No-IP.com Guides / Tips

Setting up an FTP server with a No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ Host Name. by Cheryl! Tisland

What many people may not realize is that it is not necessary to have a true "server" in order to have your own FTP site. It can be accomplished with any computer and any operating system. I first set up an FTP server on my Windows 95 machine many years ago. It can even be done with a Mac. The nice thing about this, is that with your computer, internet connection, some software and a NO-IP host name, you can be up and running easily and quickly sharing files with friends, colleagues or the world. Begin by visiting your favorite shareware web site and do a search for "FTP Daemon" or "FTP Server". Make sure it is server software and not client software. There are many available in all flavors. Some are better than others, so be sure to compare packages. Once you get your software downloaded and installed, you will want to do some configuration for users and the directories and files that you want to allow them to see. I have a drive partition that I use for all my server related folders and files, and this works very nicely. If you dont want to dedicate a complete partition, then create a folder called "Server" or whatever you like. You will need to decide if you want to allow anonymous connections or not. If you do, I suggest you have a separate folder that is your public folder. Be cautious when allowing anonymous connections, though. My software allows me to choose whether the anonymous connection is read only or read/write. You may want to think about how open you want to be to the world. You can also set up users and passwords and give each user access to a different directory. This can be very convenient for those files that you only want to share with special people. So, now that you have your server software all set up, it is time to get a NO-IP host name for your FTP Site. This will make it much easier for people to access your FTP Site since it is much easier for people to remember a friendly name rather than an IP address. It is also very essential if you have a dynamic IP address because it will be very difficult for users to access an FTP site with an ever changing address. In this case, the NO-IP Dynamic Updater is a great tool that automatically updates your host name with your IP address every time it changes. The NO-IP Dynamic Update Client is available for Windows 9x/NT/2k, Mac OS, and Linux. You can download it here.

So your ISP has decided to block port 80? by Joel Rasmus

So your ISP has decided to block port 80, eh? No big deal. You can still serve your website without them knowing! Step 1: Change the port your webserver runs on. Here is how you do it. First, you will need to change the port that your web server runs on. I decided to use port 8080. In Microsofts IIS, you do this by editing the default web sites properties. Right click on the default web site and select Properties. Once you have done that it will bring up another window. Enter your port here. (Note: this tip can be used with other web servers, just figure out how to change the port and continue with step 2.) Step 2: Create your port 80 redirect. If you already have a host created that youd like to use, select modify from the Hosts/Redirects menu. If not click add from the Hosts/Redirects menu. Once you are on the host editing page, select the option "Port 80 Redirect". After you have done this, enter the IP address of the webserver and the port you selected it to run on. Now click add or modify. Step 3: Making it dynamic. If the IP that your webserver runs on is dynamic, youll want to make sure you are running our dynamic update client, which is available from the downloads page. After you have installed and configured the update client make sure the host you have created or modified in this tip has been selected to be updated.

Using No-IP with a Cable/DSL router. by Dan Durrer

So your ISP sticks you with a dynamic IP. To add salt to the wound they only give you one address. Many people have opted to use a cable/DSL router to get around this issue. The router allows you to use multiple computers sharing one Internet connection and IP address using network address translation (NAT). A popular one is the LinkSys BEFSR41 4-port Cable/DSL Router. There are numerous vendors that make a similar product. This article describes how to use No-IP in NAT environment using the LinkSys Cable/DSL Router. If you have a different router, this article is still a good read. The router prevents users on the Internet from accessing PCs connected to your local network. So you want to run a server, but how are people going to get to your server if your router is not allowing people to connect to your PC. Not to fear... the LinkSys router has a feature called port forwarding. Port forwarding is a mechanism used to take Internet traffic destined for a particular port and then sending it to a computer on your local network. Lets use a web server as an example. I have setup a web server on my Linux box with address 192.168.100.2. I want to share the web site with some friends on the Internet using my No-IP hostname (trinkets.servehttp.com). Setting up the update client My external IP addresses is dynamic so I will need to use the No-IP dynamic update client to keep my hostname updated with the most current IP. Just install the client on any machine that resides on your local network. If you just use the default settings the client will try to send the local LAN IP address to the No-IP servers. No-IP doesnt allow the assignment of private network addresses. So what we want to send is the IP address of the router. How do I do that? The new Windows client will auto-detect your router. On the Mac version select use "Router/Gateway" under the address resolution tab of the update client. On the Linux version set the client to use NAT. So I have applied the changes and added my host trinkets.servehttp.com to the update client. The updater client now updates the host trinkets.servehttp.com with the most current IP address of my LinkSys router. Port forwarding My friend now enters http://trinkets.servehttp.com into their browser, but whoops... nothing there. The router doesnt have port forwarding configured so it just denies the connection. So I need to configure port forwarding. Open up a web browser and login to your routers web-based configuration. By default the IP address for configuration is set to http://192.168.1.1/. Enter the username and password, click on the Advanced Tab (congratulations your an advanced user! ). In the advanced section, click on the Forwarding tab. Remember Im running a web server on 192.168.100.2 so I am going to enter 80 in both boxes on the Service Port Range fields and 192.168.100.2 for the IP address. Next click apply. Voila!! Port forwarding is setup for web services. Now all my friends can access my server using http://trinkets.servehttp.com/. Gotchas: Each port can only be forwarded to one local IP. So we cant have multiple web servers running on port 80. Need to disable Remote Management to run a web server on port 80. When testing your webserver, the external IP address may not work from inside your local network. Consider having a friend on a different network connection bringing up your website. Keep in mind that you are not limited to just web servers. As long as you know the port number you can do this for almost any type of server,like ftp, vnc, irc, pcanwyhere... just about anything. Good Luck!!

Setting up a better No-IP-accessed server. by John Edwards

I know the feeling of spending nearly (or even over) $100 on a cable/DSL router or dialup access point, only to have it be extremely difficult to configure to allow internal servers access from the internet. This is why, instead of paying a large sum of cash for a hassle-in-a-box, you should just transform one of your computers into a router, at the cost of only an additional Ethernet card and some of your spare time. Step 1: Choosing the computer The computer that is running the most proficient server OS should be your choice for the new router. If you are running a workstation with Linux, BSD, or any other form of Unix, this should be your primary choice. After this, 2000 * Server (Server, Advanced, etc.) would be your next choice, followed by XP Professional, 2000 Professional, XP Home, ME, and 98SE. Later versions of Mac OS may be able to perform the function, but I am not experienced in them. If you are not running any computers with the above operating systems, I would suggest you install Linux on one, or buy a dedicated computer for Linux. This OS provides for lower hardware costs and absolutely free software if one knows where to obtain it. After you have designated your new routing computer and installed the new Ethernet card, its time to configure it. Step 2a: Internet Connection Sharing *Skip this step if you are NOT going to use Windows on the new router.* Microsoft ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) is a free (so to speak, one must still pay for Windows) and effective method for routing an internet connection from one interface to another within Windows and has been available since Windows 98 Second Edition. Installing it, however, depends on which version of Windows you are currently running. XP/2000 (any version): Open up "Network and Dial-Up Connections" under the Control Panel, and right-click on the icon that corresponds to your internet connection and bring up its properties. Click the "Sharing" tab on the top of the newly-opened window, and enable internet connection sharing for that device via the checkbox. ME: Open Add/Remove Programs under the Control Panel and click on the "Windows Setup" tab. Click on Communications and click "Details." Click the checkbox next to Internet Connection Sharing and click OK until it begins to install. Windows ME will then bring up an easy-to-use Home Networking Wizard to set up Internet Connection Sharing. In the following wizard, be sure that you select your previous internet device as the internet device, and your new Ethernet card as the home network device. 98SE: Typically the same as ME, except Internet Connection Sharing is under Internet Tools rather than Communications. Microsoft ICS will turn Windows into a fully-functional router, and will serve as a DNS (point all your other computers to 192.168.0.1 for their primary DNS servers) and DHCP (will assign IPs to all your other computers automatically) server. A personal firewall software such as Blackice Defender can then be installed for added protection. Microsoft ICS will assign the routers home Ethernet card with the IP 192.168.0.1, so the computers on your network will have a 192.168.0.x IP scheme (for those who are interested). Step 2b: IP MASQ *Skip this step if you are NOT going to use Linux, BSD, or any other Unix OS on the new router* IP Masquerading is Nix (Linux, BSD, or any other Unix)s version of Microsoft ICS, and is a bit harder to set up, but much more rewarding. Firstly, THOROUGHLY read the Linux IP Masquerade HOWTO at http://tldp.org/HOWTO/IP-Masquerade-HOWTO/, as it will make your life for the next two or three hours (it took me nearly a week to set it up my first time around!) easier. The easiest thing to do is to grab a sample configuration file and change the interface names accordingly; however, you should assign your own rulesets if you are feeling pretty comfortable with the feel of IP MASQ. Step 2b-A: Deciding on a ruleset scheme A ruleset allows you to accept, deny, reject (same as deny, but sends back a rejection notice), or masquerade a packet, coming in, going out, or forwarded through the Nix router, from a certain/any source, to a certain/any destination, using a certain/specific port on either/both source and destination. For example, I could reject a packet coming into the Nix router from port 5687 on ANY IP to any IP if I know that a popular trojan horse uses that IP for connectivity to the person who implements it on your computer; this will block access to the Trojan horse both ways if it is ever implemented on any of your internal computers. The most important thing to remember is that rulesets are applied in the order that they are entered. So, if you first implement a ruleset to deny all packets directed to www.linux.org, and then implement a ruleset that allows access to www.linux.org on port 80, then computers on your network will ONLY have WWW access to www.linux.org. However, if you apply the port 80 rule first, and then the deny all, there will not be WWW access. This can prove to be an effective firewall, since you can first apply a ruleset to deny everything from everything destined to anything, and then only allow through what needs to be allowed through. Step 2b-B: Logging Make sure you implement whatever means of logging your version of Nix allows in the IP MASQ process (consult the IP Masquerade HOW-TO for more info). This allows you to monitor the internet usage of your internal computers, as well as tell who has attempted to (or HAS) gained unauthorized access to your network. This information can prove quite useful in tracking down potential felons. In conclusion, IP MASQ will allow your router to be ten times as secure as a Microsoft ICS router, but is unfortunately ten times harder to set up, so the choice is up to you. On an interesting note, a Nix computer with secure rulesets (as described above) is classified as a hardware firewall, as it is directly implemented into the OS and makes decisions based on a wide range of packet properties. Step 3: No-IP This is truly the easiest step of the three. After your router is up and working, download the appropriate No-IP updater from www.no-ip.com and install it on your router, making sure it is set up to report the IP assigned to your internet device. Doing this will allow the updater to seamlessly report IP changes to No-IP as they occur, rather than having downtime waiting for the next time your updater reports the new IP. After this, go to any computer with internet access and run "ping (your No-IP domain name)". This can be done from Start > Run on any Windows machine, or straight from the command line on a Nix computer. If you are getting ping replies, then congratulations, you are in business! Step 4: Set up a server Windows 2000 (any version), Windows XP, and Nix (depending on the distribution) come with optional WWW, FTP, and Telnet access that can set up quickly and easily. 98SE and ME can have Personal Web Server (available through Add/Remove Programs -> Windows Setup) installed, which allows a webpage to be served from the computer. You can then run dedicated servers of any games you may play on this computer, and they will be completely accessible from both the internet and from the computers on your network. Any other server software you install will also be accessible from both the internet and from the internal network. Additional server software can also be obtained for a Nix computer, allowing it to run as a DNS server, DHCP server, Quake III server, MUD, or anything you can think of. And that is that! For the cost of only an additional Ethernet card and a bit of your spare time, you can have a cable/DSL/dialup router set up for your network, and you will also be able to run servers on this router, where they will be completely accessible from both the internet and the internal network. If you have any problems, questions, or comments, feel free to contact me.

