Gizmo Project and Bonjour

The new Gizmo Project, which is touted at http://www.gizmoproject.com as superior to Skype, adds a new Bonjour Service to the Windows XP (or Windows 2000, or Windows NT) Services folder. This service starts automatically and runs a process named mDNSResponder.exe which cannot be ended by Windows Task Manager. Uninstalling the software does not remove the service. You can disable it, but not remove it from your system. And unless you disable and stop it, you will not be able to delete the Gizmo Project folder with the file mDNSResponder.exe in it.

Reply from Kasauli on Aug 27, 2005 - 06:07 PM

What exactly Bonjour service is and what is its purpose? What are the consequences of running Bonjour and why Gizmo Project added it in version 1.0?

Could you please elaborate?

Thanks,

Kasauli

Reply from groucho on Aug 27, 2005 - 06:21 PM

Bonjour Service is an Apple networking service. You can read about Bonjour for Windows here http://developer.apple.com/softwarelicensing/agreements/bonjourwin.html
Unfortunately, Gizmo Project's makers tell you nothing about this very serious problem when they push their software on you

Reply from mazilo on Aug 27, 2005 - 07:21 PM

Do you know how this mDNSResponder.exe process gets launched? Chances are it gets launched as a service and can be terminated through the service management. If not, you can boot your windows in safe mode and remove the process as well as the file. Beware that removal of this file may cause your computer to generate an error service message. If so, just remove and/or disable the mDNSResponder.exe entry in the service table.

Reply from merkstra on Aug 31, 2005 - 01:18 PM

go to gizmo folder(program files), rename the file mDNSResponder.exe to 1234.dll or something like that. Delete the file, kill the process and it's gone.

Reply from jren207 on Aug 31, 2005 - 02:28 PM

Whoa, I got it after an auto-update or Gizmo project last night. Just started up my computer today and there it was. It uses 100% CPU constantly... and it stops my protection (anti-virus/firewall) from starting correctly, or making it start late (got a message about an atempt to disable my protection).

But anyway, if you can manage to get into services (it makes the computer lag bad), then open the properties of the Bonjour service.

You'll notice that on the recovery tab, it says, after first fail, then selected is "Restart the service", then after second fail, "Restart the service", etc. That's why when you try to kill it in Task Manager, it starts again.

The easiest way to stop it starting is to select "Disabled" as it's startup type, on the "General" tab or the service. Then click "OK".

When you restart your system, it won't.

Reply from mazilo on Aug 31, 2005 - 03:11 PM

Perhaps after you have disable the service to start @ reboot, you can use the service manager to shutdown the current running service instead of rebooting your computer.

Reply from dean on Aug 31, 2005 - 03:21 PM

Is bonjour the type of application that enables the creation of P2P networks?

Reply from mykill on Sep 02, 2005 - 05:45 PM

Michael Robertson - CEO of SIPphone, makers of Gizmo Project here.

I can assure you we that do NOT install any third party applications. I have run many high profile companies including MP3.com and Linspire and we have never installed any hidden software applications. No spyware, no p2p, no adware - nothing. No exceptions.

In a recent version, we do install Rendezvous which is an IETF draft standard which is used extensively by Apple as well as other communication programs like Trillian. Products like iphoto, itunes, ichat also use Rendezvous. You can read more about it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonjour_%28protocol%29

What Rendezvous does is allow machines on a subnet to communicate with each other without leaving the subnet. It's is a local subnet discovery technology. You know how in iTunes it automatically identifies all other iTunes users in your network to stream music from? That's what we do to. This makes voice quality very high for users inside a particular domain.

The service should uninstall Rendezvous when you uninstall Gizmo Project and we will look into it to see why it's not for you.

While we're talking about Gizmo Project and what Skype does or does not do. It's Skype users who should beware. Skype takes your bandwidth and processor and uses it route other people's calls. There is NO way to turn this off if you're running Skype. Gizmo Project never users your computer to route any calls other than your own.

Skype charges for voicemail which is free for Gizmo Project users. Skype has started charging for avatars which are free on Gizmo Project.

-- MR

Reply from emartin on Sep 02, 2005 - 05:59 PM

Hi all,

I work on Gizmo Project. Let me clear up some things.

mDNSResponder.exe is a Windows Service that is part of Bonjour. Bonjour (previously known as Rendezvous) was created by Apple:

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/bonjour/

What Bonjour does for Gizmo is it finds two or more Gizmo's that may be behind the same network and sets up a P2P connection to each other.

