Pf Configuration Incompatible With Pf Program - Version

OpenBSD 7.5-current (GENERIC) #5

pfctl -f /etc/pf.conf

He pulled up the man page on his laptop. pf.conf(5) . There it was, buried in the "Migration Notes" for 7.5: The from <list> syntax has been deprecated for non-route-related filter rules. Use an anchor or table for multiple source prefixes. Direct lists in a pass in rule will now raise a fatal syntax error. A fatal error. Not a warning. Not a "this might break." A stone-cold, refuse-to-start fatal error.

He VPN’d in, his coffee cold before he’d even poured it. The first command was ritual. pf configuration incompatible with pf program version

He wrote his post-mortem at dawn. Title: "PF_CONFIG_VERSION vs. PF_PROGRAM_VERSION: A Case of Silent Deprecation."

Then the prayer:

His stomach turned to ice. Current. Not -release . Not -stable . Someone—a junior with a cowboy hat and a cron job—had pointed their package repository to the bleeding-edge snapshots. And the new PF, the one in 7.5-current , had changed. OpenBSD 7

The old PF (the one running on 7.4) had been lenient. It saw the curly braces, expanded the list in memory, and carried on. The new PF was a stricter grammarian. It saw the same syntax, declared it heresy, and refused to load any rules at all. Zero firewall. No state table. No blocking. No logging.

pfctl -sr | grep "api_sources"

gw-04-dfw wasn't just in a backup state. It was a naked machine on the public internet, its interface wide open. Use an anchor or table for multiple source prefixes

But he knew the real story. The firewall had been working fine. Until the moment it wasn't. And the difference between those two moments was a single line in a changelog no one had read, and a list of IP addresses wrapped in the wrong kind of curly braces.

pass in on $ext_if inet proto tcp from 10.88.12.0/24, 10.88.13.0/24 to port 8080

Julian leaned back. The problem wasn't malice. It wasn't a hacker. It was a ghost in the machine: a mismatch between the intent of a config (written for a forgiving world) and the reality of a program (now pedantic, unforgiving).

pfctl -sr pfctl: DIOCGETRULES: Device not configured Not configured? That meant PF wasn’t even running. He checked the logs.

The rule was there. Clean. PF was running. CARP sync re-established. The pager fell silent.