So you want to use your PC from anywhere on the Net? by Joel Rasmus

Need to make settings changes to your Windows box, but you are a hundred miles away? Would you like to use your X display for your linux box from any machine on the Net? Well have no fear, there is a solution out there for you, and it doesnt cost a penny! What am I talking about? VNC of course. For those of you that havent heard of VNC, it stands for Virtual Network Computing, and is made by AT&T Laboratories. It is, in essence, a remote display system which allows you to view a computing desktop environment not only on the machine where it is running, but from anywhere on the Internet and from a wide variety of machine architectures. Check it out today. Youll be impressed on how easy it is to setup and use, and the best part is that it will work with your No-IP hostname! Note: If the machine you are trying to connect to is behind a router, ports 5800 and 5900 will need to be forwarded to the machine running VNC. VNC - Virtual Network Computing Also see Tight-VNC, an enhanced version of VNC. If you are using a router you will need to open ports 5800 and 5900 to the appropriate internal IP.

How to set up IIS to host your website. by Charlie Harding

IIS? What on earth is that? For those that dont know, IIS (Internet Information Services) is Microsofts web / mail / ftp server. In this tutorial, we will be ignoring the mail and ftp server side, and concentrating on the web server (Incidentally, there are much better mail and ftp servers available for windows that the ones provided with IIS, but the web server provided, I feel, is one of the best that you can get for Windows. IIS is provided as standard with Windows 2000 (Professional, Server and Advanced Server), Windows XP Professional Edition, but not with Windows 95/98/ME or Windows XP Home Edition, so if you have one of the last 4, you need to upgrade..sorry :) Windows NT also contains IIS but I have no experience with that so I cannot say how well this article will apply to it (but it cant be that different I am sure). Firstly, before setting up the web server, I strongly recommend going to http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com and installing all service packs, hotfixes and patches that are available (make sure that you are protected against Code Red in 2000/NT and the UPNP problem in XP). Remember to check back there every few weeks while your server is running, to make sure your computer is protected against security flaws that will inevitably arise in windows. Also, if you are on Windows 2000, apply the code red patch. Now that your system is as secure as it can be, it is time to install IIS. Go to Add/Remove Programs in Control Panel, and then click the Add/Remove Windows Components (1) button on the left of the window that pops up. You will be told to wait for a few seconds, and then the Windows Components Wizard will pop up. Double click on the Internet Information Services (IIS) entry (2) and the IIS window will pop up (3). A list of IIS components appears and you need to check the ones that you want to install. Check the boxes next to the following, but make sure all the other boxes are unchecked: Common Files Documentation Internet Information Services Snap-In World Wide Web Server Click OK and you will be returned to the Windows Components Wizard. Click Next and IIS will be installed for you. During the installation, you may be asked to provide your windows CD, if you are, put it in and click OK. When the installation has finished, click Finish, then click Close to close the Add/Remove Programs window. Now you need a web site to host, and I am assuming you have already made one. Make a new folder in the C: drive called WEB_ROOT, and copy your web site into there. Now you need tell IIS that this is where your web site is. Right click on My Computer on the desktop and go to Manage. The Computer Management applet will now open, and IIS is found in Services and Applications. Default Web Site (2) will appear under IIS, and you need to right click on that and go to Properties (In the photo below, mine appears as WAP, but it is just because I have renamed it, as I am about to show you!). This is the main section for adjusting the web site options, and it is here you will change anything to do with your site. Type a description of your site in the Description box like My Web Site or davidsite.no-ip.com so that you recognise it in future. Note I have called mine WAP as I am hosting a test WAP site at the moment. Next time you open Computer Management, instead of saying Default Web Site, it will say the name you type in here. Note that when people are looking at your site, they will not see that name at all, ever. Click on the Home Directory tab, and type C:\WEB_ROOT in the Local Path box. Now click on the Documents tab; make sure that Enable Default Document (3) is checked, and then click Add. Type in the name of your first page of your web site that you want people to see (usually index.htm, or index.html), then click OK. Select that document in the list, and then use the arrow buttons to move it to the top. Click OK (4) at the bottom of the window to return to the Computer Management window. Select your site, and then click the play button at the top right of the window. This will start the server, and allow people to see it. If you want to stop it, press the stop button, but when it is stopped, people wont be able to see your site. Close the Computer Management window and open Internet Explorer. Type http://localhost/ in the location box at the top, and then press enter. If all has gone well, your website should appear and you should be able to navigate it like any other website. Now anyone can access your site by typing in http:/// where is your IP address. An IP address is a unique number which defines a computer on the internet, so your IP address defines your computer on the internet. To find out you IP address, go to Start>Run and type in cmd and press enter. Then type ipconfig and press enter. Your IP address for your internet connection will be shown (1). It will be 4 numbers from 0 to 255 separated by periods (.), eg 62.7.43.219, but this is hard to remember and tell people, which is where No-IP comes in. Set up a redirection to your IP address using the No-IP free service, and then when people type in the name you have chosen, they will see your site. Finally, in closing, a few seemingly obvious things which are often forgotten: In order for people to see your website, your computer needs to be turned on and connected to the internet (which is why DSL or cable connections are good), people looking at your website will use your bandwidth of your connection, meaning that if you are on a modem, it will be slow for you and slow for people looking at your site (another reason DSL or cable is good), if you have a dynamic IP address (it changes when you go offline) you will need to update the No-IP records with your new IP when you reconnect to the internet, using the No-IP website or an update client, otherwise your site will not be accessible via your No-IP domain name.

How to setup an Apache web server, Using your own domain name and No-IP+ service by Vildan Hasanbegovic

Part 1. Pointing your domain name to No-IPs DNS First, you will have to register your domain name or already own one. If you need to register a new domain name, click here. Lets just suppose that you already own one. Make sure to point your domain name to the following DNSs at registrars setup as noted below: Order in which DNS servers are represented is important. ns2.no-ip.com ns1.no-ip.com ns3.no-ip.com This will make sure that your domain name is pointed to NO-IPs DNS servers. Part 2. NOIP Dyn-Update Client Configuration Click Add Domain under NO-IP Plus menu and type your domain name. Then, Activate your domain name. Third, download NOIP Dyn-Update Client for Windows. After simple installation you will be able to see your new domain name in the hosts lists like this, with an happy smiley face icon indicating that your domain name is working: yourdomainname.com www.yourdomainname.com If you do not have www.yourdomainname.com in your hosts lists you can add it from your Add under Hosts / Redirects menu. Note! It may take up a few hours until your domain name is propagated on the Internet, and you are able to ping your domain name after you activate it with No-IP+ service. Part 3. Apache Web Server Setup Apache has been the most popular web server on the Internet since April of 1996. The March 2002 Netcraft Web Server Survey found that 54% of the web sites on the Internet are using Apache, thus making it more widely used than all other web servers combined. Apache is a standard Web Server used on UNIX operating systems, such as Linux, but there is also an Windows version of Apache (instead of using MS IIS), and if you prefer more control over your Web Server, this is the one you for you. First, you will need to download latest binaries available from apache.org website. The current stable release is Apache 2.0.36. http://www.apache.org/dist/httpd/binaries/win32/ There is an MSI Installer Package available as well. This is one well get. It is the file that ends with .msi. Make sure you get .msi.asc file as well, it is a signature file for this installation package. Run .msi file and Apache installation will start automatically and follow instructions on the screen. At the Server Installation page, type your already registered domain name in the first field, Network Domain, same in the second field, Server Name, and your working email address in the third field. This address will be used as webmasters contact email address. Click to enlarge Continue with your installation process untill its completed. When your Apache installation is completed, Apache will start as a system process and show up in your system tray (image 2). Green Play icon indicates that your Web Server is Online and functioning properly, and Red Stop icon indicates that your Web Server is Offline or couldnt start for some reasons. If installation went fine you should se an green play icon. Now, lets test our web server by typing 127.0.0.1 in the browsers URL field. If your Apache server is installed properly and it is online, you should be able to see Apache test page. Congratulations! Your Apache Web Server is configured and working.

