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[desole_al]

Hi. First, let me start say that this is the first time I use this program, and I know nothing about it (or any similar program)!

I understand I have low ID. I am not sure what that means, but I tried to read the wiki guide, and it says:
"To be given a high or low ID will only depend on having TCP port 4662 (or the one set up in Preferences) opened"

So I would like to open this "port", but I have no idea how to do it... (I am using a powerbook G4, MacOSX).
I understand this might seem a stupid question, but please tell me what to do!

Thanks.

[phoenix]

desole_al,

Wellcome to the world of p2p

Actually, the lowid/highid issue is a matter of having your TCP port (4662 by default) accessible, and not open. aMule opens it every time it starts to run, but this port must be accessible from the outside world. If you are behind a firewall or if your computer has a private net ip behind a NAT, then you will have a lowid.

Having a highid means that your TCP port is accessible and that other clients can connect to you without the help of a server. A lowid means that this is not possible, so the server will ask you to connect to anyone that wants to connect to you. Lowid clients cannot connect to lowid clients, that is the only disadvantage of having a lowid. Sorry, also the servers have a limit on the number of lowid clients they accept, because of the overhead lowid clients generate.

I think that you will still have to read a lot, I can point you to two links:
http://www.amule.org/wiki/index.php/FAQ_aMule
http://www.amule.org/wiki/index.php/Firewall

Any doubts, please ask.

Cheers!

[desole_al]

Dear Phoenix,

first, let me thank you for your reply. I have to confess though that I still do not understand much... I tried to read the wiki FAQ at the links you wrote me, but it is a bit too complicated for me!

You said: "If you are behind a firewall or if your computer has a private net ip behind a NAT, then you will have a lowid."
I really do not understand what this means (how do I know if I am "behind a firewall?, what is a "private net ip"?, and a "NAT"???), but, most important, I have no clue on how to avoid it!?!

Could you PLEASE explain me, step by step, what to do in order to fix this problem? (Or, can you direct me to somewhere where there is an EASY explanation on how to do all this?)

---

In fact I have another question. How do I now what are the files that I am sharing? How do I make some of my own files available to the network? (in order to increase my rates?)

Thanks.

[ken]

A firewall is a network device intended to protect your computer from unauthorized access by other computers elsewhere on the network.  There are several things that may act as a firewall:

• Your own computer.  Mac OS X has firewall software built in, although it is turned off by default.  To check if it has been turned on, go to System Preferences -> Sharing -> Firewall.  It will tell you if your firewall software is on or off.
• The router, cable modem, or DSL modem through which you connect to the wider network.
• If you are on a LAN (local-area network) such as within a dorm room or an office, your LAN administrator may have set up a firewall
• Your ISP

A NAT device is usually used to share a single internet connection among several computers.  NAT stands for Network Address Translation.  It has to translate the one address associated with your one internet connection into several addresses for the several computers.  Each of the computers has an address that is only meaningful within your home network -- it can't be addressed directly from the outside world, only the NAT device can be.  This is what phoenix meant by "private net ip".  So, you have to configure the NAT (if you have one) to translate aMule-related connections coming from the outside world to the specific computer that is running aMule.

Tell us something about how you are connected to the internet.  Are you at home, in a dorm, in an office?  Are you connected through a modem, DSL, cable, LAN?  What ISP?  Do you have a router?  Do you share one internet connection among several computers?

You share files in the directories you specify in the aMule preferences.  The Incoming directory is automatically shared.  Also, any directories you select in the Shared Directories control (double-click a directory to share it) are shared.  To see which files are being shared, click on the Shared Files icon in the aMule toolbar.  It looks like a filing cabinet.

[phoenix]

desole_al,

I am sorry for beeing too technical. In fact, these are not complicated concepts, you just have to somewhat get used to them. Ken's post is really fine, try to answer his questions, maybe we can help you more.

When you connect to the internet, this can be done in a number of ways. The simplest and easier way would be a direct connection with a valid IP address. This way, every one can reach you, and you can reach every one. Btw, you can always reach every one that is reachable. When is someone "not reacheable" ? A computer is not reachable when it has a private IP address. This is an address the ISP's (Internet Service Provider) usually gives you, so that they do not have to give you a real public IP. This is an old way of thinking that public IP costs money, so they tend not to give that for free. They may give you an IP like 192.168.xxx.xxx, or 10.xxx.xxx.xxx and this IP will not be routed in normal internet routers. These are private internet numbers, what means that these IP addresses will never be reachable by anyone in the world. There can actualy be several machines in the world with the IP address of 192.168.1.1. These numbers are reserved for private use. In that case. there is always a computer device that will do the connection to the outside world so that you can connect with the other public IP machines. This device will perform a NAT (Network Address Translation). This means that every message that you send to the outside world will use the public IP address of the NAT machine, and that the NAT machine will take care of knowing which packets are in fact addressed for your machine, and deliver them to you.

Some routers or ADSL modems are capable of NAT, so maybe you have one such device. If for one reason or the other, you are behind a firewall or a router or a NAT device, you must tell this device that you are expecting connections from the outside world on a certain port. This is called "port forwarding". Of course, when you forward ports, you are in fact reserving resources, and this means that if you forward the port 4662 of the NAT machine to your machine, no other machine inside the private network will receive incomming connections on this port.

Another thing that might be happening is that some ISP's block connections to the default TCP aMule port (4662). This is done in order to try to discourage the use of P2P applications. But you can always change the default, so that even those evil ISP's cannot block you.

