My firm produces some devices with a network interface. The devices are sent with a IP address = 0.0.0.0. The customers plugs the device on the private net in the field and, by using a tiny app written with VB6, discover it and set the correct IP address.
This working by using UDP messages: the app broadcast a "Who's there?" UDP message, read back the answer(s) containing the MAC address of the device(s), and the the user send another UDP message containing the new IP address for target MAC.
Now, for some unknown reasons, one of these device get its IP address set to 127.0.0.2. The problem is that now the VB app can't find (via UDP) the device anymore, making it impossible to change the IP address to a valid one.
Further analisys revealed than if the app is running on Windows XP it sees the device, but if the app is running on Windows 7 the UDP message does'nt arrive to to the "socket" (while Wireshark can see the answer from the device).
Now, there a solution to allow Win7 to let "pass" an UDP message sent from a 127.0.0.2 external address? If yes, we could avoid to ship around the world a replacement device with a correct IP address and all the trouble of phisically mounting it in the field.
Here's a Wireshark capture of the "question" and the "answer" not "detected" by the VB app:
cap.pcapng
Now, for some unknown reasons, one of these device get its IP address set to 127.0.0.2.
You need to fix that.
The 127/8 block is reserved for the "loopback" address (ie. localhost). No packets sent to 127.0.0.2 will leave your systems NIC. Unless there are bugs in the drives (or hardware): this could be the case with WinXP.
My application communicates with several GSM electric controllers, that means that I have to send anywhere between one to twenty messages every few hours. right now I'm working with HUAWEI Mobile Connect - 3G. it is a USB device that uses a comm port for the pc communication and I'm using GSMComm to send messages and read/delete messages from the device.
Every two seconds I'm checking the device's storage, and if there is any message, I will then read it and store it locally and then clear the device's storage. I'm not sure if I'm working correctly, but it seems to me as if it is a very unreliable device:
Every time I boot my machine, I must remove the device from the USB or my machine will get stuck at the BIOS start up screen (or whatever the name is).
Very frequently the comm port can become unavailable for some reason. I have to close and re open the port, and at times that may not even help.
In the production machine of my client, when he uses one of his software's that utilize the first comm port, he will get a warning message from the software about problems in the port if the device is plugged in (the device port is around 28 or something).
If you've been using a device which you consider reliable, or have been working with the same device as I work with, or you just think that I'm doing it wrong, I'd like to get an advice from you.
Thanks.
This sounds like an issue with your modem. Have you tried any other models? Consumer USB models tend to be unreliable. The preferred method, though slightly more expensive, is using a commercial grade modem in situations where you need the reliability.
Some modems to look at:
Wavecom Fastrack
Sierra Wireless Airlink
These use a serial port or ethernet to communicate with the host which is far more reliable. Serial ports may not be available in your particular situation but even a USB to RS232 adapter will be more reliable.
One further option is to use a smartphone, there are several applications that you can act as a gateway through HTTP.
SMS Gateway for Android:
https://market.android.com/details?id=eu.apksoft.android.smsgateway&hl=en
i have not used this method, but it seems like some people are having luck with it. it may not be any more reliable then your USB modem though.
Hope that answers your question.
I have used WaveCom's modem for sending messages in bulks and found it to be reliable. One difference though, in my implementation was i used Kannel as an SMSC, so my queues were automatically handled by Kannel. But sending multiple requests like 40+ per minute didnt pose any problems for me.
Hope this helps.
Is there a way to find out the IP address of a device that is directly connected to a specific ethernet interface? I.e. given one host, one wired ethernet connection and one second host connected to this wired connection, which layer or protocol below IP could be used to find this out.
I would also be comfortable with a Windows-only solution using some Windows-API function or callback.
(I know that the real way to do this would probably via DHCP, but this is about discovering a legacy device.)
Mmh ... there are many ways.
I answer another network discovery question, and I write a little getting started.
Some tcpip stacks reply to icmp broadcasts.
So you can try a PING to your network broadcast address.
For example, you have ip 192.168.1.1 and subnet 255.255.255.0
ping 192.168.1.255
stop the ping after 5 seconds
watch the devices replies : arp -a
Note : on step 3. you get the lists of the MAC-to-IP cached entries, so there are also the hosts in your subnet you exchange data to in the last minutes, even if they don't reply to icmp_get.