Setting up a Windows 2000 VPN connection with a No-IP Host Name by Alain Kumschick

You have a network on the other side of the country. You need to connect to that network. No problem! With VPN (Virtual Private Network) your dream can be true! Configure your server (Windows 2000 Server, Advanced Server) so that other users can access the network via VPN. First of all, make sure you have a fast Internet connection on both computers. You will need it! I tried it myself with a 512kb DSL connection, and it was not possible to work like that. Now I have a 1MB DSL connection, on both ends, and its ok. Create a free account at No-Ip if you still dont have one or take a No-Ip+ like I did. Lets say that your Internet address is http://www.example.no-ip.com Once thats done, go to "Routing and Remote Access". If you cant find it, click on "Start" â > "Run" and type "rrasmgmt.msc". A new window will open. Click "Action" -> "Configure and Enable Routing and Remote Access". Follow the instructions on your screen and DONT forget to select the VPN (Virtual Private Network) option. After this you will need to restart your server even if you dont get the message to restart your server. After the restart, create a new account and dont forget to allow this account to connect to your computer via VPN. Now configure your Windows 2000 Professional Workstation! Click on "Start" -> "Programs" -> "Accessories" -> "Communications" -> "Network and Dial-up Connections". A new window will open. Click on "Make New Connection" Click "Next", than select the 3rd option (Connect to a private network through the Internet) After this step, select the connection that you want to use to connect to the Internet. If you dont have a Dialing up connection you will get this message here: Type your Internet address, in this example we used http://www.example.no-ip.com so type only example.no-ip.com. Click next 2 times and then you are done. Now double click the connection and type your username and password. Then click "Connect". After this go to "Windows Explorer" or "My Network Places" and type in the address bar of your server name (ex.: \\exampleserver) And voila, the job is done. Now you can access a shared folder or printer via "My Network Places". If you need more help to configure VPN go to: http://www.kumschicknw.com/documents/?pg=vpn

Blocked Port 25? .. Mail on a Non-Standard Port by David Jonas

When I first began playing with linux so many years ago I found it fun to send mail from my Windows machine (located on the floor right next to my linux box) to sendmail, which would then have to send it back through my gateway, which was the Windows machine! This was merely amusing and not very useful, but it did teach me much about mail protocols and how dial-up PPP interacts with an ISP. This is how it works: Your email program, Eudora for example, has a setting for an SMTP server. When you send an email message a connection is created to that SMTP server on port 25, the message is transferred and you disconnect. From there, the SMTP server looks up the MX record for the destination host of the email (the part of the email address after the @ sign) and connects to that SMTP server, also on port 25. The mail is transferred to this new server and if this is the destination for the email message, it is delivered to the appropriate user. Now, years away from my neophyte tinkering, I administer multiple mail servers and run one at home. But heres the rub: Cox cable, my home Internet provider, blocks port 25, the default SMTP port (used for incoming and outgoing mail.) This may sound like they are doing something mean, but their intentions are pure. Many home users run misconfigured mail servers (often unknowingly) that transport spam and viruses. When the ISP blocks port 25, these dangerous transports are effectively cut off from the Internet. But what about we informed users who just want some professional facilities at home? What about us?! To the lament of the computing community No-IP.com raised a benevolent ear and came up with Reflector. Reflector effectively bypasses the protective impediment your ISP has created returning liberty to the seekers of knowledge (and those who just want all of their ports.) By configuring your home mail server to use a non-standard port and using reflector, the outside world will be able to deliver mail to your server. With Reflector the mail delivery process changes at the point where the SMTP server looks up the MX record for the destination host of the email. The lookup returns No-IPs mail server. The message is delivered to No-IP and No-IP sends it on to your mail server, but connects on your non-standard port thereby thwarting your ISPs block. Not only that, but Reflector also gives you the added benefit of Backup MX, that is, if your mail server goes down, No-IP spools your mail until your mail server comes back up! Heres how to set up Reflector: Configure your mail server to use a port other than 25. This should be a high numbered port to avoid conflicts with other well-known ports. I prefer port 9925. All decent mail servers can do this, check your documentation. Sign up for No-IPs Reflector. The set up for Reflector is painless and only takes a matter of seconds: Log in to No-IP.com (create an account if you dont have one, its free) and click on Add Mail Service under No-IP Mail on the left. Enter the domain you would like reflected. Choose Mail Reflector on the next page and activate the service. Go to Manage Mail under No-IP Mail (right below Add Mail Service.) You will see your domain listed with type: Reflector and status: Active. Under Action choose Modify Enter the non-standard port number you configured on your mail server. In the mail server text field enter the fully qualified domain name of your mail server (e.g. mail.mydomain.com) or the IP address. No-IP will verify the port, so be sure your mail server is running. If No-IP was able to verify your server, its time to change your MX record. If not, check your mail server and its documentation and try until it verifies. If the domain of your mail server is managed by No-IP, go to the manage hosts section. Choose modify on the domain to which your mail server is configured. This would be whatever comes after the @ in the email address. At the bottom of the page under Mail Options enter mail1.no-ip.com for priority 5 and mail2.no-ip.com for priority 10. If your domain is not managed by No-IP.com, you will have to change your MX record at your registrars or DNS providers site. The settings should be mail1.no-ip.com for priority 5 (i.e. primary) and mail2.no-ip.com for priority 10 (i.e. backup). You are now set up on No-IP.com. The port number changes are immediate, but the changes to the MX record can take up to 5 minutes. Time to test! Test the configuration. From a computer other than your mail server, send an email to an account residing on your mail server. Delivery should only be taking a few minutes depending on your ISPs SMTP server. You should receive the email without complication. In the header of the message you will see the message relayed through a No-IP.com or Vitalwerks.com mail server (for example, "Received: from goodyear.vitalwerks.com [63.210.163.179] by splizzle with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.2600.1); Fri, 9 Aug 2002 14:21:06 -0700".) If you have something like this, congratulations, everything is working! If not, check over each part of your configuration and use nslookup to check the MX record for you domain. Now that you have Reflector set up you can add many things to your home mail server such as IMAP, Mail Backup, Web Mail, or logging. You can even set up accounts for yoru friends! Reflector is also perfect for businesses that use a shared DSL line or cable hook up. Demand full control over your email!

The Newbies Guide to the No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ Linux Client by Scott Harden

Alright, youve just installed linux for the first time and want to prove to all of your friends that you are elite by installing, configuring, and constantly running the no-ip client on your linux machine! Great plan, but oh yeah, you have no idea what to do since all of the documentation you find expects you to know how to work around in the linux console. Sure, you installed RedHat or Mandrake with no sweat (ok, maybe a little), but doing things in a console with commands and compiling things? Dont worry its not as bad as it sounds! Im here to walk ya through it step by step. The first thing we need to do is launch a terminal. A terminal is a method to let you use a console (a place where you can type commands to get things done). Im assuming youre using RedHat or Mandrake or some other easy distribution of linux. Launching a terminal may be different on different machines. If youre using KDE, poke around the system menus until you see something that says "term" or "terminal". If youre at your linux machine and all you see is text (no mouse) and all you can do is type, youre already at a terminal! For my examples Im using a terminal that Ive customized. It will probably look slightly different for you, however if you type the same things it should all work out fine. If something in one of my pictures is highlighted in yellow, that means you are expected to type the highlighted regions. The rest is done automatically. buckle your seatbelts! step 1: launch a terminal by whatever means you can. Once again let me emphasize your terminal will probably look different than mine. Your might just say $ instead or something other than bash-2.05b$, but it really doesnt matter. As long as it has a $ at the end, it should work out fine. If it has a # at the end, youll want to type "exit" until it turns into a $. If you type exit and it logs you out before you see a $, then log back in as a user other than root. step 2: make a noip directory and download the linux client I suggest you make a directory that we can work in for downloading and installing the no-ip linux client. Once youve opened a terminal, it should be in the directory of "/home/yourname/". To see if thats where you are, type pwd and linux will spit out the location of where you are. If youre somewhere other than your home directory, type cd /home/yourname/ and youll be in your home directory. To make a directory for noip to live in, type mkdir noip && cd noip . This will make a directory with the name "noip" and move you into the directory once finished. Next, weve got to download the linux no-ip client. The most current version of the linux client will always be located at http://www.no-ip.com/client/linux/noip-duc-linux.tar.gz To download the file, type wget http://www.no-ip.com/client/linux/noip-duc-linux.tar.gz note: your linux distribution might not have the program wget installed, if this is the case try using fetch (on a bsd system) or even launch your browser and download the file and save it in /home/yourname/noip/ then go back to the console for the next step. step 3: decompress the archive then move into its directory Assuming everythings gone well so far, the downloaded file should be in /home/yourname/noip. The next step is to decompress it. The file ends in .tar.gz, this is called a "tarball". The .tar ending shows that there are multiple files smacked into one. The .gz ending tells you that the .tar file has been compressed. To decompress this file and separate the individual files, use the command tar zvxf file . Replace file with the exact filename of the file you just downloaded. To see the files in this directory (in case you forgot the filename) type ls and a list will be shown. When the file is being extracted, itll list the files and directories that are being created. Once it is finished itll return you to the $, and allow you to type again. Youll want to enter the new directory thats been created. To do this, type cd noip-duc-linux (the directory will be the name of the file, without the .tar.gz ending) step 4: become root Next we need to compile and install the client, to do that we need to login as the user root. Simply type su and you will be prompted for your root password. Once you have entered the correct password and pressed enter, you will notice a little something has changed. Instead of a $ being at the end of the line, the line will end with #. The # is how you know you are logged in as root. note: If you have forgotten your root password, you will be jumped on by twenty-four mexican llamas. step 5: compile and crank up the installer The first thing well do while logged in as root is compile the no-ip client. To do this simply type make while in the no-ip directory (you should be there already). Itll spit out some gibberish and pause for a little while, just let it be. Once it finishes itll drop you off at a # again. This time, type make install. Now youre ready for step six! I got an error message!! what now?!? If you didnt get an error while doing step five, skip this section and go to step six. If you got an error, all it means is your system doesnt have the software it needs to compile applications from their source code. The easiest way to use noip2 without compiling it from its sources is to use the binary file they give you. Type ls binaries to see the files in the binaries folder. There will probably be only one file listed. This is the filename you will use in the next command cp binaries/filename ./noip2 and once thats finished, you can type make install and head over to step six! step 6: configuration Youll notice a few lines of code have appeared and now youre being prompted for your login string. Dont worry its not anything hard =o) Just enter the email address you used when you signed up for the no-ip service. If you have not signed up for the no-ip service, you can do so here. Next youll be prompted for your password. Enter it perfectly, and mind your capitalization! If your password is rejected, run make install again, and try until you can type it correctly. If you think you have forgotten your password, no-ip can have your password mailed to you! Right after your password is verified youll be prompted for an update interval. What the..? Dont panic, Ill explain. The no-ip service works by constantly checking your IP address and sending it to the no-ip server. All youre being asked is "how often (in minutes) do you want us to update your ip?". Thirty should be fine. Type 30 and press enter to complete the installation process! I got an error message "no such file or directory" what can I do?!?!? Do this step ONLY if you got an error message like the one above highlighted in red. This simply means the configuration file needs to live in /usr/local/etc/ to work properly, but there is no /usr/local/etc/ on the system. To correct this, simply (still as root) type mkdir /usr/local/etc and the directory will be created. Run make install again and repeat step 6. step 7: make the noip client run every time the system boots Alright, so weve correctly configured and installed the noip client. Technically we could run it by typing noip2 every time we wanted to update our ip address in no-ips databases. But thats incredibly un-cool. Youll want to make the noip2 program run automatically every time the pc boots, am I right? Luckily this is a breeze to do. Linux looks at the "rc.local" file every time the computer starts and runs all programs in the list. Some might argue there are better ways to have programs start at boot time, but this is by far the easiest and it works just fine. To find the location of the noip2 client, type whereis noip2 and the console will show you where the file is located. Use this information in the next step if it differs from mine. While youre still logged in as root, type echo /usr/local/bin/noip2 >> /etc/rc.local and proceed to step eight. step 8: quietly celebrate, then show all of your friends what you just did Run to the kitchen, grab some goldfish and a big fat coke, plop down at your desk, put sunglasses on, and call all your friends telling them what youve just accomplished! Your linux machine will sync with the central noip database automatically! You are now the noip master! Congrats!

