SparkLabs Blog.

The latest news and releases.


Viscosity For Mac & Windows: Version 1.7

We're very pleased to announce that version 1.7 of Viscosity is now available for both Mac and Windows! This is one of our biggest updates yet, with significant engineering changes for improved speed and performance, new features, and lots of small tweaks and fixes.

There are a number of enhancements to the user interface, including new ways to manage and import connections. Viscosity's main menu has been overhauled to offer more information at a glance and to make active connections more accessible. IP addresses, traffic totals, and traffic rates can now all be displayed alongside the connection status. The Details window has also been updated to display additional connection information, in particular DNS servers and encryption details for active connections.



Viscosity 1.7 adds support for OpenVPN 2.4, which offers new encryption functionality, improved dual-stack IP support, and many small enhancements. As well as OpenVPN 2.4.2, the OpenVPN 2.3 branch has been updated to version 2.3.16.

Viscosity has also seen many internal improvements on both Mac and Windows platforms to boost speed and performance. The Mac version has been re-implemented from the ground up to remove legacy code and adopt more moden APIs. This has a large and noticeable impact on Viscosity's performance, with everything from startup time to connection processing speed enhanced.

A new "Block IPv6 traffic while connected to IPv4-only connections" option has been added to prevent IPv6 traffic leaks when connecting to VPN connections that tunnel all IPv4 traffic only. The Windows version of Viscosity also now uses the Viscosity DNS System for Full DNS Mode (instead of just Split DNS mode) to prevent any potential DNS leaks due to the Windows DNS System changes in the Windows 10 Creators Update.

We're also pleased to introduce traffic obfuscation (obfsproxy) support in Viscosity. By setting up an obfsproxy server and enabling obfuscation in Viscosity you can avoid connectivity problems on networks that may attempt to block or limit VPN connections, such as some Wi-Fi hotspots or censorship prone areas.

Version 1.7 also contains a large assortment of other small improvements, including editor changes, connection management improvements, improved reconnection behaviour, small requested tweaks, and much more. Please refer to the release notes below for a complete list of changes.


Version 1.7 Mac Release Notes:

added
Active connections are now listed separately in the main menu
added
OpenVPN 2.4 Support
added
Traffic obfuscation support (obfsproxy)
added
New right/control click menu for Preferences->Connections
added
Connections can now be imported by dragging them onto the connections list
added
DNS and encryption information now displayed in the Details window
added
New Block IPv6 when connected to an IPv4 only connection option
added
New Automatically reconnect if disconnected option for connections and folders
improved
Significant performance improvements
improved
Significant memory usage improvements
improved
The system Python framework is no longer required
improved
Ability to get additional connection details via AppleScript
improved
Ability to delete multiple selected connections at once
updated
OpenVPN 2.4 updated to version 2.4.2
updated
OpenVPN 2.3 updated to version 2.3.16
updated
OpenSSL updated to version 1.0.2k
fixed
Various bug fixes and enhancements
removed
OS X 10.8 is no longer supported


Version 1.7 Windows Release Notes:

added
Active connections are now listed separately in the notification tray menu
added
OpenVPN 2.4 Support
added
Traffic obfuscation suppport (obfsproxy)
added
Connections can now be imported by dragging them onto the connections list
added
DNS and encryption information now displayed in the Details window
added
New Block IPv6 when connected to an IPv4-only connection option
added
New Automatically reconnect if disconnected option for connections and folders
improved
DPI scaling improved for multiple windows
improved
Viscosity's DNS System is now used for all DNS modes by defualt
improved
Use Windows DNS System for Full DNS option to disable the above behaviour
updated
OpenVPN updated to 2.4.2
updated
OpenVPN updated to 2.3.16
updated
OpenSSL updated to 1.0.2k
updated
.NET 4.5.2 or later is now required
fixed
Mitigates against stuck DNS servers caused by a forced reboot
fixed
Scripting return values are no longer localized
fixed
Various bug fixes and enhancements
removed
Windows Vista is no longer supported

Finally, please note that version 1.7 ends support for OS X 10.8 and Windows Vista. OS X 10.9 and Windows 7 are now the minimum operating system versions required to be able to run Viscosity.

The 1.7 update can be automatically installed from inside Viscosity, or downloaded and manually installed. For support with this version please visit our support section.