/ppp/ directory, but it's empty. Logs seem to go into /var/log/system.log. – D.W. Aug 23 '16 at 17:49
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    @D.W. I'm on Sierra 10.12.6 and /var/log/ppp.log is still being written to as I write – PandaWood Sep 16 '17 at 04:38
  • Where can I find Cisco IPSec logs? – Kirill Oct 06 '17 at 09:33
  • Not using the terminal and just to extend previous information, on mac open the Console Tool and on the right side (explorer) and click on /var/log you should see in the middle panel a list of logs, click on the ppp.log – Pedro Luz Oct 31 '17 at 10:51
  • On Mojave, this file does not exist, even after enabling verbose logging for L2TP – Elliott Apr 21 '20 at 21:01
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For completeness, I'll add a way to view the log in the GUI.

Open the Console utility, select Show Log List from the toolbar (if it isn't already shown), then select FILES > /private/var/log > ppp.log from the sidebar.

On macOS Catalina, the toolbar reads "Log Reports", then ppp.log

The macOS Console application on macOS Catalina

Velociround
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Gordon Davisson
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