To connect to PPTP server from command line on Ubuntu/Linux, create file

sudo vi /etc/ppp/peers/honvpn

Here honvpn is name of the connection, this can be anything. Add following content to the file.

pty "pptp 35.154.48.22 --nolaunchpppd"
name hostonnet
password tpmH7cb@zKHxAD
remotename PPTP
require-mppe-128

Here 35.154.48.22 is IP of PPTP server.

hostonnet is the PPTP server username.

tpmH7cb@zKHxAD is the PPTP server password.

Now to connect to VPN, run

sudo pppd noauth call honvpn

After connect, you get a ppp0 interface

If you don’t use noauth, you get authentication related error like

boby@hon-pc-01:~ $ sudo pppd call honvpn
pppd: The remote system is required to authenticate itself
pppd: but I couldn't find any suitable secret (password) for it to use to do so.
boby@hon-pc-01:~ $

This can be fixed by editing /etc/ppp/options

sudo vi /etc/ppp/options

Find

# Require the peer to authenticate itself before allowing network
# packets to be sent or received.
# Please do not disable this setting. It is expected to be standard in
# future releases of pppd. Use the call option (see manpage) to disable
# authentication for specific peers.
auth

Replace “auth” with “noauth”.

To disconnect, you can just kill all pppd processes.

boby@hon-pc-01:~ $ ps aux | grep ppp
root     11942  0.0  0.0  33360  2648 ?        Ss   23:05   0:00 pppd call honvpn
root     11943  0.0  0.0   4508   700 ?        S    23:05   0:00 sh -c pptp 35.154.48.203 --nolaunchpppd
root     11946  0.0  0.0   6476   792 ?        S    23:05   0:00 pptp 35.154.48.203 --nolaunchpppd
root     11957  0.0  0.0   6476   124 ?        S    23:05   0:00 pptp 35.154.48.203 --nolaunchpppd
boby     15344  0.0  0.0  14224   932 pts/20   S+   23:47   0:00 grep --color=auto ppp
boby@hon-pc-01:~ $ sudo kill -9 11942
boby@hon-pc-01:~ $ ps aux | grep ppp
boby     15396  0.0  0.0  14224  1016 pts/20   S+   23:47   0:00 grep --color=auto ppp
boby@hon-pc-01:~ $