Opensource Tech. Stuffs

How-to merge or consolidate many excel worksheets into one

2019-09-14T14:52:00.006+01:00

Insert in MS Excel VBA the code below and run. It will combine all worksheets in one called "Combined_worksheet"
==
Sub Combine()
'UpdatebyExtendoffice
Dim J As Integer
On Error Resume Next
Sheets(1).Select
Worksheets.Add
Sheets(1).Name = "Combined_worksheet"
Sheets(2).Activate
Range("A1").EntireRow.Select
Selection.Copy Destination:=Sheets(1).Range("A1")
For J = 2 To Sheets.Count
Sheets(J).Activate
Range("A1").Select
Selection.CurrentRegion.Select
Selection.Offset(1, 0).Resize(Selection.Rows.Count - 1).Select
Selection.Copy Destination:=Sheets(1).Range("A65536").End(xlUp)(2)
Next
End Sub

2018-05-02T08:46:00.003+01:00

Guide for installing DHIS2 on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Thanks to https://dhis-2.blogspot.com.ng/

Works up to DHIS 2.28

This guide assumes Ubuntu 16.04 LTS is installed on a local machine/VPS with 4GB of RAM and DHIS2 is used for testing purposes. This is based on the official DHIS2 documentation, correcting some of it's mistakes in the commands.

Login with the Ubuntu 'root' account or any account in the Ubuntu sudoers list.

Setting server time zone
sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
Creating an Ubuntu user to run DHIS2
Create a new user called 'dhis' by invoking:
sudo useradd -d /home/dhis -m dhis -s /bin/false

Then set the password for the account by invoking:
sudo passwd dhis
Make sure you set a strong password
Creating the configuration directory
sudo mkdir /home/dhis/config

Set ownership of the directory to 'dhis' user created above
sudo chown dhis:dhis /home/dhis/config
PostgreSQL installation
sudo apt-get install postgresql-9.5 postgresql-contrib-9.5 postgresql-9.5-postgis-2.2
Create a non-privileged PostgreSQL user called 'dhis' by invoking:
sudo -u postgres createuser -SDRP dhis

Create a database by invoking:
sudo -u postgres createdb -O dhis dhis2

Create the PostGIS extension
sudo -u postgres psql -c "create extension postgis;" dhis2
Creating DHIS2 configuration file
sudo -u dhis nano /home/dhis/config/dhis.conf

Insert following lines to the file (update PostgreSQL dhis user password according what you set above):

# Hibernate SQL dialect
connection.dialect = org.hibernate.dialect.PostgreSQLDialect

# JDBC driver class
connection.driver_class = org.postgresql.Driver

# Database connection URL
connection.url = jdbc:postgresql:dhis2

# Database username
connection.username = dhis

# Database password
connection.password =xxxx

# Database schema behavior, can be validate, update, create, create-drop
connection.schema = update

# Encryption password (sensitive)
encryption.password = xxxx
Java installation
Oracle Java will need to be installed manually because it no longer supports installation via apt-get.

Create a directory to install Java

mkdir /usr/java/

cd /usr/java/

wget -O java-linux-x64.tar.gz http://oracle-java-download-link
(You need to replace http://oracle-java-download-link with "Linux x64" download link from this page: https://www.java.com/en/download/linux_manual.jsp
It will be something like: http://javadl.oracle.com/webapps/download/AutoDL?BundleId=233162_512cd62ec5174c3487ac17c61aaa89e8)

tar zxvf java-linux-x64.tar.gz
Tomcat and DHIS2 installation
sudo apt-get install tomcat7-user

To create a Tomcat instance for DHIS2 move to the dhis folder created above:
cd /home/dhis/

Create Tomcat instance:
sudo tomcat7-instance-create tomcat-dhis

Set ownership of the created folder to dhis user
sudo chown -R dhis:dhis /home/dhis/tomcat-dhis/

Edit setenv.sh:
sudo nano /home/dhis/tomcat-dhis/bin/setenv.sh

Add the following lines to the bottom of the file:

export JAVA_HOME='/usr/lib/jvm/java-8-oracle/'
export JAVA_OPTS='-Xmx2000m -Xms1000m'
export DHIS2_HOME='/home/dhis/config'

