Topic: Autodial configuration

[Steve Hiner]

I have solved every problem so far except these two:
(Running e-smith in Gateway and Server Dial-up mode)

When I force a dial-out from a Windows98 client (specifically IE5) it will dial out OK but I _always_ get a timeout error on the client even though the server connects before the timeout.  If I refresh the page it works OK.  I have read on the news servers various advice like echo 1 (or 7 depending on the post) to ip_dynaddr but that didn't seem to help.  Since I don't really know what ip_dynaddr is and I don't know where to find information on it since it doesn't have a man page (I would assume most /proc entries don't have a page) I don't know if this is likely to help.

Also, once I get the connection and the page load the server disconnects immediately.  I have tried editing the standard.filter and increase the timeouts for www access and the default at the bottom of the tcp section but it doesn't seem to help.  I can, of course, keep the link open by pinging an outside server, it will even keep the link up for a little while after I stop pinging.  Is there a way to find out what is causing the timeout - for instance is there any way to spy on diald.conf/standard.filter to find out what is being triggered to cause the dial-out?  If I knew what caused the dialout I could bump up that timeout (I assume it isn't tcp.www since that timeout doesn't affect my situation).  

I have considered just defaulting everything to hold the link up for 15 minutes or somehting but I don't think that is neccessary - this must be solveable the right way.  I have also considered just removing the auto-dial and timeouts and opening the connection from 8am-6pm every weekday but that doesn't seem like a good solution either.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, my Church is very eager to have this installed but I don't want to make Linux look bad by having annoying Internet access.  Just today they installed an NT server for file sharing so I lost half the battle and I don't want to lose the other half.  By the way, I told them e-smith would handle the file sharing but they listened to their paid consultant instead of me since I am a volunteer (I guess they forgot that I am a consultant 40 hours a week - they just get my services for free).

Steve

[Kim Morrison]

Hi Steve,

Sorry to hear you've been having some problems, Steve.  

1.  IE is timing out.

I wonder if you have the same problem with Netscape, Steve. We've heard rumors about IE doing this with non-MS proxy servers.

"I have read on the news servers various advice like echo 1 (or 7 depending on the post) to ip_dynaddr but that didn't seem to help."

The software actually already does this.

2.  The disconnect problem you are experiencing is intriguing and probably fairly deep to diagnose and solve.  We don't reproduce the problem here and I don't recall having other reports of it.  This will take some time to diagnose and resolve - we'll look into it for the next release or, as time permits, before hand.  If you have the resources and want it resolved immediately, this is the kind of tech support issue handled immediately under our 90 day support contract.  

It may also be that someone else has experienced, diagnosed and resolved this issue. If so, perhaps they'll post here or email you directly.  If you figure it out, we'd very much appreciate knowing how it came out.

Best regards,

Kim

[emjay]

I am having the same problem as steve.
The modem disconnects after about 20 seconds of inactivity of net traffic.
I am having to run IRC all the time just to keep the modem alive.
This is really annoying.
Appart from this small problem then all else is ok.
Great product.

Mick.

[Joseph Morrison]

Hi Mick,

In Steve's case we're pretty sure that the problem is related to the use of a content-filtering proxy. Are you using any kind of proxy setting in your web browser?

The diald configuration looks for outgoing requests to port 80 to keep the line up. If your requests are going out to any other port (as they might in a proxy environment) you will have to adjust the diald configuration file /usr/lib/diald/standard.filter. Also you might want to read the diald manual pages for hints.

Hope you succeed in getting this working,
- Joe

[Steve Hiner]

I made the change you suggested to standard.filter, adding tcp.8914 for the source and destination timeouts but it didn't seem to make any difference.  Any other suggestions?  At this stage I am more interested in helping you diagnose a posible problem than in solving my problem since I have found an acceptable, though not ideal workaround.

In case you are interested I have set the sendmail timeout to 20 minutes so combined with the 15 cron setting for fetchmail I am hoping that it will stay connected during business hours.  I just did this last night so I haven't been able to test it yet but I believe it should work assuming sendmail gets called everytime fetchmail is called.

Another workaround I have considered is to add a new entry to cron, something like:
ping -c 1200 -i 30 -q www.inficad.com
set up to start at 8am so it will ping my ISP every 30 seconds from 8am to 6pm.  I am avoiding this one since it uses bandwidth and is, in my opinion, rude to my ISP.

Perhaps one of these workarounds will help Mick.

By the way, this also solves the problem I was having with IE and Navigator always throwing a timeout error on the first page request if the modem was not already connected.

Steve

[Joseph Morrison]

Hi Steve,

> I made the change you suggested to standard.filter, adding
> tcp.8914 for the source and destination timeouts but it didn't
> seem to make any difference.

The only reports I have heard about this problem have been related to the use of proxy servers, so I'm quite sure this is the right track. Are you positive you have the proxy port number right? I reviewed the diald documentation and it may be that services have to be specified by name, rather than by port number. So here is my next suggestion:

(1) Edit the file /etc/services and add the following line in there somewhere:

contentproxy     8914/tcp

(2) Then try the following rule in the diald filter file:

accept tcp 300 tcp.dest=tcp.contentproxy
accept tcp 300 tcp.source=tcp.contentproxy

The number is in seconds; this rule will hold the line up for 300 seconds (five minutes) for a connection.

Please let me know whether this works.
Best regards,
- Joe

[Steve Hiner]

Joe,

You have made me a happy man.  That solved the disconnect problem.  

It seems like that would be an easy solution to integrate into the next version since all you would have to do is ask the user what port their proxy is on.

The only issue I had left and I don't know if this is typical of my personal setup, though I think I have read other people bring up this problem at least on the newsgroups if not on this bboard, is that the first request from a Windows browser (IE or NS) always times out if the modem isn't already connected.  Any ideas?  I have looked through the browser settings and I haven't yet found a timeout setting - I will have to look through the MS Knowledge Base, maybe there is a registry setting.

Thanks for all your patience and your help,
Steve Hiner