Get-NordVPNServerList
SYNOPSIS
Gets the list of NordVPN servers.
SYNTAX
DefaultOperation (Default)
Get-NordVPNServerList [[-First] <UInt16>] [-UpdateFallback] [-WhatIf] [-Confirm] [<CommonParameters>]
RawData
Get-NordVPNServerList [[-First] <UInt16>] [-Raw] [-WhatIf] [-Confirm] [<CommonParameters>]
Offline
Get-NordVPNServerList [-Offline] [-WhatIf] [-Confirm] [<CommonParameters>]
DESCRIPTION
Returns a list of NordVPN servers.
By default, this function returns all servers that match the passed parameters,
but the search can be limited to the first x servers with -First x.
NOTE : Using the -First parameter will result in some servers matching the
filters being missed. You should only do so if this instance is acceptable.
This function utilises the raw NordVPN servers web API.
This means that a large quantity of data (~20 MB) must be downloaded and
parsed, as the raw API does not support direct filtering, and therefore this
must be done locally. For this reason, it is recommended to use
Get-NordVPNRecommendedList which utilises the recommended servers API, which
supports direct filtering. This function should be used in scenarios where all
servers need to be indexed, including those that are full/unavailable.
The structures of objects returned by this function can be found in the about topic About NordVPN-Servers Classes.
EXAMPLES
Example 1
PS C:\> $allServers = Get-NordVPNServerList
PS C:\> $allServers.Count
5871
PS C:\> $allServers[0]
Name Value
---- -----
CountryCode US
Services {1, 5}
Status online
Updated 03/04/2020 15:15:18
Created 22/09/2016 00:00:00
CityCode manassas
City {CountryCode, Longitude, Code, Id…}
Specifications {8}
Hostname us349.nordvpn.com
PrimaryIP 162.210.198.129
Groups {11, 15, 21}
Id 590772
Country {Cities, Code, FriendlyName, Id}
Locations {21}
IPs {793}
Load 100
Technologies {9, 5, 3, 7…}
Downloads the NordVPN server list, outputs the number of servers currently registered, and shows the entry for the first server. This demonstrates the structure of the Server entry.
Example 2
PS C:\> Get-NordVPNServerList -Country JP -Group legacy_obfuscated_servers -Technology openvpn_xor_udp | Select-Object CityCode, Hostname, PrimaryIP, Load
CityCode Hostname PrimaryIP Load
-------- -------- --------- ----
tokyo jp492.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.66 11
tokyo jp493.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.67 5
tokyo jp494.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.68 17
tokyo jp495.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.69 25
tokyo jp496.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.71 22
tokyo jp497.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.72 68
tokyo jp498.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.73 49
tokyo jp499.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.74 9
tokyo jp500.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.76 9
tokyo jp501.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.77 46
tokyo jp502.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.78 15
tokyo jp503.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.79 24
tokyo jp504.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.81 6
tokyo jp505.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.82 13
tokyo jp506.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.83 15
tokyo jp507.nordvpn.com 212.102.50.84 13
Displays a list of all obfuscated servers in Japan, using the country, group, and technology filters.
Example 3
PS C:\> Get-NordVPNServerList -UpdateFallback -Offline
Get-NordVPNServerList: Parameter set cannot be resolved using the specified named parameters. One or more parameters issued cannot be used together or an insufficient number of parameters were provided.
PS C:\> Get-NordVPNServerList -UpdateFallback -First 100
Get-NordVPNServerList: Parameter set cannot be resolved using the specified named parameters. One or more parameters issued cannot be used together or an insufficient number of parameters were provided.
PS C:\> Get-NordVPNServerList -Offline -First 100
Get-NordVPNServerList: Parameter set cannot be resolved using the specified named parameters. One or more parameters issued cannot be used together or an insufficient number of parameters were provided.
Demonstrates the mutual exclusivity of the -Offline, -UpdateFallback, and
-First <int> parameters. The -First parameter is designed to reduce the
amount of data received from the API, at the expensive of completeness in
results if any filters are applied. Since this results in an incomplete list,
the function will not allow the fallback file to be updated.
Likewise, the -First parameter is inconsequential when using local data.