The next step is to download the DHIS2 WAR file and place it into the webapps directory of Tomcat:
wget https://www.dhis2.org/download/releases/2.28/dhis.war

Move the WAR file into the Tomcat webapps directory. We want to call the WAR file ROOT.war in order to make it available at localhost directly without a context path:
sudo mv dhis.war tomcat-dhis/webapps/ROOT.war

DHIS2 should never be run as a privileged user, so edit the startup.sh:
sudo nano /home/dhis/tomcat-dhis/bin/startup.sh

Replace everything in the file with the following lines:

#!/bin/sh
set -e

if [ "$(id -u)" -eq "0" ]; then
echo "This script must NOT be run as root" 1>&2
exit 1
fi

export CATALINA_BASE="/home/dhis/tomcat-dhis"
/usr/share/tomcat7/bin/startup.sh
echo "Tomcat started"
Running DHIS2
DHIS2 can now be started by invoking:
sudo -u dhis tomcat-dhis/bin/startup.sh

To monitor the behavior of Tomcat, the log is the primary source of information. The log can be viewed with the following command:
tail -f tomcat-dhis/logs/catalina.out

DHIS2 can be stopped by invoking:
sudo -u dhis tomcat-dhis/bin/shutdown.sh
Assuming that the WAR file is called ROOT.war, you can now access your DHIS2 instance at:

http://localhost:8080 or
http://your.server.ip.address:8080

Default login details:
Username: admin
Password: district
Starting DHIS2 at server startup
Create init scripts:
sudo nano tomcat

Enter the following lines:

#!/bin/sh
#Tomcat init script

HOME=/home/dhis/tomcat-dhis/bin

case $1 in
start)
sudo -u dhis ${HOME}/startup.sh
;;
stop)
sudo -u dhis ${HOME}/shutdown.sh
;;
restart)
sudo -u dhis ${HOME}/shutdown.sh
sleep 5
sudo -u dhis ${HOME}/startup.sh
;;
esac
exit 0

Move the script to the init script directory and make it executable by invoking:
sudo mv tomcat /etc/init.d
sudo chmod +x /etc/init.d/tomcat

Next make sure the tomcat init script will be invoked during system startup and shutdown:
sudo /usr/sbin/update-rc.d -f tomcat defaults 81

DIY Easiest Way To Repair a MacBook Pro Charger

2017-01-22T21:27:00.002+01:00

Warning Messages in "R" on Mac.

2017-01-20T10:09:00.002+01:00

When starting R (or using any IDE like RStudio), the following warning messages are displayed:

During startup - Warning messages:
1: Setting LC_CTYPE failed, using "C"
2: Setting LC_COLLATE failed, using "C"
3: Setting LC_TIME failed, using "C"
4: Setting LC_MESSAGES failed, using "C"
5: Setting LC_PAPER failed, using "C"

To clear this error message, following the steps below:

Open terminal and enter:
defaults write org.R-project.R force.LANG en_US.UTF-8
Restart R or R-studio.

How to backup multiple Mysql databases and automatically delete

2015-12-30T06:37:00.002+01:00

The script below was adapted from iHRIS Backups (http://wiki.ihris.org/wiki/Backups) which was designed to backup one database. The script below will backup all databases in Mysql.

There is the option to remove database backup files older than 7days except from the first day of the month.

#!/bin/sh

MHOST=localhost

MUSER=db_username

MPASS=db_password

BACKUPDIR=/db/backup/dir

MYSQL="$(which mysql)"

MYSQLDUMP="$(which mysqldump)"

SUFFIX=`date +%F`

cd $BACKUPDIR

echo "Run MySQL backup"

DBS="$($MYSQL -u $MUSER -h $MHOST -p$MPASS -Bse 'show databases')"

for db in $DBS

$MYSQLDUMP -u $MUSER -h $MHOST -p$MPASS $db > backup_${db}_${SUFFIX}.sql

bzip2 -f backup_${db}_${SUFFIX}.sql

done

## Uncomment the following line to remove backup files older than 7 days except from the first day of the month.

#find $BACKUPDIR -name "backup_*.sql.bz2" -mtime +7 -not -name "backup_*-01.sql.bz2" -exec rm {} \;

Save the file, and ensure the script is executable using the command chmod a+x newfile.