Host multiple Web sites by using IIS and a single IP address by Vildan Hasanbegovic

The information in this tutorial applies to: Microsoft Windows 2000 Server Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server Microsoft Windows 2003 Server Family Microsoft Small Business Server 2000 Important Notice: Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS) 5.x under Windows 2000, Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional does not allow you to host more than one web server. You will have to upgrade to one of the operating systems in the list above to be able to host multiple Web sites with IIS or simply choose other Web Server platform (e.g. Apache). Summary: This tutorial provides step-by-step instructions for hosting multiple Web sites with IIS (Internet Information Server) 5.x or 6.x by using a single IP address and No-IP service. Setting up NO-IP+ Plus accounts Create an No-Ip account, if you havent already done that, login to your account, and click "Add Domain" in the No-Ip Plus menu. Enter the domain name you want to use with No-IP Plus service and follow instructions to complete your setup. Download and install Dynamic DNS update client and configure it for your account allowing it to download your hosts you recently setup with NO-IP+ Plus service. Note: If you have chosen to setup a new domain name, you have to allow DNS services for your domain name up to 24 hours to be propagated on the Internet. Setting up IIS Usually IIS is not installed automatically under MS Windows operating systems, so you will have to install it by going to Windows Control Panel, choosing Add/Remove Programs, then Add/Remove Windows components, and check Internet Information Services (IIS). After installation is completed, go to Windows Control Panel, Administrative Tools and start Internet Services Manager. Click for full size. Setting-Up Web Site(s) 1. Right-click the Server name (root of the tree marked with an asterisk *) choose New, Web Site. 2. Type Description of your first Web site and click next. (e.g. mysite1) 3. In the Ip address field choose "(All Unassigned)". 4. In the port field enter 80 or something else if you are using alternate ports (or if your ISP has blocked port 80). 5. In the Host Header field enter domain name (e.g. mysite1.com) (One of the domain names you have setup earlier with No-Ip+ service) and click next. 6. Click Browse and point to the directory where your Web Site files for the domain name above are located. (e.g. C drive -> sites folder -> mysite1) Make sure that "Allow anonymous access.." box is checked if you want all users to be able to see your website. Click next. 7. For standard browsing preferences leave settings on this page as they are, otherwise configure them after your needs. Click next. 8. Click Finish. Repeat this step for every Website you need to setup. Now, you will be able to see your WebSite(s) name(s) in the server list now. Try opening your browser and type your domain name in the URLs field, (e.g. mysite1.com) If everything is configured as it should be, you will be able to see your website. Congratulations! Now, you can repeat process above to setup as many Websites you want with IIS. Configuring/Troubleshooting Web Site(s) If you cant see your website or see login window (web browser returns message "You are not authorized to view this page") you will have to configure properly access rights for your website or index file (the first file that your users see when they type in your domain name) that you will use with your website. 1. Right-click the Website name in your server list you recently setup and choose Properties from the menu. 2. Click Directory Security tab then click Edit "Anonymous Access.." section. 3. Make sure that Anonymous Access property is checked and click "Edit..." button. 4. See if user account located has right access setup to access information on your computer/website folder. To make sure that you have a problem with access rights, try using/setting Administrators account here. Now, try opening your browser and type your domain name in the URLs field, (e.g. mysite1.com) If you had a problem with access rights, this has been resolved and you will be able to see your website. If you have resolved access-right issue, but you are receiving "Directory Listing Denied" message, you have probably pointed your website to the index file that has not been associated with allowed/registered index file on/for your website. 1. Right-click the Website name in your server list you recently setup and choose Properties from the menu. 2. Click Documents tab. Under Enable Default Document section you will se index files registered with your website. If you are using e.g. myindexfile.htm or myindexfile.html or myindexfile.php as your index file you will have to declare/register it here. 3. Click Add, then type your index file name (e.g. index.php), and press Ok. 4. Press Ok again. Now, try opening your browser and type your domain name in the URLs field, (e.g. mysite1.com). Congratulations! Now, you can repeat process above to properly configure all Website(s) with IIS.

Monitoring your web services with No-IP by Kurt von dem Bussche

Ever have those days when you come into work only to find 500 messages in your inbox. All of which are complaints that the web server is down or something broke during the night. I had that happen a few times and it was never a pleasant experience. But having your site go down due to a hardware or software problem is more than a nuisance. It can be extremely costly if you make your living through your presence on the web. Taking steps to ensure your site stays up is always a good plan, but something can always go wrong. For example, your cable or DSL modem could go out. You could have a power failure or your ISP might have decided that morning that they dont like seeing traffic on the port you are using and block it. What about if your site uses a database backend, if the database fails, your site fails. There are countless other factors and forces of nature out there that can bring your site down. Sure there are hardware solutions, but those are costly. I want something that notifies me within minutes of there being a problem. That way I can fix a problem when it happens and not have to check on it manually. Its this situation that prompted No-IP.com to create its network Monitoring service. Monitoring effectively is a system that runs 24 hours a day 7 days a week, numerous times each hour. It runs from two primary locations in the U.S. on separate networks and has a third backup location should anything go wrong. Monitoring works by checking your web services remotely. If the monitoring service can get to your site, database, ftp server, etc... and verify its working. Monitoring will log its result and continue. Should it get a bad response from your service, or a slow response, Monitoring will then notify you of the problem. What makes Monitoring different is the fact that with the Advanced Monitoring package, you will have optional failover support. Should your service go down you can have all your traffic diverted to another IP address, web site or to a custom web page stored on No-IP.coms servers. When your service comes back up online, Monitoring will undo the failover settings and normal operations will continue. Here is how you can set up monitoring through No-IP.com: Verify the service you want to monitor is working. Whether it is a web server ftp server, POP, IMAP or SMTP server etc... Sign up for No-IPs Monitoringservice. If you already have your DNS with No-IP then you can take full advantage of all the services. If not, you will not be able to use the failover/offline support. The set up for monitoring is very easy and only takes a matter of seconds: Log in to No-IP.com (create an account if you dont have one, its free) and click on "Add Domain" under Monitoring on the left hand side. Pick a Monitoring package. Click on Basic or Advanced for more information and click the radio box on the one you decide on. If you want failover support, the Advanced package is the one you want. Enter the domain you would like to have monitored. If No-IP.com manages your domain, choose it from the list. Otherwise enter it in the space below. Click the "add my domain button" and activate it. Go to back to the site and click on "Add Monitor" under the Monitoring link on the left hand side. Select your domain and click next. For this example I will setup monitoring to monitor my web server that is running on my "WWW" host. So I would select the "WWW" host from the drop down and under Service I would select "Check HTTP" and click next. The next page lists the options for this monitor. To start monitoring immediately I would chose "Yes" to active. If you run your web server on a port other than 80, enter it in the port section. If you signed up for the advanced package, you can enable failover support for this host by clicking yes on "Use Offline Settings". Make sure you set up your offline settings for this host under the "Plus" link on the top left when you are done, if you have not already. The next step on the page is to figure out where you want the alerts sent. I entered my primary email address for the primary. And since my cell phone can receive emails I put that for the secondary. This way, I will get notified on both if Monitoring sees a problem. The last step is to decide when I want to get notifications. You can select different rules in the "Notify on" list. Since I want to know about anything that happens I selected "All Events" for my primary email account. For the phone Im a bit pickier, so I selected "Critical and Recovery". This way I will only get alerts on the cell phone when my site is confirmed down or when it recovers. Click add, and thats it. Your service will be checked the next time the monitoring service runs. You can go view how it is doing under the "View Status" link under Monitoring or under Manage Monitors. Now that you have Monitoring set up, you can add more monitors to keep an eye on other services that you have. This is by far the easiest and most cost effective solution to avoid unnecessary outages and downtime. Plus I will be able to enjoy my nights and weekends and not have to go checking up on my web site.