The fallback file will also not be updated if the data is being retrieved from
it.
Example 4
PS C:\> $MyRequirements = @(
>> [pscustomobject]@{Country = 'DE'; Group = 'legacy_obfuscated_servers'}
>> [pscustomobject]@{Country = 'BR'; Technology = 'ikev2'}
>> [pscustomobject]@{Country = 'US'; Group = 'legacy_obfuscated_servers'; Technology='openvpn_dedicated_udp'}
>> )
PS C:\> $MyRequirements | Get-NordVPNServerList | Select-Object Hostname, CountryCode, Load
WARNING: No servers in the first 5873 results matched the filters! Filters:
Country: US
Group: legacy_obfuscated_servers
Technology: openvpn_dedicated_udp
Try increasing the value of the -First parameter or changing the filters.
Hostname CountryCode Load
-------- ----------- ----
de666.nordvpn.com DE 72
de667.nordvpn.com DE 60
de668.nordvpn.com DE 72
de669.nordvpn.com DE 95
de670.nordvpn.com DE 100
de671.nordvpn.com DE 74
de672.nordvpn.com DE 55
de673.nordvpn.com DE 96
de726.nordvpn.com DE 100
de727.nordvpn.com DE 100
de728.nordvpn.com DE 54
de729.nordvpn.com DE 46
de730.nordvpn.com DE 24
de731.nordvpn.com DE 100
de732.nordvpn.com DE 31
de733.nordvpn.com DE 100
br13.nordvpn.com BR 45
br14.nordvpn.com BR 34
br15.nordvpn.com BR 43
br16.nordvpn.com BR 38
br17.nordvpn.com BR 44
br18.nordvpn.com BR 30
br19.nordvpn.com BR 39
br20.nordvpn.com BR 48
br21.nordvpn.com BR 31
br22.nordvpn.com BR 100
br23.nordvpn.com BR 58
br24.nordvpn.com BR 31
br25.nordvpn.com BR 29
br26.nordvpn.com BR 32
br27.nordvpn.com BR 24
br28.nordvpn.com BR 42
br29.nordvpn.com BR 17
br30.nordvpn.com BR 13
br31.nordvpn.com BR 13
br32.nordvpn.com BR 31
br33.nordvpn.com BR 59
br34.nordvpn.com BR 16
br35.nordvpn.com BR 23
br36.nordvpn.com BR 61
br37.nordvpn.com BR 41
br38.nordvpn.com BR 35
br39.nordvpn.com BR 23
br40.nordvpn.com BR 23
br41.nordvpn.com BR 49
br42.nordvpn.com BR 28
br43.nordvpn.com BR 45
br44.nordvpn.com BR 17
br45.nordvpn.com BR 3
br46.nordvpn.com BR 5
br48.nordvpn.com BR 4
br49.nordvpn.com BR 3
br50.nordvpn.com BR 3
Creates three custom filter profiles, passes them to Get-NordVPNServerList
and displays the results as a list with the hostname, country code and current
load. Notable is the warning displayed when the filter returns no results. In
this case, the third request, there are no US servers that support both
obfuscation and dedicated IP allocations.
It is also important to note that piping to Get-NordVPNServerList does not
result in multiple API calls, unlike Get-NordVPNRecommendedList. The entire
servers list is retrieved once, and then filters are applied for each object in
the pipeline. You can also pipe requests to the function when the -Offline or
-UpdateFallback switches are present, since the filters are not applied until
after the server list is processed.
Example 5
PS C:\> (Measure-Command {Get-NordVPNServerList}).TotalSeconds
18.4931146
PS C:\> (Measure-Command {Get-NordVPNServerList -UpdateFallback}).TotalSeconds
25.496875
PS C:\> (Measure-Command {Get-NordVPNServerList -Offline}).TotalSeconds
3.1637942
PS C:\> (Get-ItemProperty .\NordVPN_Servers.xml).Length / 1MB
117.799512863159
PS C:\> (Get-ItemProperty .\NordVPN_Servers.xml.zip).Length / 1MB
2.66928958892822
Demonstrates the time taken to download and process all server entries, as well
as the additional time when these processed entries are written to file and
compressed. The operation is ~40% longer when the fallback file is updated.