Note (2) : now I am on linux. I am not sure, but it can be windows doesn't reply to icm_get via broadcast.
Is it the only one device attached to your pc ?
Is it a router or another simple pc ?
To use DHCP, you'd have to run a DHCP server on the primary and a client on the secondary; the primary could then query the server to find out what address it handed out. Probably overkill.
I can't help you with Windows directly. On Unix, the "arp" command will tell you what IP addresses are known to be attached to the local ethernet segment. Windows will have this same information (since it's a core part of the IP/Ethernet interface) but I don't know how you get at it.
Of course, the networking stack will only know about the other host if it has previously seen traffic from it. You may have to first send a broadcast packet on the interface to elicit some sort of response and thus populate the local ARP table.
Windows 7 has the arp command within it.
arp -a should show you the static and dynamic type interfaces connected to your system.
Your Best Approach is to install Wireshark, reboot the device wait for the TCP/UDP stream , broadcasts will announce the IP address for both Ethernet ports
This is especially useful when the device connected does not have DHCP Client enabled, then you can go from there.
You can also get information from directly connected networking devices, such as network switches with LDWin, a portable and free Windows program published on github:
http://www.sysadmit.com/2016/11/windows-como-saber-la-ip-del-switch-al-que-estoy-conectado.html
LDWin supports the following methods of link discovery: CDP (Cisco Discovery Protocol) and LLDP (Link Layer Discovery Protocol).
You can obtain the model, management IP, VLAN identifier, Port identifier, firmware version, etc.
I'd like to sell headless Linux servers to SOHO users. Typically, they'll have a DHCP-capable ADSL modem cum switch to which they'll connect their workstation and the server.
In order to just show up with the server, I need to find a way to just plug the server into the switch to get an IP address from the modem, and then have the server broadcast its adresse so I can then connect to it with Putty from the workstation.
I thought about using Samba to broadcast a message using the Messenger Service, but unless I'm mistaken, this only works if the two hots are configured to use the same workgroup/domain.
Do you know of way to get the server's IP address from the workstation?
Thank you for any tip.
Take a look at UPnP and zeroconf services like Apple's Bonjour.
I'd probably suggest using the normal approach for switches and modems as you are treating your device as an appliance, i.e. set a default IP 192.168.0.1, and connect to that to then configure the device into the local infrastructure.
I don't know of any good solutions.
Some DHCP servers will register the name you send in the request - then give that name in your setup instructions. But I suspect home user DSL routers aren't in that category.
Maybe you could ship a tool on CD that does arp requests to get the IP address? (Given the MAC address printed on the box)
Broadcast packets periodically on some arbitrarily chosen UDP port, and build some client software to listen for those packets.
I often run into problems where I can't get something to connect to something else. I usually forget to check something obvious. Can you help with:
A tip/technique for diagnosing a connection issue
The name of a tool or application that can help (and the situation in which it's useful)
I know the question is a little non-specific, but hopefully the answers can form a useful starting point for anybody who's stuck trying to get computers/programs talking to each other.
Please can you give one answer per answer so the best ones can be voted up.
Simple checks to run when debugging network problems:
Has each machine got an IP address, Go to command prompt and run ipconfig. Key things to check here are the interfaces and ensuring the appropriate ones have IP addresses.
Check both machines IP addresses are in the same range and subnet if you are running it on an internal or Virtual network.
Try pinging each machine from the other to see if they can communicate with each other. Note that some firewalls will block ping requests.
If Pinging fails then check to see if firewalls are active. If the communication is within a 'safe' internal network then try disabling the firewalls and re-pinging.
If the connections are over a wireless network then check signal strength.
If pinging fails and you are connecting through several networks then try running a tracert to see at which will may show you where on the network the connection is failing.
If you are able to ping but not connect then check firewall settings and network connection settings. Windows 2000+ has the capability of setting port an ip access on a connection properties.
Try drawing a network diagram of the connections to help in visualising the problem.
If you are connecting through routers, firewalls and loadbalancers then check that all devices are not tied to any specific ip addresses and that the IP address redirection (if in place) is correct. Also check any NAT logs to see if connections are being received and properly re-directed.