MySQL Databases - Commandline Backup and Restore

2015-02-28T00:26:00.002+01:00

Backup A Single Database
mysqldump -u root -p dbname > dbname.sql

Where:
dbname = is the name of the database to backup
dbname.sql = is the name of the backup file, can also be location of backup file
Restore A Single Database
mysqldump -u root -p dbname < dbname.sql
Backup All Databases
mysqldump -u root -p --all-databases > All-dbname.sql
Restore Single Database from All Database Backup
mysql -u root -p --one-database dbname < All-dbname.sql

Perl warning Setting locale failed in Ubuntu

2014-10-28T10:15:00.000+01:00

Perl Locale Warning.
The warnings could be irritating, especially when installing any application. The warnings are also visible when some commands are run

The warnings look like:
perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory

and when you run Run locale from the commandline

bonkhi@sparda-coven:$ locale

locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory

LANG=en_US.UTF-8

LANGUAGE=

LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8"

LC_NUMERIC=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_TIME=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8"

LC_MONETARY=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8"

LC_PAPER=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_NAME=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_ADDRESS=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_TELEPHONE=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_MEASUREMENT=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_IDENTIFICATION=en_NG.UTF-8

LC_ALL=

To solve this, generate the missing locale

locale-gen en_US.UTF-8

Set the missing locale

export LANGUAGE=en_US.UTF-8
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8
export LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8
locale-gen en_US.UTF-8
dpkg-reconfigure locales

How do you reset the circuit protection on Yamaha RX-v373?

2014-10-03T13:52:00.002+01:00

Yamaha RX-V373 AV receiver's protection circuity is activated when there is fluctuation in power three (3) consecutive times. This protection mode disables the capability to "turn on" the device.

To disable this:

Hold "Info + Tone Control + Straight" for at least five seconds, while still holding, press the "Power" button.

Manually reboot the AVR for normal operation.

Using Php 5.3 on Cpanel platform

2013-05-15T14:55:00.002+01:00

To install applications that require a higher PHP version, create a .htaccess file inside the application directory and specify which version of php you want used.

# Use PHP 5.3
AddType application/x-httpd-php53 .php

SSH permission issue - failed to add host to known hosts (/home/username/.ssh/known_hosts)

2013-04-29T11:11:00.004+01:00

The permission set on the .ssh folder, the private keys and public keys matter. To solve the problem of -

Failed to add the host to the list of known hosts (/home/username/.ssh/known_hosts)

.ssh folder - permission set to 700
public keys (id_rsa.pub or id_dsa.pub)- permission set to 644
private keys (id_rsa or id_dsa)- permission set to 600

Restore crashed Windows 7 (with no recovery image) after installing Ubuntu

2012-11-23T18:10:00.000+01:00

Have you tried dual booting Ubuntu and Windows 7 and windows fails?

Did the Ubuntu installation complete successfully, and grub was properly installed but you still get the blue screen of death when you try booting windows?

Well, this is simple. The answer is with the file type of the windows partition.

I am assuming you have set up Ubuntu and grub is correctly installed. If not, please see https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair#A1st_option_:_get_a_CD_including_Boot-Repair for more information.

To correct this, boot your system to the Linux installation and run in root:

fdisk -l /dev/xxx

The Id for the windows partition (sda1 & sda2) is 42 which is the code for SFS. Change the file type Id to 7, which corresponds to HPFS/NTFS/exFAT, save and reboot.

fdisk /dev/xxx
In the prompt, type p to print the current partition table

To change the file type, type t in the prompt and enter the partition to change.

In my case, I will enter 1.

For a list of the Hex code list of the file types, enter L in the prompt.

Enter 7 in the prompt, which corresponds to the HPFS/NTFS/exFAT file system.

Repeat the process for the second or third windows partition, and when done enter w in to save.

Reboot your system, and grub will load windows ! ! !

Install Solaris, Apache, Mysql & Php (SAMP)

2011-10-18T17:37:00.001+01:00

You may be conversant with the terms LAMP and WAMP. This means a stack of applications.

For LAMP = Linux, Apache, Mysql and Php/Perl/Python.
For WAMP = Windows, Apache, Mysql and Php/Perl/Python.