A Quick Guide to Using Alternate-port SMTP with Exchange by David Jonas & J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide is for Exchange 2003. We dont currently have a guide for Exchange 2007, but a user has submitted the steps he took to get a working configuration. They are at the bottom of this page. Thanks to No-IP.com users Ernie and Francisco Thillet for the info! Setting up Exchange 2003 to use Alternate-port SMTP is a quick and painless process. Basically three (3) items need to be changed in the Default SMTP Virtual Server and then the service must be fully restarted. Lets begin. Open the Properties pane for the Default SMTP Virtual Server using the Exchange Manager Go to the Delivery tab. There are three buttons at the bottom. We will need to make changes in the dialogs presented by each of these buttons. Start with Outbound Security... On the Outbound Security dialog choose Basic Authentication and enter your username and password. This is the username that corresponds to your SMTP service and it looks like this: domain.com@noip-smtp. Be sure there are no extra spaces at the end of your username! The password is the password that you created on the No-IP.com website for Alternate-port SMTP. Choose OK to close this dialog and return to the Delivery tab of the Default SMTP Virtual Server Properties pane. Click the next button, Outbound connections.... On the Outbound Connections dialog change the TCP port to 3325. Choose OK to close this dialog and return to the Delivery tab of the Default SMTP Virtual Server Properties pane. Click the next button, Advanced.... On the Advanced Delivery dialog change the Smart host to smtp-auth.no-ip.com. Choose OK to close this dialog and return to the Delivery tab of the Default SMTP Virtual Server Properties pane. Choose OK to close the properties pane. Configuration is complete! But the service needs to be restarted in order for the changes to take effect. Stop the service and wait a little for it to shutdown completely. Then start it back up. If youre not using a separate SMTP Connector on your Exchange server, youre done! Send a test email and watch your logs to see that it was delivered properly. NOTE: If youre using an SMTP Connector with your Exchange server, youll have to perform the following procedure as well. Open the Properties pane for the SMTP Connector using the Exchange Manager On the General tab, select the Forward all mail through this connector to the following smart hosts radio button and fill in smtp-auth.no-ip.com. Next, go to the Advanced tab Once on the Advanced tab, click on the button marked Outbound Security, select Basic authentication and then click on the button marked Modify In the resulting Outbound Connection Credentials box, enter your username and password. This is the username that corresponds to your SMTP service and it looks like this: domain.com@noip-smtp. Be sure there are no extra spaces at the end of your username! The password is the same password that you created on the No-IP.com website for Alternate-port SMTP. Click on the OK button in the Outbound Connection then again in the Outbound Security and the SMTP Connector dialog boxes. Your configuration is now complete. Exchange 2007 These instructions have not been tested but have been reported to work. Open up EMC (Exchange Management Console) Expand Organization Configuration, click on Hub Transport, then click on the Send Connector tab. Right click and create new connector and give name of the connector, then next. Click Add for Address Space and use the internal address or * for all, then click next. Under Network Settings click on the radio button for Route mail through the following smart host and put smtp-auth.no-ip.com then click next Next is Authentication...click on Basic Authentication and put in user name and password, click next Last find source server then next. Click on New, then finish and restart services. Important: Open a Exchange Management Shell (Start -> Programs -> Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 => "Exchange Management Shell") and type the following to set the port, replacing SENDCONNECTORNAME with the name you gave the send connector in step 3: Set-SendConnector -Identity "SENDCONNECTORNAME" -port 3325

Using Security Camera systems with No-IP by Kurt von dem Bussche

Overview Using home and commercial security cameras over the internet has been growing in popularity. The major problem in doing so is that most locations that you want to monitor via a camera system, will only have a Dynamic IP address instead of a fixed IP address. With No-IP.coms services this problem can be overcome with our DNS Plus service. Typically, when you want to view your camera system over the internet, you enter in the IP address into a browser or into the software client provided by the camera manufacturer. With a dynamic IP address, the IP will constantly be changing and checking your camera system from off site will be impossible. With the No-IP.com plus service we can assign a fully qualified domain name to your dynamic IP address so you will not have to worry about remembering the numeric address. With our software client running somewhere on the network with the cameras, anytime your IP address changes we will know about it. Example Lets say you purchase a No-IP plus account for the domain "mysecuritycamera.net". On our website you can add a hostname called "camera1.mysecuritycamera.net". Then you just have to go to the location where the security camera setup is located. You then install our No-IP.com DUC update client on any machine at that location. You then give the client your login information so it will list the host name "camera1.mysecuritycamera.net". You then just check the box for the "camera1.mysecuritycamera.net" and you are done. Now, whenever you want to access this camera system, you just type in "camera1.mysecuritycamera.net" into your browser or software client that is provided by the camera manufacturer. In the event you have more than one location that you need to monitor, you can just create another host name on our site and install the client at that location as well. On a side note, if you will be using our service to monitor more than one location, we highly recommend you implement the Sub-Account feature that is included with the plus service. You can read about it here So how do I get started? Just follow the 8 steps below to get started. You can create an account for free, if you have questions then please visit our Support ticket system. Create an account Confirm your account Login to your account Add a No-IP Plus domain to your account Add a host to your Domain Making it dynamic Configure your router Run your services Step 1: Create an account To create an account with No-IP.com simply click the "Sign-up Free!" link at the top of the page, or click here. Fill in the required fields on the new account form and click the "Sign Up Now!" button on the top of the page. Step 2: Confirm your account Once you have entered your account information into the new user form, and have submitted it, you will receive an email to the address you provided. You will need to check that account and look for the email from No-IP.com. Inside the email you will see a link to confirm your account, click this link. (Yahoo and Hotmail customers click here) Step 3: Login to your account Now that you have confirmed your account, you can login to No-IP.com. On the top of the page just below the No-IP logo. You will see an area to enter your email address and password. Enter the information that you signed up with, and click "Login". Step 4: Add a No-IP Plus domain to your account You should now be logged into the No-IP.com members section. Here you can add a domain to your account by either going to "Plus Managed DNS" or to "Domain Registration" if you are buying a new domain name. Just follow the activation steps to the checkout area. Step 5: Add a host to your domain After checking out, you can log back into your account and add a host to your newly added domain name. Click on "hosts/redirects" on the left hand side and then click on "add a host". Type in a host name, and select your domain from the drop down menu. Then click "Create Host" at the bottom of the page. Step 6: Making it dynamic Now that you have a host in your account, you will want to install the our Dynamic Update Client at the location that has the Dynamic Address. This is a free download from our downloads tab at the top of the site. After installing the Dynamic Update Client, be sure to configure it with your Email address and password that you used to login to this site. Note: If you are using Sub-Accounts you will want to enter the sub account name with a colon then the email address for the username and the sub-account password. The client will run in the Tray on windows machines. Be sure to open it and click on the options button and check the box "Run on startup". Step 7: Configure your router (optional) If you can already reach your camera system by IP address, then you can skip this step. If this is a new setup you will have to open some ports up on your router. You may wish to contact the Vendor of the camera system to find out what ports need to be opened. Once you find out what ports need to be opened, you will have to consult your routers manual and look for the port forwarding or virtual servers section. Common ports to forward are port 80 for web, port 21 for ftp, and port 25 for mail. Only forward the ports that you need to use. To verify that your router is setup correctly, visit www.canyouseeme.org. Step 8: Run your Camera system With the above configuration in place you can now run your services just like you used to do, but now you can use the host and domain name to access them. You will no longer have to remember the IP address of the machine you are trying to get to. If you run into trouble be sure to check our FAQ and our Tips section for help.

Using Remote Desktop with No-IP by J.P. Kleinhaus

Overview The use of Microsofts Remote Desktop Connection to access another computer over the internet has been growing in popularity. One major obstacle to overcome is that most locations that you want to connect to will only have a Dynamic IP address instead of a Static IP address. With No-IP.coms services this problem can be overcome. Typically, when you want to access your remote computer over the internet, you enter the IP address of that computer into the remote access software. With a Dynamic IP address, the IP will be constantly changing and getting into your remote computer from off site will be impossible. No-IP.com can assign a fully qualified domain name to your Dynamic IP address so you will not have to worry about remembering the numeric address each time. With our software client running somewhere on the same network as the remote computer, anytime your IP address changes we will know about it and be able to direct you to that remote machine regardless of what IP address its currently assigned. Example Lets say you signed up and configured your No-IP account to use one of our free domains. Next, install our No-IP.com DUC (Dynamic Update Client) client on any machine at the location you will want to access. You then give the DUC software your No-IP login information so it will list your available host names and then select the one you want to use for that machine. Now, whenever you want to access this remote computer over the internet, you just type in that host name, i.e., "myhome.myvnc.com" into your remote access client and youll be connected to your remote machine. In the event you have more than one location that you need to access, you can just create another host name on our site and install the client at that location as well. On a side note, if you will be using our service to connect to more than one location, we highly recommend you implement the Sub-Account feature that is included with the Enhanced service and No-IP Plus Managed DNS service. You can read about it here So how do I get started? Just follow the simple steps below to get started. You can create an account for free to try this out; if you have questions then please visit our Support ticket system. Create an account Confirm your account Login to your account Add a No-IP Plus domain to your account Add a host to your Domain Making it dynamic Configure your computer for remote access Configure your router Run your Remote Desktop application Step 1: Create an account To create an account with No-IP.com simply click the "Sign-up Free!" link at the top of the page, or click here. Fill in the required fields on the new account form and click the "Sign Up Now!" button on the top of the page. Step 2: Confirm your account Once you have entered your account information into the new user form, and have submitted it, you will receive an email to the address you provided. You will need to check that account and look for the email from No-IP.com. Inside the email you will see a link to confirm your account, click this link. (Yahoo and Hotmail customers click here) Step 3: Login to your account Now that you have confirmed your account, you can login to No-IP.com. On the top of the page just below the No-IP logo you will see an area to enter your email address and password. Enter the information that you signed up with, and click "Login". Step 4: Add a domain to your accountNote: If youre using our free service, you can skip to step 5 below. You should now be logged into the No-IP.com members section. Here you can add a domain to your account by either going to "Plus Managed DNS" or to "Domain Registration" if you are buying a new domain name. Just follow the activation steps to the checkout area. Step 5: Add a host to your domain After checking out, you can log back into your account and add a host to your newly added domain name. Click on "Hosts/Redirects" on the left hand side and then click on "Add". Type in a host name, and select your domain from the drop down menu. Then click "Create Host" at the bottom of the page. Step 6: Making it dynamic Now that you have a host in your account, you will want to install the our Dynamic Update Client at the location that has the Dynamic Address. This is a free download from our downloads tab at the top of the site. After installing the Dynamic Update Client, be sure to configure it with your Email address and password that you used to login to this site. Note: If you are using Sub-Accounts you will want to enter the sub account name with a colon then the email address for the username and the sub-account password. The client will run in the Tray on windows machines. Be sure to open it and click on the options button and check the box "Run on startup". Step 7: Configure your computer to accept remote connections Click Start, point to Settings, click Control Panel, and then double-click the System icon. On the Remote tab, select the Allow users to connect remotely to this computer check box, as shown in the image below. Ensure that you have the proper permissions to connect to your computer remotely, and click OK. Leave your computer running and connected to the Internet. It should now be ready to accept connections from the outside. Step 8: Configure your router If you can already reach your remote desktop system by IP address, then you can skip this step. Also, if your computer is directly attached to the ISPs cable/DSL modem you can skip this step because you do not have a router. If this is a new setup you will have to open some ports up on your router or firewall. You will need to open port 3389 (tcp) to allow the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) to operate normally. Most router vendors refer to this as "Port Forwarding" or "Virtual Services". You will want to forward port 3389 to the internal IP address of the windows machine you are trying to access. The internal IP address will be something similar to 192.168.x.x. For more information and some guidance on forwarding ports in your router, see our guide: A Primer on Opening and Forwarding Ports on your Router. To verify that your router is setup correctly, visit www.canyouseeme.org and enter in port 3389 into the port area. If the site reports a failure, check your router settings and retry. If you are running a software firewall, personal firewall or anti-virus internet protection you may have to configure it to allow port 3389 traffic. Step 9: Run your Remote Desktop client With the above configuration in place you can now run your remote access services using the host and domain name to access them. You will no longer have to remember the IP address of the machine you are trying to get to. Simply open your remote access client (were using Remote Desktop Connection in this example), fill in your host name and your username and password for your account on the remote computer. Note that any computer systems accessible from the Internet should be configured to use a username/password to authenticate users. Of course remember to replace the Computer, User name and Password fields with your own information. If you run into trouble be sure to check our FAQ and our Tips section for help.

