pfSense-Some lifesaving tips

Today I was changing the pfSense webGUI port to https but it didn’t work and I was not able open the webGUI. Now this box is sitting hundreds of miles away with no remote support. Oh boy I thought wtf! why I did that. But now how to get it back, another problem which I forgot while changing to https is one instance of openVPN is also running on 443! Yeah I know TCP over TCP is bad choice but … So, then I started the troubleshooting:

I tried to disable the firewall:

# pfctl -d    —>                disable firewall rules
# pfctl -e    —>                turn the firewall back on
# pfctl -f /tmp/rules.debug  —> loaded ruleset

No luck

I thought of if I can somehow delete the instance of openVPN running on 443? Found the configuration files in /var/etc/ but no luck.

Than sometime back I read that pfSense stores its configuration in XML. Found it in /conf/config.xml. In /conf/backup/ there are old version of backup files. Opened it in vi and yes there it is in <webgui>, changed to http from https but still no GUI.

# sockstat  says no lighthttpd running

Tried reloading the webconfigurator option 11 in the menu still no port 80. How to reload the config.xml, I didn’t wanted to reload the machine. Instruction on reloading config.xml which is available here didn’t work.

Held my breath and pressed 5 (reboot) and webGUI is back.

phew….

PS: is there any way to restore the back via ssh?

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