Maybe this is all still too technical to you, but let me give you an advice: try to understand what I am saying. Try to read as much as you can so that my words make sense to you. You will not be able to fix your problem if you are not able to understand what is happening. And it will be very hard for us to help you if you don't help us with that. I am here to answer any questions you might have that are inside my scope of knowledge, but you have to ask them. I can't answer them if you don't ask them. And you can't ask them if you don't understand. No one was born knowing, so don't be ashamed to ask. But aslo do your job, and search the internet for the missing information. Google is your friend

Problems are detected by symptoms, but symptoms may have many different causes. You need to find the causes of your problem and this is hard to do that without a good undrestanding of what is happening.

Cheers!

[desole_al]

Dear Ken and Phoenix,

first let me thank you for trying so hard to explain me all this stuff. Your answers were very helpful (even though I still didn't fix the lowID problem...)

I want to answer Ken's questions:

> Your own computer. Mac OS X has firewall software built in, although it is turned off by
> default. To check if it has been turned on, go to System Preferences -> Sharing -> Firewall.
> It will tell you if your firewall software is on or off.

I checked this, and indeed the MacOSX firewall is turned off.

> Tell us something about how you are connected to the internet. Are you at home, in a
> dorm, in an office? Are you connected through a modem, DSL, cable, LAN? What ISP? Do
> you have a router? Do you share one internet connection among several computers?

I am at home. I am connected to the internet through DSL, and I don't think I have a router (namely, I do not share the DSL connection with anyone else).
The internet service provider is, I think, the italian phone company named Fastweb. At least, my computer is attached to the DSL box that they installed to my wall.

I probably am not on a LAN, since I don't share the connection with anybody.

if I understand correctly, the problem is coming from the internet service provider. Is this true?
I don't know whether I have a NAT or not. And I don't know if I have a valid public IP address, or a "fake" private IP address. How do I find out?

I hope this will help you help me And I hope you will still have the patience to answer all my questions...

Thanks a lot!

[ken]

First thing I would try, as suggested by phoenix, is to tell aMule to use a different port than its default 4662.  You can change this in the aMule preferences dialog, in the Connection section, under Client TCP Port.  Pick a new number to use there, from 1024 to 65530.  Then quit aMule and restart it.  See if that helps.

If you still have low-id, then your DSL box may include a firewall and/or NAT.  If you can find out the brand and model number of the box, some people here may be able to help you configure it.

It's also possible that your ISP runs a firewall to protect your connection.  You could call and ask them.

[desole_al]

Dear Ken and/or Phoenix,

again, thanks a lot for all your help. I tried again to fix the lowID problem, but still I ave not fixed the problem yet. This is what I tried to do and where I am standing now:

> First thing I would try, as suggested by phoenix, is to tell aMule to use a different port than
> its default 4662. You can change this in the aMule preferences dialog, in the Connection
> section, under Client TCP Port. Pick a new number to use there, from 1024 to 65530. Then
> quit aMule and restart it. See if that helps.

I tried to do this, but it didn't help.

> If you still have low-id, then your DSL box may include a firewall and/or NAT. If you can
> find out the brand and model number of the box, some people here may be able to help
> you configure it.
>
> It's also possible that your ISP runs a firewall to protect your connection. You could call and
> ask them.

I then called Fastweb (the phone company which provides the internet connection). They told me that indeed I have a private IP address, and the connection probably has a NAT.
I also tried to ask them if they knew how to  do the "port forwarding" (as suggested by Phoenix a while ago), but they said they could not help me on this.

So I have to ask you  again if you can help me fix the problem... (with easy instructions, please

As you suggested, I got some information about the DSL box which is on my wall.
It is called "HAG (Home Access Gateway), Access Media", and it is provided by Fastweb. I even found a manual of it on the internet (I started following Phoenix's advice to use Google . Here is the link:
http://www.fastweb.it/InfoTecniche/pdf/hag.pdf
Unfortunately it is written in Italina, but maybe it can be of help anyway.

I hope you'll help me again.
Bye.

[snac]

Hello Desole. You italian ?
Fastweb use NAT/PAT. You have a ip private 10.x.x.x .
The administrators net fastweb are many bad X(

But you go to *URL REMOVED BY ADMIN* for resolve the your problem.


Byez

- URL removed by admin - harmful mod.

[phoenix]

desole_al,

Well, if you have a private IP, forget about your router now. You will never get a high ID like this.

If you ISP does not give you a public IP, then this is an evil ISP provider. And if you ask them one, they'll probably charge you more for this. Say farewell to them, change to some ISP that gives you a public IP. Or else, you will have to live with the fact that no one can initiate a connection to your machine, and for aMule that means low id.

Cheers!

[doctorwebbox]

I have port 4662 availablew but still have LoID. Any ideas?

[Kry]

You have 4662 no available.

[phoenix]

It might be available in you box, but it might be unreachable from the outside world. Try that script:
http://www.amule.org/testport.php

And report the results. Also, read this:
http://www.amule.org/wiki/index.php/AMule_problems

Cheers!

[lfroen]

doctorwebbox: no means no:

Discovered open port 21/tcp on 81.179.226.219
Discovered open port 80/tcp on 81.179.226.219
Discovered open port 23/tcp on 81.179.226.219
Discovered open port 22/tcp on 81.179.226.219
Discovered open port 254/tcp on 81.179.226.219

No 4662, right ?