A Primer on Opening and Forwarding Ports on your Router by J.P. Kleinhaus

Most, if not all, internet users use a router to connect their network to their ISPs DSL or cable modem. One of the key ingredients in getting a web server, email server or even a remote desktop connection to function properly is to make sure the inbound traffic destined for that machine actually reaches it. The router by default prevents users on the Internet from accessing PCs connected to your local network. So you want to run a server, but how are people going to get to your server if your router is not allowing people to connect to your PC? Routers have a feature called port forwarding; port forwarding is a mechanism used to take Internet traffic destined for a particular port and then sending it to a computer on your local network. To do so involves opening and forwarding traffic on the proper ports. These ports are determined by the application in question; some common ones include 21 for FTP servers, 25 for SMTP mail, 80 for web servers etc. You will have to determine which ports you need to open based on the needs of your particular software. There are many router manufacturers and each of them make several different models of routers, with new ones coming out almost daily it seems. Since space and time prevent us from showing detailed instructions for every possible router on the market today, this guide will cover some of the more commonly available brands and should give you enough insight to be able to perform the needed steps on similar equipment you may have. Remember too that opening and forwarding ports on a router effectively exposes your internal network to the Internet. You should only open the ports that are needed to get your applications to work and always make sure your computers have all the latest patches and security updates applied in order to minimize the possibility of someone compromising your network. D-Link DI-614+ Linksys BEFSR41 Netgear MR814 Sonicwall TZ-150

Installing and Configuring the Windows Version of the No-IP Dynamic Update Client (DUC) by J.P. Kleinhaus

The No-IP DUC is a small piece of free downloadable software that we provide; it periodically goes out on the internet and determines what your current dynamic IP address is. If a change from the previous address is detected, an update request is sent to our servers and the result is that your computer remains reachable over the internet by using your hostname rather than having to know your IP address. In this article, Im going to go over the installation and basic configuration of the WindowsÃ¯Â¿Â½ DUC so that you can get your No-IP service up and running with your dynamic IP address. A critical component of getting your No-IP dynamic DNS service running is our ability to know what your current IP address is and to receive an update when that address changes. Without knowing what your current IP address is, its impossible for us to translate your hostname (yourname.no-ip.com for example) to your IP address and direct internet traffic to you. This is true regardless of which service youre trying to run; be it an email server, a web server, a security camera system, etc. Without your IP address, internet traffic doesnt know where to go. Step one is to download the software. To do so, go to our WindowsÃ¯Â¿Â½ download page and select one of the download locations and when asked, save the file to your hard drive. Locate the downloaded file on your computer and double-click on it to start the install process. Follow the prompts; make sure to make the right choices for your own system as this guide is only an example of one possible way to customize the install. Choose the installation directory. Click Finish to continue on to the configuration portion of the setup. The No-IP DUC should start up and present you with a window asking for your username and password. Enter the username/password you used when you created your No-IP.com account. If you dont have one then click the link to sign up. This tutorial assumes you have already gone through the the steps necessary to create and confirm an account. After entering your information, the DUC software will retrieve the hosts from your No-IP account. If you havent yet created any hosts, you can elect to do so by clicking on the add/remove hosts link in the lower screen of the DUC and this will take you into your No-IP account on our site. From your list of available hosts, select the ones that you want to be dynamically updated with this locations IP address. You select the hostnames by clicking in the box to the left of the name with your mouse. Once youve selected the hosts, the client will immediately update the IP address of the hosts in our database with your current IP address. You can tell if this was successful if the smiley face next to the hostnames changes from orange to yellow as seen in the images; there will also be text confirming the updates in the lower screen of the client software. There is some customization that can be done to ensure that the client is always running when your system is online. In order to get to those options screens, push the Options button and another window will appear that allows modifying some of the DUC settings. If youre running WindowsÃ¯Â¿Â½ XP/2000/NT and your account has Administrator privileges, you can select the "Run as a system service" option. This is the preferred way to run the client as it will run and update your IP address automatically even if no one logs onto the machine. This is very useful for servers where there might not be anyone that routinely sees the machine; if it restarts for any reason, the No-IP DUC will always be running. Note: When DUC runs as a service, theres no icon in the system tray. Alternatively, you can select the "Run on startup" option. This will only run the DUC when the current use logs onto the machine. It will not restart the client automatically if the machine reboots for any reason and the user isnt there to logon again. This is probably a very bad choice for servers or any machine that will run unattended. The "Run at startup" option will put the No-IP DUC icon in the system tray. While you can run both the service and startup options simultaneously, its not necessary to do so for the software to function properly. If youre experiencing a loss of connectivity to your server due to frequent IP address changes, one option that might be useful is to change the scheduling of updates. By default, the DUC checks for IP address changes every 30 minutes. This is sufficient for 99.9% of our users. Most ISPs that use dynamic addressing only change the address once a day and typically less often. If youre in that rare percentage of users that finds their address changing more often than every 30 minutes, you can modify the DUC to check for IP address changes as often as every five (5) minutes. We dont recommend changing this setting unless you find it necessary as it just creates useless and redundant network traffic if youre not experiencing a problem. In order to modify the timing of updates, click on the Connection tab of the Options window. At the bottom youll see a slider that can be manipulated with your mouse to change the update timing. Again, do this only if necessary to resolve a frequently changing IP address problem. This is the basic setup for the No-IP WindowsÃ¯Â¿Â½ DUC software. Feel free to explore the other options but use caution when changing settings. Its possible to configure the software in a manner that prevents it from working in your installation. Changes should only be made when necessary and only if you fully understand the change that youre making.

Configuring Microsoft Outlook For Use With No-IP POP-3 Service by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide will show how to configure your Outlook email client to work with the No-IP POP-3 email service. Open Outlook and select Email Accounts from the Tools menu Under E-mail, select "Add a new e-mail account" and click Next Select POP3 and click Next Fill in all the required information Test new account settings Click Next to save the new account information Click Finish to close the wizard Step 1: Open Outlook and select Email Accounts from the Tools menu Step 2: Under E-mail, select "Add a new e-mail account" and click Next

Port Forwarding on the Sonicwall TZ-150 Wireless Router by J.P. Kleinhaus

In order to open and forward ports on your Sonicwall TZ-150 Wireless router, simply perform the following steps in order. Logon to your router Go to the Firewall Access Rules menu Start the Rule Wizard Create a new Public Server Rule Select the type of server you want to run Supply the internal IP address of your server Specify the destination interface Apply the new rule Check the rule for accuracy and logout Step 1: Logon to your router Open your web browser and type http://192.168.168.168/ in the address window (http://192.168.168.168 is the default IP of the Sonicwall TZ-150; if youve changed this then use the appropriate address). Enter username "admin" and password "password" (these are the default Sonicwall TZ-150 values). Note: If you have changed the default username and password then use the values you have changed them to. Step 2: In the menu on the left side of the page, look for the Firewall menu and then click on Access Rules. Once youre in the Access Rules section, click on the Rule Wizard button in the upper righthand corner. The wizard is the simplest way to define a new access rule. Step 3: Start the Access Rule Wizard. Push the Next button to commence the process. Step 4: Create a new Public Server rule. Step 5: Select the type of server you want to run. Were using HTTP (web server) for this example. There are numerous pre-defined rules to choose from. If you cant find one that meets your needs, then you can create a new service but that goes beyond the scope of this document. Please refer to your Sonicwall documentation for instructions on creating a new service. Step 6: Supply the internal IP address of your server. You can determine this by running IPCONFIG from a command prompt on a WindowsÃ¯Â¿Â½ box. Step 7: Specify the destination interface. In this case you want to send the traffic to your internal local area network (LAN). Step 8: Apply the new rule. Step 9: Check the finished rule for accuracy and then logout. Youre done! There are a couple of gotchas you should be aware of: Because most routers use NAT (Network Address Translation), you can only open a specific port or ports to one computer at a time. For example: If you have 2 web servers on your network, you cannot open port 80 to both computers. You will need to configure 1 of the web servers to use a different port (8080 for example). Now you can open port 80 to the first computer and then open port 8080 to the other computer. Remember that opening and forwarding ports on a router effectively exposes your internal network to the Internet. You should only open the ports that are needed to get your applications to work and always make sure your computers have all the latest patches and security updates applied in order to minimize the possibility of someone compromising your network.

