Port Forward Testing Application

I've seen a fair few postings about one-way audio etc, so I thought I'd knock up a little port forward tester. This is now in our downloads section:-

Download here

There's a version for Linux and Windows.

How it works

This is a client application. It's sister server is running on our web server box. This client connects to the server via TCP/IP (on port 8585) thereby circumnavigating any firewalls or NAT, does a quick and dirty handshake, then sends up the client requested ports to test to the server.

The server then sends out a special "PING" type packet via UDP to that clients IP address.

If the UDP packet arrives, the port forwarding is working correctly, if it doesn't, something has gone wrong, and you'll be notified either way.

Windows Version

Should be self explanatory. You can test 4 ports at a time. Enter the port numbers in the boxes and hit "go".

The "View Log" button will show you connecting to our server, and give confirmation that the UDP packets have been sent, and if they get received. If there is a problem connecting to our server, and you definitely have an internet connection and haven't blocked port 8585 in your firewall, it maybe that the server has a problem. In which case, let me know. This is still very much in beta.

Linux

This is a command line app. There is no installer and there are no dependancies. It should run on any flavour of Intel based *nix/BSD.

You can have up to 4 ports entered at the command line.

EG:-

./testport 5060 8000 8001

Will test those three ports and output the result.

Type:-

./testport --help

.... for more info.

Any comments for additions/bugs etc please post here. I am currently looking at incorporating a STUN test to determine firewall type etc, which I hope will follow as Version 2.

Dean

The utility has been very helpful and works as advertised.

Dean, is there any time frame for version 2 of the utility? The ability to check NAT/firewall type will be hugely useful as well for many out there like me. Is there any utility that you can recommend that will let me identify the type of NAT/firewall?

Thanks,

Kasauli

Hi Kasauli,

Thanks for the feedback - I'm glad you found it useful.

There is a tool that does a STUN/NAT determination type test:-

NATCheck : http://midcom-p2p.sourceforge.net/

We had a little discussion about NATCheck here:-

http://www.voipuser.org/forum_topic_1953.html

I think that WINstun may also do this but I'm not 100% sure:-

winSTUN : http://sourceforge.net/projects/stun/

In any event, NATCheck will do the trick for you.

Both are open source.

Because of those 2 being around, version 2 of my own port tester app. kind of went on the back burner. I will still do it as I think these two tests rolled into one app. would be useful (I'll then make it open-source), but I've got other VoIP User development duties to take care of which are more pressing just at the moment.

Hope that helps,

Dean

.

im geting this using the linux tool


[root@asterisk1 portfwdtest]# ./testport
bash: ./testport: Permission denied


.

Hi Vberroa,
What user permissions have you set on the testport programme and who would you be running it as?

Easiest is to change owner to root (chown root testport) and set the permissions to 755 (chmod 755 testport)

If you're already running as root, all you should need to do is:-

chmod u+x testport

dean :

I've seen a fair few postings about one-way audio etc, so I thought I'd knock up a little port forward tester. This is now in our downloads section:- Download here Dean

Is the server hosting this tool, still up? I tried a few ports which I was expecting to be ok (such as port 80 or 389) and they fail.

My goal is to be able to set up my brother's VOIP and walk away, knowing that all of the ports (TCP and UDP) which the VOIP provider says in their FAQ must be accessable, actually are.

Is there a way to check port ranges?
Some voip providers have gigantic port ranges -- and I fear that I'll walk away with the VOIP TA working -- but not working all of the time....

Hi dzr and welcome to VoIP User,

It seemed to have stalled for some reason - I've restarted the server.

Try again now?

Dean

dean :

Hi dzr and welcome to VoIP User, It seemed to have stalled for some reason - I've restarted the server. Try again now? Dean

Thanks. I still get failures...

dzr :

dean : Hi dzr and welcome to VoIP User, It seemed to have stalled for some reason - I've restarted the server. Try again now? Dean Thanks. I still get failures...

I noticed that the router's SPI was dropping it, no matter what port I tried. I then turned off SPI and still get failures - even if I turn of my PC's firewall (what a scary thing to do!).

I'm also getting failure on all ports.

I have been using your program for about a week now and it has been working great and I can't tell you how usefull it is. However, for the past couple of days every time I try and check a port it says "Failed to Connect to TCP server at Voip User." When I check the log it says "4/2/2006 12:16:51 PM : Connecting to server..."

Is the server still running? If not, is there any other program that will check my UDP ports.

Thanks a lot!

There's a small bug in the server - it seems to fall over every 2-3 months or so.

I've restarted it - should be OK again for a few more months now

Dean

Running like a charm, thanks a lot Dean!

the program "testports" sometimes fails to connect to the port specified on my pc and it may take retries to succefully connect. Is this normal?????.

I hate the portforwarding my netgear router does, as it requires me to enter the external ip on the applications for the router to return me the packet otherwise the router sends it using my internal IP!!!! I think my router forgets to change it! but this program makes me wonder as sometimes the program says it could connect and other times it timesout and is not my network problem I think. What can I do? when I host worms game if I don't specify my external ip on the tcp settings everyone tell me they see my internal ip on the internet and therefore they can't connect to my game so that's why I'm saying this.