Because other applications may install the Bonjour Service, the Gizmo Project installer/uninstaller has to try to intelligently determine if Gizmo is the one installing it. This is probably where the issue is with some users. We'll look into it furthur to make sure Bonjour ALWAYS gets uninstalled if we install it.

If you do not wish it installed, We posted an application here for you to download that will remove the Bonjour Windows Service from your system :

http://gizmoproject.com/jasmine TurnOffBonjour.exe

Thanks,
emartin

Reply from dean on Sep 02, 2005 - 08:18 PM

Michael & Martin - thanks for stopping by and clearing up the issue.

Without wishing to drag the thread off-topic, most of our members here are aware of Skypes application of the "super-node" and bandwidth usage - we've discussed it several times. The overall view of that type of P2P proxying is already considered here to be a bad idea.

eMArtin : The Gizmo use of Bonjour sounds very interesting and I'll look into it further. Thanks for the link to the uninstaller. For those requiring it, the direct link is here:-

ftp://gizmo:sippitgizmo@misc01.gizmopro ... onjour.exe

Dean

Reply from jimskipper on Sep 09, 2005 - 06:02 PM

mDNSResponder.exe is installed and used by Apple's iTunes software among other things.

Reply from ocumo on Sep 10, 2005 - 03:56 PM

Quote:

No spyware, no p2p, no adware - nothing. No exceptions.

When I installed QuickTime, I thought I was installing a movie/media player plugin with "better" quality than others. But then, during the installation, and very quietly, the application tried to connect to the Internet: to the servers 224.0.0.251 and 217.237.150.141 using the protocol UDP and then IGMP. Using dslreports "whois", I found that the first server is aparently assigned to Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA),
4676 Admiralty Way, Suite 330 Marina del Rey CA 90292-6695 US
The second belongs to RIPE Network Coordination Centre (RIPE), P.O. Box 10096 Amsterdam

Now, what does this all mean? Why this is not explained during the installation that there will be a hidden attempt to communicate to some servers somewhere for unknown reasons?


I just blocked the internet access to this application, and found that the QuickTime plugin works. I was lucky that I did not restart my PC when the installation asked so, and became curious "why" and found the service and the not asked to be installed application. Then, google helped me to find this discussion. I don't see here a good explanation to the jren207 post:

Quote:

It uses 100% CPU constantly... and it stops my protection (anti-virus/firewall) from starting correctly, or making it start late (got a message about an atempt to disable my protection).

Is there any explanations to that?

Can I trust the "uninstaller" application, anyway, if the whole story doesn't look so clear after all? How can I know that running that executable it won't be something else?

This is the kind of stories that make so many people starting to be disgusted with companies that act that way. Respect for the customers implies a more transparent process, and not installing hidden processes, service that run with high privileges and can not easily be dealt with, representing security problems, like exemplified by jren207. I am starting to hate already all this story and concerned that it might be difficult to clean out this from my PC.

Any good explanations?

Reply from bprib on Sep 10, 2005 - 07:54 PM

I agree.

I find it completely appalling that MR says "No spyware, no p2p, no adware - nothing. No exceptions"...and then a developer on the project says "What Bonjour does for Gizmo is...sets up a P2P connection" You can't have it both ways.

I am attempting to uninstall Gizmo and may never reinstall it...

Reply from LouisC on Sep 10, 2005 - 09:40 PM

OMG... this service stalled my hub and caused major internet problems... the internet was just dissapearing even though the hub said connected !!! took me a day and phonecalls to BT and D-Link who both told me they could not work out what the problem was. I narrowed it down to my laptop which has itunes 5 on it and the found this odd service using the internet. banned the service from using the net (through za) and ended process in task manager and whazam my internet is back and stable as ever. What the hell caused this is what i would like to know, what does this app do to bring down a whole networks internet ??? is it because my router was blocking requsts with the nat firewall ?? the creaters of this rubbish need to have a rethink. had i have known that installing an Mp3 player, yeh an mp3 player thats got nothing to do with networking, was causing the trouble i would not have spent all day trying to find it.
Hope this solvs other issues in the future ....

My hub is a dsl g-604t

Louis Christodoulou

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