However, using the fallback file which contains pre-processed server entries,
is 5-6x faster than downloading and processing this data.
This is true even when the setting DeleteServerFallbackAfterUse is enabled,
meaning the archive is extracted each time the function is run.
It is therefore important to consider how often the list of registered servers needed to be updated, and the fallback used where necessary to improve performance and reduce load on the web API.
Also notable is the size of the uncompressed server fallback file (~50 MB).
When the file is updated, it is automatically compressed to a much more
reasonable ~2 MB. By default, the uncompressed file is kept to improve
performance when using the local data. However, on systems where storage space
is an important consideration, such as thin clients, the setting
DeleteServerFallbackAfterUse can be enabled, which causes the uncompressed
file to be deleted after each use. In this way, it behaves as a temporary file
and only the much smaller compressed version needs to persist on the disk.
Use Set-NordVPNModuleSetting DeleteServerFallbackAfterUse 1 to enable this
feature.
Example 6
PS C:\> Set-NordVPNModuleSetting OfflineMode 1
PS C:\> (Measure-Command {Get-NordVPNServerList}).TotalSeconds
2.8380877
This shows the functionality of the OfflineMode module setting. When enabled, the Countries, Groups, Technologies, and Servers lists are retrieved only from the local fallback files. This is useful in scenarios where network access may be temporarily limited.
PARAMETERS
-Confirm
Prompts you for confirmation before running the cmdlet.
Type: SwitchParameter
Parameter Sets: (All)
Aliases: cf
Required: False
Position: Named
Default value: False
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
-First
Searches only the number of servers specified (1-65535).
NOTE: Lowering this number may result in some servers matching the filters to
be missed.
Type: UInt16
Parameter Sets: DefaultOperation, RawData
Aliases:
Required: False
Position: 0
Default value: 8192
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
-Offline
Temporarily overrides the OfflineMode setting and uses the fallback file stored
in NordVPN_Servers.xml.zip. This does not change the value of the setting but
is useful when many calls to Get-NordVPNServerList will be made. The first
call can be used to update the fallback with -UpdateFallback and subsequent
calls can utilise -Offline to use the downloaded copy.
Type: SwitchParameter
Parameter Sets: Offline
Aliases:
Required: False
Position: Named
Default value: False
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
-Raw
Returns the raw server entry data without processing. This speeds up operation but results in an inconsistent data structure due to the API’s naming conventions.
You cannot use this switch with the -Offline or -UpdateFallback parameters.
Type: SwitchParameter
Parameter Sets: RawData
Aliases:
Required: False
Position: Named
Default value: False
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
-UpdateFallback
Passing this switch causes the function to update the NordVPN_Servers.xml.zip
file, using the data retrieved from the NordVPN web API or cache. This is
useful if many called will be made to Get-NordVPNServerList, since the
offline data can be loaded much more quickly and does not need to be parsed,
unlike data directly from the web API.
Type: SwitchParameter
Parameter Sets: DefaultOperation
Aliases:
Required: False
Position: Named
Default value: False
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
-WhatIf
Shows what would happen if the cmdlet runs. The cmdlet is not run.
Type: SwitchParameter
Parameter Sets: (All)
Aliases: wi
Required: False
Position: Named
Default value: False
Accept pipeline input: False
Accept wildcard characters: False
CommonParameters
This cmdlet supports the common parameters: -Debug, -ErrorAction, -ErrorVariable, -InformationAction, -InformationVariable, -OutVariable, -OutBuffer, -PipelineVariable, -Verbose, -WarningAction, and -WarningVariable. For more information, see about_CommonParameters.
INPUTS
None
OUTPUTS
NordVPNServerList
NOTES
If the module is configured to only use the fallback files, with the command
Set-NordVPNModuleSetting OfflineMode 1, the server list will be retrieved
from NordVPN_Servers.xml in the module directory. This is useful for offline
environments.
Use Set-NordVPNModuleSetting OfflineMode 0 to restore web API usage.
NOTE : The NordVPN_Servers.xml fallback file is not included with the module as
must be generated using Get-NordVPNServerList -UpdateFallback should this
functionality be required.