To get your new Solaris 11 installation SAMP ready, we need to install Apache, Mysql and Php.

kilo@kilo:~$ sudo -s
Password:
root@kilo:/home/kilo#
root@kilo:/home/kilo# pkg refresh
root@kilo:/home/kilo# pkg install amp
               Packages to install:    12
           Create boot environment:    No
               Services to restart:     1
DOWNLOAD                                  PKGS       FILES    XFER (MB)
database/mysql-51                         3/12     554/729    59.0/75.2

When done, enable the apache and mysql service.
root@kilo:/home/kilo#svcadm enable apache22
root@kilo:/home/kilo#svcadm enable mysql

By default, the mysql root user has no password.
root@kilo:/home/kilo# mysql -u root

Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 4
Server version: 5.1.37 Source distribution

Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.

mysql>;

We can set the password for the root user in mysql using

root@kilo:/home/kilo#mysqladmin -u root password "PASSWORD"

If you get the error -

bash: mysqladmin: command not found

It means that the command mysqladmin is not in the path.
root@kilo:/home/kilo# which mysqladmin
which: no mysqladmin in (/usr/gnu/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin)

To solve this, use the full path for the command.
root@kilo:/home/kilo# find / -name mysqladmin
/usr/mysql/5.1/bin/sparcv9/mysqladmin
/usr/mysql/5.1/bin/mysqladmin

/usr/mysql/5.1/bin/mysqladmin -u root password "PASSWORD"

Configure pkg in Solaris to use proxy

2011-10-18T17:36:00.000+01:00

To configure your Solaris image packaging retrieval client (pkg) to use proxy -

kilo@kilo:~$ sudo -s   (I am using solaris 11. su - root can also be used)

Password: 

root@kilo:/home/kilo#  

root@kilo:/home/kilo#export http_proxy=”http://proxyusername:proxypassword@proxyservername:port”

Replace the following -
proxyusername = your proxy account username
proxypassword = your proxy account password
proxyservername = your proxy server address
port = proxy port number

Access scanner from LTSP server and thin clients

2011-10-11T13:24:00.000+01:00

There seem to be a permission issue with accessing usb scanners from LTSP server and connected thin clients. Logging in as normal users, you cannot access the connected scanner.

Running the scanimage command as a normal user
ltsp@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~$ scanimage -L
device `hp3900:libusb:001:011' is a Unknown RTS8822 chipset based flatbed scanner

while logging in as the root user, running the scanimage command gives the parameter of the connected scanner.
root@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~# scanimage -L
device `hp3900:libusb:001:011' is a Hewlett-Packard Scanjet 3800 flatbed scanner

You can however use any scan utility, but you will need root access to do this. To correct this - Looking at the permission for the usb character file
ltsp@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~$ lsusb
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 004 Device 005: ID 1c4f:0002 SiGma Micro
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 001 Device 011: ID 03f0:2605 Hewlett-Packard ScanJet 3800c
Bus 001 Device 009: ID 03f0:5c17 Hewlett-Packard
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

The user/group permission to the usb character device responsible for the connected usb device has read & write for the root user and group.
ltsp@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~$ ls -l /dev/bus/usb/001

total 0
crw-rw-r-- 1 root root 189, 0 2011-10-11 00:28 001
crw-rw-r--+ 1 root lp   189, 8 2011-10-11 13:03 009
crw-rw-r--+ 1 root root 189, 10 2011-10-11 09:17 011

Change the group from root to users. (In my case, the group users has all ltsp client users in that group)
root@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:/dev/bus/usb/001# chgrp users 011
root@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:/dev/bus/usb/001# ls -al
total 0
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root      100 2011-10-11 09:10 .
drwxr-xr-x 7 root root      140 2011-10-11 00:28 ..
crw-rw-r-- 1 root root 189, 0 2011-10-11 00:28 001
crw-rw-r--+ 1 root lp    189, 8 2011-10-11 13:03 009
crw-rw-r--+ 1 root users 189, 10 2011-10-11 09:17 011

And now.......
ltsp@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~$ scanimage -L
device `hp3900:libusb:001:011' is a Hewlett-Packard Scanjet 3800 flatbed scanner
ltsp@ltsp-ProLiant-DL380-G4:~$

Ubuntu 11.04 installation hangs on timezone selection

2011-10-11T10:19:00.000+01:00

When installing Ubuntu 11.04, the installation process hangs on time zone selection. The installation hangs because of your network (Internet) connection.