Port Forwarding on the D-Link DI-614+ Router by J.P. Kleinhaus

In order to open and forward ports on your D-Link DI-614+ router, simply perform the following steps in order. Logon to your router Go to the Virtual Server menu Enable the Virtual Server entry Name your Virtual Server Provide the internal IP address of your computer Select the Protocol Type Fill in the ports required Adjust scheduling if needed Apply the changes Step 1: Logon to your router Open you web browser and type the IP Address of the router in the address window (Default IP Address is 192.168.0.1). Enter username (admin) and your password (blank by default). Note: If you have changed the default password then use the value you have changed it to. Step 2: Click on Advanced on top and then click Virtual Server on the left side. Step 3: Check the Enabled button in order to activate this entry Step 4: Create a distinctive name for your new virtual server entry Step 5: In the Private IP box, enter the IP address of the computer on your local network that you want the incoming service to access. Step 6: Select the correct Protocol Type - either TCP, UDP, or both. If you are not sure, choose both. Step 7: Enter the port information next to Private Port and Public Port. The public port is the port seen from the WAN side, and the private port is the port being used by the application on the computer within your local network. Note: The private and public ports are usually the same. Step 8: Enter the scheduling information. Choose Always unless you want to restrict access by time of day or day of the week. Step 9: Click the green Apply button and then click Continue. There are a couple of gotchas you should be aware of: Because most routers use NAT (Network Address Translation), you can only open a specific port or ports to one computer at a time. For example: If you have 2 web servers on your network, you cannot open port 80 to both computers. You will need to configure 1 of the web servers to use a different port (8080 for example). Now you can open port 80 to the first computer and then open port 8080 to the other computer. If your application needs multiple ports open, you can make multiple entries here or alternately have a look at the Firewall functions. USE CAUTION if you intend to experiment with the Firewall settings. Remember that opening and forwarding ports on a router effectively exposes your internal network to the Internet. You should only open the ports that are needed to get your applications to work and always make sure your computers have all the latest patches and security updates applied in order to minimize the possibility of someone compromising your network.

Port Forwarding on the Linksys BEFSR41 Broadband Router by J.P. Kleinhaus

In order to open and forward ports on your Linksys BEFSR41 router, simply perform the following steps in order. Logon to your router Go to the Advanced menu Name your rule Select the range of ports to forward Select the Protocol Type Specify the internal IP address of the target machine Enable the new rule Apply the changes Step 1: Logon to your router Open you web browser and type the IP Address of the router in the address window (192.168.1.1 is the default IP of Linksys routers). Enter username (blank by default) and your password (admin). Note: If you have changed the default password then use the value you have changed it to. Step 2: Click on the orange Advanced button on top and then click Forwarding. Step 3: Create name for your new forwarding rule Step 4: Select the range of ports you want to forward This information depends on the needs of the services youre making available over the Internet. In this case were demonstrating with the port used by Windows Remote Desktop Connection (3389). Step 5: Select the correct Protocol Type - either TCP, UDP, or both. If you are not sure, choose both. Step 6: Enter the IP address of the target machine on your network that the traffic gets forwarded to. Step 7: Enable the port forwarding rule you just created. Step 8: Click the Apply button to save the rule. There are a couple of gotchas you should be aware of: Because most routers use NAT (Network Address Translation), you can only open a specific port or ports to one computer at a time. For example: If you have 2 web servers on your network, you cannot open port 80 to both computers. You will need to configure 1 of the web servers to use a different port (8080 for example). Now you can open port 80 to the first computer and then open port 8080 to the other computer. If your application needs multiple ports open, you can make multiple entries here or alternately have a look at the DMZ option. USE CAUTION if you intend to experiment with the DMZ option as it will essentially expose all the ports on one computer to inbound Internet traffic. Remember that opening and forwarding ports on a router effectively exposes your internal network to the Internet. You should only open the ports that are needed to get your applications to work and always make sure your computers have all the latest patches and security updates applied in order to minimize the possibility of someone compromising your network.

Port Forwarding on the Netgear MR814 Router by J.P. Kleinhaus

In order to open and forward ports on your Netgear MR814 router, simply perform the following steps in order. Logon to your router Go to Port Forwarding Select the service to forward Specify the internal IP address of the target machine Add the new forwarding rule Check the rule for accuracy Step 1: Logon to your router Open you web browser and type http://192.168.0.1/basicsetting.htm in the address window (http://192.168.0.1 is the default IP of Netgear routers; if youve changed this then use the appropriate address). Enter username "Password" and password "password" (these are the default Netgear MR814 values). Note: If you have changed the default username and password then use the values you have changed them to. Step 2: In the menu on the left side of the page, look for the Advanced menu and then click on Port Forwarding. Step 3: Select the service you want to forward Were using HTTP (web server) in this example. You can choose from the other pre-defined ones available or define your own custom service using the Add Custom Service button to use PC Anywhere or Remote Desktop for example. Step 4: Enter the IP address of the target machine on your network that the traffic gets forwarded to. Step 5: Click the Add button to save the rule. Step 6: Check the finished rule for accuracy and then youre done. There are a couple of gotchas you should be aware of: Because most routers use NAT (Network Address Translation), you can only open a specific port or ports to one computer at a time. For example: If you have 2 web servers on your network, you cannot open port 80 to both computers. You will need to configure 1 of the web servers to use a different port (8080 for example). Now you can open port 80 to the first computer and then open port 8080 to the other computer. Remember that opening and forwarding ports on a router effectively exposes your internal network to the Internet. You should only open the ports that are needed to get your applications to work and always make sure your computers have all the latest patches and security updates applied in order to minimize the possibility of someone compromising your network.

Configuring Microsoft Outlook For Use With No-IP Alternate Port SMTP Service by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide will show how to configure your Outlook email client to work with the No-IP Alternate Port SMTP email service. Open Outlook and select E-mail Accounts from the Tools menu Under E-mail, select "View or change existing e-mail accounts" and click Next Select the email account for which youre setting up Alternate Port SMTP service and click Next Fill in all the required information Customize additional settings Setup up the new port for the SMTP server Click on the OK button to return to the previous window Confirm that the new server settings work properly

How to use No-IP POP3 Email Service with Microsoft Outlook Express by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide will show how to configure your Outlook Express email client to work with the No-IP POP-3 email service. Open Outlook Express and select Accounts from the Tools menu Click the Add button and choose Mail Enter your name as youd like it to appear and click Next Fill in your email address Enter the No-IP POP3 email server information and the SMTP server information from your ISP Fill in your No-IP POP3 email address and password Click Finish to close the wizard Click Close to save your changes and return to Outlook Express Step 1: Open Outlook Express and select Accounts from the Tools menu Step 2: Click the Add button and choose Mail from the available types of accounts

Using Outlook Express with No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ Alternate Port SMTP Service by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide will show how to use your Outlook Express email client in conjunction with the No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ Alternate Port SMTP email service. Open Outlook Express and select Accounts from the Tools menu Select the account for which youre setting up Alternate Port SMTP service and click Properties Fill in all the required information Enable outgoing server authentication Customize authentication settings Setup up the new port for the SMTP server Save your settings Step 1: Open Outlook Express and select Accounts from the Tools menu Step 2: Under the Mail tab, select the account you want to modify and click Properties

Hardware Dynamic DNS Clients and No-IP by J.P. Kleinhaus

Several currently available router/firewall appliances exist that have a No-IP.com compatible Dynamic DNS (DDNS) client built into the devices firmware. Many of the manufacturers of these devices work closely with us to test and certify their systems for use with No-IP. For example Symantec, Sonicwall, D-Link, SMC, and Draytek all have built-in support for DDNS from No-IP. So with all that great support and potential ease of use, why do we recommend the use of our own Dynamic Update Client (DUC) software instead? The software client you can download is always the latest and most up to date version available. Bug fixes and new features wont usually appear in hardware or firmware clients in a timely (if ever) fashion but theyll be on our site in a matter of hours. If youre using our sub-account feature to segregate and password protect groups of hosts or different locations, theres typically no support for that functionality in the hardware clients. The software client has extensive logging capabilities and can be used to troubleshoot problems that might arise. Logging functionality in firmware based clients is limited at best. With the software client you will also know instantly when your update goes through. Configuration of the software client is mostly automated: Provide it with your No-IP username and password and it will download all of the hosts in your account; you can then pick and choose which hosts youd like dynamically updated with a few mouse clicks. You can set the interval at which the client checks for changes to your IP address, you can specify an alternate port if the client cant communicate with our servers on the standard port for some reason, and you can even schedule other events to happen when an IP address update happens. In short, while the router based clients are sometimes the only possible solution (think standalone security camera DVR with no PC at the location for example), for most users our software based client is the better choice.

