web publishing with port forwarding

[wobbie]

Hi I seem to have a problem making my database available on the web. I'm working with filemaker 6 on Os X panther.

I've activated the web companion and activated TCP/IP port 591. In the webbrowser, the database is now available on the computer that runs the database on URL: http://127.0.0.1:591. In the LAN I can connect to the web interface on http://192.168.254.30:591/index.html

Now I want to make the site available to the world...

The computer that hosts the database has a static IP, so on the router I've forwarded port 591 to the LAN-IP (192.168.254.30)

When I insert the adress http://www.myURL.com:591/index.html I keep getting a "Page not available"

Does anybody know what is wrong, is it the URL, do I have to forward other ports....

Thx

[Martin Brändle]

Why do you not set the Web Companion to port 80, the standard web port? Is there another web server running on the same machine?

[wobbie]

I have a webserver running on port 80 on another machine in the LAN, that's why I can't use port 80, on the router I've mapped the requests on port 80 to the internal IP of the webserver. This works fine, just like my FTP server (yet another machine), but when i try this with filemaker, it won't work....

[Garry Claridge]

Do you have a Firewall running anywhere?

Garry

[wobbie]

The firewall on the Mac serving the DB is inactive. And the firewall on the network allows all traffic...

I've even changed the port to port 80 and disabled the webserver. then I mapped port 80 to the Mac that is serving the DB.... same thing, the DB can be approached in the LAN but not from the WAN....

I'm completely clueless...

[Steve T.]

Howdy, w! AFAIK, port forwarding the desired web port is all you need to do, but maybe your ISP is blocking ports and didn't tell you. Try :8080 which is listed as an alternate web port and see what happens... oh, sorry... I see you tried a :80 switcheroo and that didn't help. Hmm...

You're getting a "Page Not Available" error, though, right? Doesn't that imply the server is serving and you are making some kind of connection? Try pointing port traffic to a non-server and see if you get a different error message. Could it be something simple like setting your default page (index.html, index.htm, default.html, default.htm)? If you're using Custom Web Publishing, you can serve static web pages, too... make an HTML page called called test.html and see if it shows up.

You can use NETWORK UTILITY (in Applications > Utilities) to do port scans, pings, and traces to help track down the problem, too.

I suppose you can try forwarding :5003 to the FM server and see if you can connect to a shared FM db from the internet using FILE > OPEN > HOSTS or OPEN REMOTE just to see if that works, too.

--ST

[kfutter]

Okay, a couple of misconceptions here.

Firstly, you can run as many webservers as you like on port 80 (no need to change port numbers), as long as they all have different IP addresses (or you're using virtual hosts).

Secondly, it's advised to use port 591 for FM web stuff, as FM has registered this port expressly for this purpose, and it's normally considered the "default" for FM web publishing.

The only problem is that most firewalls (and proxy servers for that matter) will block or ignore traffic on port 591 by default. This is most likely your problem, though if you're doing this entirely on a LAN then your proxy may be blocking, if you have one.

Also, port 8080 isn't an "alternative" port for web traffic, but the default port for proxy servers (through which most of the world's http traffic passes). But Steve's right - it's often used this way.

Kevin

[Martin Brändle]

Okay, a couple of misconceptions here.

Don't start like this - we just tried to help her or him.

Secondly, it's advised to use port 591 for FM web stuff, as FM has registered this port expressly for this purpose, and it's normally considered the "default" for FM web publishing.

It's not very convenient to have an address like http://www.something.com:591/ . People are just not used to it.

Port 591 is mostly used in connection with the Web Server Connector of FMI, e.g. if you have a web server engine like Apache and FMU installed on the SAME computer. Then you need to separate the ports of the webserver (80) and of FMU (591) and couple it with the WSC. Otherwise you would get a conflict, because FMU does not support virtual hosts.

E.g., in our current configuration we have the following setup:

RAIC of 3 computers

- 2 rather slow computers with FMU on port 80 and canonical address www.adress1.com for solution 1, the DNS does the round tripping (e.g. distributes the queries on both machines).

- 1 strong computer with Apache webserver on port 80, FMU on port 591, canonical address www.adress2.com for solution 2, and WSC installed. WSC couples to the other 2 computers by port 80 and to local installed FMU on port 591, and does the round tripping for all 3 RAIC machines. We did this way because solution 2 has more accesses than solution 1, and therefore needs to be backed by additional machines.

[Garry Claridge]

Try to have just a web-server (port 80) running on the FM computer and see if that can be accessed from the Internet.

Try to eliminate what may be causing the lack of port forwarding. (Is it just to FM, or is just to that computer?)

Good Luck.

Garry

[Steve T.]

Also, port 8080 isn't an "alternative" port for web traffic

Thanks for the clarification, Kevin, but I was just repeating what I think this site said...

http://www.iana.org/assignments/port-numbers

http-alt 8080/tcp HTTP Alternate (see port 80)

http-alt 8080/udp HTTP Alternate (see port 80)

[kfutter]

Martin - my apologies if my reply sounded rude; it was certainly not my intention. Personally I have never been able to get WSC to work, and after lots of trying I gave up on it. Our ultimate solution involves an Xserve running Apache (and our website) on port 80, which makes queries to our FMU machine (running on port 591) via PHP. PHP obviates the need for the ugly URLs you cite, and in fact hides the presence of FM altogether. Prior to that though we'd been through all sorts of convolutions to get/keep an FM solution running.

Steve - I haven't seen such definitions before, so I can't really comment directly. Maybe my take on it is out-of-date now?

Has any of this actually solved the original poster's question?

Cheers,

Kevin