The trick in dealing with this is disable your network connection and restart the installation.

Drupal Internal links don't work after migration

2011-09-12T14:08:00.000+01:00

In some cases, after migrating all internal links in drupal defaults to the homepage. If you encounter this issue, enable mod_rewrite in Apache.

For Ubuntu users,

sudo a2enmod rewrite

Restart Apache

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

You can also.......
(a) make sure that you have Drupal's .htaccess file
(b) make sure that the apache vhost which controls your site does not contain an AllowOverrides None which disables .htaccess files in your site's directory. Change it to AllowOverrides All

Moodle 2.1.1 - Redirect to 'My Moodle' page after user logon

2011-08-15T01:19:00.000+01:00

To redirect users to their course page referred to as 'My Moodle' page after login in moodle 2.1.1,

Click on Site administrator -> Appearance -> Navigation -> Default home page for users -> My Moodle  

Moodle 2.0 - Convert database engine from MyISAM to InnoDB

2011-08-11T18:32:00.008+01:00

This scenario usually occurs when you upgrade moodle. If upgrading from moodle-1.9 to moodle-2.1.1, there is a database engine compatibility issue.

In the moodle notification page, the message below usually pops up:
Database tables are using MyISAM database engine, it is recommended to use ACID compliant engine with full transaction support such as InnoDB.

To convert your database engine to InnoDB, run the innodb.php script in the directory of the admin directory which is resident in the moodle directory.
http://moodlesite.domain/admin/innodb.php

Replace moodlesite.domain with you moodle path or IP address.

Enable Apache "public_html" for users in Ubuntu 10.04

2011-08-11T03:47:00.001+01:00

Enable mod_userdir, which is installed by default with Apache2.
sudo a2enmod userdir

Create public_html directory with the user's permissions
mkdir public_html

I don't know if that is a bug or a feature. Edit file /etc/apache2/mods-available/php5.conf and comment out lines

...IfModule mod_userdir.c...

        ...Directory /home/*/public_html..

        ...php_admin_value engine Off

        .../Directory

    .../IfModule...

Restart Apache Finally, you should restart Apache.
sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

You can test with http://localhost/~username or http://ip-address-of-system/~username

How to configure rpm/debian package manager to use proxy

2011-07-25T13:07:00.000+01:00

To configure package manager to use proxy in fedora, CentOS, ubuntu or generally any rpm/debian based linux, you will need to enter your proxy login details in apt.conf (for debian based) and yum.conf (for rpm based).

For RPM Based
Create or edit /etc/yum.conf and add the details below, replacing proxy-server, port, username and password with your own login details.

# The proxy server - proxy server:port number
proxy=http://proxy-server:port
# The proxy account details
proxy_username=username
proxy_password=password

For DEBIAN Based

Create or edit /etc/apt/apt.conf and add the details below, replacing proxy-server, port, username and password with your own login details.

ACQUIRE {
http::proxy "http://username:password@proxy-server:port/"
}

How to disable Reverse Proxy Filter on Bifrost during startup

2011-07-18T19:49:00.000+01:00

Bifrost is an operating system modified, minimal and optimized Linux distribution, with the kernel configured for firewalling and routing. The filter which controls the firewall security policy, is part of the kernel code and can be configured via ipfwadm, ipchains or iptables. The Bifrost Network Project aims to find stability, performance, filter capabilities, administration, computer security, scalability and development possibilities of a Linux based streamlined router/firewall system. The hardware is basically a standard PC with two or more network interfaces or fiber ports (using preferably the Intel Tulip chip or an e1000 Gigabit card) and a flash disk.

Reverse proxy Filtering seems to be enabled by default on this OS. Even after disabling (setting value to 0) this in the rp_filter file, a system reboot enables it back.

To disable reverse proxy filtering even at start-up, a script must be placed in the /etc/rc.d/rc.inet.local file to automatically set the value in rp_filter to 0 for all interfaces. To do this, follow the steps below:

remount disk in writeable mode

remount w

Edit the /etc/rc.d/rc.inet.local file and add the run script
#This script disables Reverse Proxy Filter during startup
for a in /proc/sys/net/ipv4/conf/*/rp_filter;

do
echo 0 > $a
done

To take effect, restart inet
/etc/rc.d/rc.inet.local

How to install Google Reader Indicator on ubuntu using PPA

2011-07-18T00:18:00.000+01:00

Google Reader Indicator displays the number of unread items in your Reader account along with article title and excerpt. Click on an article will open it in your default browser.