Wireshark
Latest versions of ProcMon
netstat
Wireshark www.wireshark.org
Wireshark is a network protocol analyzer for Unix and Windows.
Features:
Deep inspection of hundreds of protocols, with more being added all the time
Live capture and offline analysis
Standard three-pane packet browser
Multi-platform: Runs on Windows, Linux, OS X, Solaris, FreeBSD, NetBSD, and many others
Captured network data can be browsed via a GUI, or via the TTY-mode TShark utility
The most powerful display filters in the industry
Rich VoIP analysis
Read/write many different capture file formats: tcpdump (libpcap), Catapult DCT2000, Cisco Secure IDS iplog, Microsoft Network Monitor, Network General Sniffer® (compressed and uncompressed), Sniffer® Pro, and NetXray®, Network Instruments Observer, Novell LANalyzer, RADCOM WAN/LAN Analyzer, Shomiti/Finisar Surveyor, Tektronix K12xx, Visual Networks Visual UpTime, WildPackets EtherPeek/TokenPeek/AiroPeek, and many others
Capture files compressed with gzip can be decompressed on the fly
Live data can be read from Ethernet, IEEE 802.11, PPP/HDLC, ATM, Bluetooth, USB, Token Ring, Frame Relay, FDDI, and others (depending on your platfrom)
Decryption support for many protocols, including IPsec, ISAKMP, Kerberos, SNMPv3, SSL/TLS, WEP, and WPA/WPA2
Coloring rules can be applied to the packet list for quick, intuitive analysis
Output can be exported to XML, PostScript®, CSV, or plain text.
work the OSI model from the bottom up
Physical (Do you have a network adapter/connection)
Link layer (arp, ethernet port blocked by network team (I've seen this where locked down environments see two MAC addresses coming from one workstation port and shut down the port)
Network layer (ipconfig, tracert, ping,)
Do you have a network address (DHCP, fixed)
Are you on a proper subnet/have routing between subnets
Is something in the middle blocking you
firewalls, routing tables
When in doubt, check to see if the windows firewall is messing with your communications. 8 times out of 10, it's at fault.
Using tracert is a good start to see how far along the chain you are getting.
For virtual machines it's usally a good idea to make sure you have the loopback adapter set correctly in the Host os.
Most frequently used tool is the ping. It can be used both to test your connection and the availability of a target
Second tool is the tracert if you want to see where the packets get lost.
For more advanced debugging I use the following tools: nmap, wireshark, etc.
Windows has a netstat utility which is pretty similar to the Unix netstat and can do a number of different things that might help you solve network issues.
Random example:
netstat -r displays routing information
netstat /? for usage information
Since you said you're using 2 virtual machines I would hazard a guess that both machines are setup in a NAT configuration (rather than a unique network device) -- In the NAT configuration, neither machine would (typically) be able to ping the other.
If you're familiar with the command line, you can try the "netstat" command.
You can also try "arp -a" to list all the IP/MAC addresses known to your PC.
The "tracert [ip address]" command will show you how many gateways/routers your packets jump through on their way to their destination. (This is probably not helpful if both machines are on the same network, though.)
And don't forget to check your Windows firewall settings.
Otherwise, if you want to get down and dirty, you can try the packet sniffer known as Wireshark: http://www.wireshark.org/ (aka. Ethereal)
Pull the network cable out
If you can get some communications to a device (eg a ping), but can't get your program to talk to a service on the computer. Then, try pulling the network cable out and see if the ping stops. This will verify you're communicating with the computer you really think you are.
On windows i user PortQueryUI : http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=24009
DNS activity: Portable DNS Cache and Firewall;
General network activity: Wireshark, Network Monitor;
Windows utilities: ping, netstat, nslookup.
You need to be use the process of elimination, for example if you can ping the ip address but not the hostname then there's DNS issues. If you can ping the system but not connect to a share etc.
DNS out of sync
If you're using a virtual machine and you perform a roll-back on it, then it could become out of sync with the DNS (Domain name server). Try to remove and re-add the machine to the domain, or if you've got access to the DNS machine, then get it to flush its cache.