Install Google Reader Indicator on ubuntu using PPA

Open the terminal and run the following commands

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/atareao
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install google-reader-indicator

Cloned moodle site log in problem

2011-07-18T00:10:00.000+01:00

I can't log in - I just stay stuck on the login screen (Extracted from Moodle)

This may also apply if you are seeing “Your session has timed out. Please login again” and cannot log in.
The following are possible causes and actions you can take (in no particular order):

Check first that your main admin account (which will be a manual account) is also a problem. If your users are using an external authentication method (e.g. LDAP) that could be the problem. Isolate the fault and make sure it really is Moodle before going any further.
Sessions may not be configured properly on the server. You can test this by calling the script http://yourserver/moodle/lib/session-test.php.
If your server is on shared hosting check that you have not reached your disk space quota. This will prevent new sessions being created and nobody will be able to log in.
Carefully check the permissions in your 'moodledata' area. The web server needs to be able to write to the 'sessions' subdirectory.
Your own computer (not your Moodle server) may have a firewall that is stripping referrer information from the browser. Here are some instructions for fixing Norton firewall products.
Try deleting the sessions folder in your moodledata directory (anybody currently logged in will be thrown out)
Try deleting cookies on your computer and/or try another browser or another client computer
In Site Administration > Server > Session handling, try setting a value for 'Cookie prefix'. You can also do this by setting $CFG->sessioncookie='something'; in config.php. This is especially true if you are using multiple Moodles on the same browser.
Make sure you have not removed or changed the Password Salt value(s) in config.php. If passwords were created using a salt the correct salt must be in config.php for those passwords to continue to work. This feature was optional since Moodle 1.6 but has been applied by default since 1.9.7.
Do you have a .htaccess file in your Moodle folder (or its parent directories). If so, is there anything in there that might be causing trouble (strange redirects, access restrictions etc.)?
You are using the correct username and password, yes?

Planned Changes to Next Ubuntu Version 10.04 (Lucid Lynx)

2011-07-18T00:08:00.000+01:00

Planned Changes to Next Ubuntu Version 10.04 (Lucid Lynx)

pfsense PPTP VPN setup

2010-02-23T20:12:00.001+01:00

Setting up a PPTP VPN server in pfsense is easy. Before doing this, you need to ask your self a few questions.

What is the external interface (public IP) at which users can terminate their PPTP connections on.
An address range (/28) perferably in your LAN that the remote systems will acquire.

When this two issues are sorted, we can continue setting up the server.

Log into your pfsense gateway, click on VPN------PPTP

Enable PPTP server, specify the external interface IP address or public address, and the remote address (a subnet of the LAN address) and SAVE.

To create PPTP users, click on the user tab, then click on the add user sign. Enter username and password and SAVE.

PPTP will automatically create a rule allowing traffic to the interface.

Configure PPTP client under windows

Start --> Control Panel --> Network Connections
File --> New Connection --> Next
Connect to the network at my workplace --> Next
Select VPN connection --> Next
Enter descriptive name for connection --> Next
Do not dial the initial connection --> Next
Enter hostname or PUBLIC IP address of the PPTP server --> Next
Note that in this example the IP here is RFC1918 private, however that’s only because in my lab environment the WAN IP is on a private segment.
Select do not use smart card --> Next
Click on Finish
That is all that is required. Now, if you will be accessing resources on the VPN network that are not directly connected to the firewall itself, you will probably want to skip this step.
If you do skip this step when you connect to the PPTP server, your default gateway for ALL traffic will be via the PPTP VPN. With the current ruleset I’ve created in this example, this means that you will be unable to reach any resources outside the LAN or DMZ subnets.
To remedy the situation, click on Properties
Click on Networking --> Internet Protocol
Properties --> Advanced
Uncheck “use default gateway on remote network”
Click OK, OK, OK
Now enter your username and password (configured during the PPTP User Setup process)
Click on Connect
Should get Connecting --> Verifying username & password --> Authenticated
Now right click on the tray icon for the VPN connection --> Properties --> Details
Ensure that we are using MSCHAP v2 and MPPE 128