Using Your Cisco Router with No-IP Dynamic DNS Services by J.P. Kleinhaus

Cisco IOS versions 12.4 and later have the capability to directly update your No-IP hostname using a built-in DDNS client. If you have a Cisco router with the latest firmware, this support is already built into it. We offer these examples below for informational purposes only and recommend that router configuration changes be made by qualified personnel to minimize the risk of losing Internet connectivity or causing other damage to the router. SUMMARY STEPS enable configure terminal ip ddns update method method-name ddns [both] internal name-cache http add url remove url interval maximum days hours minutes seconds exit exit interface interface-type number ip ddns update hostname hostname ip ddns update method method-name exit DETAILED STEPS Command or Action Purpose Step 1 enableExample: Router> enable Enables privileged EXEC mode. Enter your password if prompted. Step 2 configure terminalExample: Router# configure terminal Enters global configuration mode. Step 3 ip ddns update method method-name Example: Router(config)# ip ddns update method myupdate Specifies the update method name. Step 4 ddns [both]Example:Router(DDNS-update-method)# ddns Configures DDNS as the update method and enters update method configuration mode. The both keyword specifies that both A and PTR RRs will be updated. Note You can specify DDNS or HTTP but not both in one step. If you have specified DDNS, you must disable it by using the no ddns command before you can configure HTTP. For the HTTP configuration, see Steps 5, 6, and 7. Step 5 internal name-cacheExample:Router(DDNS-update-method)# internal mycache Specifies that an internal cache will be used as the update method. Step 6 httpExample:Router(DDNS-update-method)# http Configures HTTP as the update method and enters DDNS-HTTP configuration mode. Step 7 add urlExample:Router(DDNS-HTTP)# add http://username:password%40dynupdate.no-ip.com/nic/update%3Fhostname=hostname.yourdomain.com Configures a URL that should be invoked in order to add or change a mapping between a hostname and an IP address. The following example of a URL specifies adding or changing the mapping information using No-IP.com: http://username:password%40dynupdate.no-ip.com/nic/update%3Fhostname=hostname.yourdomain.com. You have to input the URL string noted above. Alternatively, you can use the URL string http://username:password%40dynupdate.no-ip.com/nic/update%3Fhostname=&myip= The special character strings and will be substituted with the hostname to update and the IP address with which that hostname should be associated, respectively. Note: Use the html encoding of %40 for the "@" symbol and %3F for the "?" symbol or IOS will complain. Step 8 remove urlExample:Router(DDNS-HTTP)# add http://username:password%40dynupdate.no-ip.com/nic/update%3Fhostname=hostname.yourdomain.com Configures a URL that should be invoked in order to remove a mapping between a hostname and an IP address. The URL takes the same form as the add keyword in Step 6. Note: Use the html encoding of %40 for the "@" symbol and %3F for the "?" symbol or IOS will complain. Step 9 interval maximum days hours minutes secondsExample:Router(DDNS-HTTP)# interval maximum 1 0 0 0 Configures a maximum update interval. The arguments are as follows: daysRange is from 1 to 365. hoursRange is from 1 to 24. minutesRange is from 1 to 60. secondsRange is from 1 to 60. Step 10 exitExample:Router(DDNS-HTTP)# exit Exits to update-method configuration mode. Step 11 exitExample:Router(DDNS-update-method)# exit Exits to global configuration mode. Step 12 interface interface-type numberExample:Router(config)# interface ether1 Enters interface mode. Step 13 ip ddns update hostname hostnameExample:Router(config-if)# ip ddns update hostname hostname.yourdomain.com Specifies a host to be used for the updates. The update will associate this hostname with the configured IP address of the interface. The hostname argument specifies the hostname that will receive the updates (for example, yourdomain.com). Step 14 ip ddns update method method-nameExample:Router(config-if) ip ddns update myupdate Specifies the name of the update method to use for sending Dynamic DNS updates associated with address changes on this interface. Step 15 exitExample:Router(config)# exit Exits to privileged EXEC mode.

Hosting Multiple Domains with Apache and No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ by J.P. Kleinhaus

Many people would like to host more than one website on their Apache server but think they cant because they only have one IP address. This guide will show you how to use the name-based virtual hosts feature of Apache in conjunction with No-IP Plus Managed DNS service to be able to do just that. This guide is based on the assumption that your web server is already configured to answer to all requests for "yourdomainname.com." We will refer to this as your primary domain name; all other domain names will be referred to as "virtual hosts". If you dont already use Apache as your web server but would like to, you can refer to our existing guide "How to setup an Apache web server, Using your own domain name and No-IP Plus service." Please bear in mind that we are offering these guides for informational purposes only and are not responsible for offering technical support for Apache or any other third party software you may be using. There is documentation that ships with Apache that will more fully explain how to configure and use your software and you should refer to that for additional assistance with these concepts. Apache also has their documentation available online. First, make a copy of your httpd.conf file for security reasons. If your Apache service fails to start with the modified file you can then use your backup to get the server up and running while you look for the error. Open your httpd.conf file in a standard text editor and find Section 3: Virtual Hosts. You should see something like this: NameVirtualHost * Edit this line by adding your servers "primary domain name" instead of the asterisk: NameVirtualHost yourdomainname.com Now, lets add our first virtual host: Lets start by configuring your server to answer requests for "www.yourdomainname.com"; "www" in front of the domain name is also considered to be a virtual host or it can sometimes be referred to as a subdomain. This hostname is not configured automatically by Apache. It is good to comment your changes (the "#" symbol denotes a comment and is ignored by the Apache software), so you can debug problems or remember why you made certain changes at a later date. Add the following code, customized for your own domain and document paths of course, to the httpd.conf file after the NameVirtualHost line: ############# YOURDOMAINNAME.COM ############ # primary domain name ServerAdmin webmaster@yourdomainname.com # webmasters email address DocumentRoot c:\www # root for your www content ServerName yourdomainname.com # your full domain name ServerAlias www.yourdomain.com # the www virtual host ErrorLog c:\www\error_log # error log file TransferLog c:\www\access_log # access log file Before you edit your server file locally, make sure that you have already added these new domain names to your No-IP Plus account. Note that when you register or add a new domain name to your No-IP account, it may take sometime for the new domain name to be propagated to the web (24 to 48 hours is typical). In order to add these additional virtual hosts, simply insert them into your httpd.conf file below the code we created in the first example. ############# SOMEOTHERNAME.COM ############ ServerAdmin webmaster@someothername.com DocumentRoot c:\www\someothername\www ServerName someothername.com ServerAlias www.someothername.com ErrorLog c:\www\someothername\logs\error_log TransferLog c:\www\someothername\logs\access_log To add the third domain name, just continue as illustrated below. ############# THIRDDOMAINNAME.COM ############ ServerAdmin webmaster@thirddomainname.com DocumentRoot c:\www\thirddomainname\www ServerName thirddomainname.com ServerAlias www.thirddomainname.com ErrorLog c:\www\thirddomainname\logs\error_log TransferLog c:\www\thirddomainname\logs\access_log Save your new httpd.conf file and restart Apache. Please make sure that the disk paths to your content are correct. If theyre not it could cause your pages not to be displayed or even prevent the Apache server from starting up normally. If everythings fine, you should be able to access your www content by typing www.yourdomainname.com in your url field. Its always a good idea to save the httpd.conf file often and restart your server to make sure that the new config file is accepted by the server without errors. To add virtual hosts or domain names, just create additional virtual host entries in your httpd.conf file based on the examples above.

Configuring Windows XP Firewall To Allow Inbound Connections by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide will show how to configure the Microsoft Windows Firewall to allow inbound access to your computer from the Internet. Windows XP includes Internet Connection Firewall (ICF) software you can use to restrict what information is communicated between the Internet and your home or small office network. If you dont have Windows XP then this guide will not apply to you. From the Windows control panel, open the Windows Firewall application Make sure the Firewall is set to "On" Click the Exceptions tab Click the Add Port button Add the proper settings for your application Click OK to save your settings Step 1: From the Windows control panel, open the Windows Firewall application. Step 2: Make sure the Firewall is set to "On." If the Firewall is set to "Off," then this article doesnt apply as youre already letting all the outside traffic in without exception.

Configuring Eudora 7 For Use With No-IP™ Alternate Port SMTP Service by David Jonas

Oh Eudora, how you brought the GUI email client to our desktops! But for so long did you languish without an update! Alas, Eudora 7 gives us an easy option to comply with the standards for email submission. The setup is a fairly straightforward process, no eudora.ini file editing! So lets begin. Create your POP account in Eudora as usual. There is no need to enter anything in the SMTP Server field for now. Here is a screenshot of what mine looks like: Next, create another persona for Alternate-port SMTP. To do this, go to the Personalities tab and right-click. Select New.... Choose Skip directly to advanced account setup and click Finish. Configure this persona to look look like mine, except remember to use your own username! This is important! On the Incoming Mail tab enter noip-smtp for the Server: field. Unintuitive, I know, but Eudora wont send your username properly without it! Heres a shot of my configuration: Were nearly done now. From the menu choose Tools -> Options..., then Sending Mail for SMTP Relay Personality choose your newly created No-IP Alt-port SMTP persona. Click OK. Another screenshot of what mine looks like: Now try to send a message with your Dominant persona (or whatever persona youre configuring this for). Youll be prompted for your No-IP Alternate-port SMTP password. It doesnt look like the correct username, but it will leave off everything after the last @ sign. Enter your password and watch Eudora send the message. Here is a screenshot of the Enter Password dialog for me: Yes, I know, No-IP advertises an alternate port of 3325. This is because No-IP wanted to provide a port that was truly alternate, that currently had no other purpose. Port 587 is the mail submission port, and, in the tradition of supporting standards and for your convenience, we also provide it. So use Eudora and promote the legacy!

What is DNS? A Quick DNS Primer by David Jonas

What is DNS? Lets start with the basics, the basis of the system. DNS stands for Domain Name Service. Its like a whitepages directory for the Internet. You supply a name, it supplies a number. The name in this case is specifically a hostname and the number is an IP address. Whats a hostname? ...Okay, then whats a domain name? The term hostname refers to the unique part that identifies a host on the Internet. In www.no-ip.com, www is the hostname. In that same example, no-ip.com is the domain name. The host portion prepended to the domain name is often referred to as the hostname and that is how we use the term here. So, in summary, www is the host, no-ip.com is the domain, and www.no-ip.com is the hostname. Whats an IP Address? An IP address is a unique number that allows computers to locate each other on a network. The Internet is a big network and uses IP addresses to route communication to the proper host. In fact, IP in IP address stands for Internet Protocol. An IP address looks like this: 204.16.252.112. That IP address is for No-IP.coms main website. So wait, how does this work? Remember, DNS looks up hostnames and returns IP addresses. When you type in a hostname, say www.no-ip.com, your computer checks with a DNS server provided by your ISP to find the IP address for that hostname. Your ISP may already know the IP address for www.no-ip.com and it will just reply with it. But if it doesnt, it knows how to find it on the Internet. First, it will ask special servers that it already has IP addresses for for the authority of no-ip.com. These special servers are called the root servers. The root servers know what IP address has the information your ISP is looking for. Then it is just a matter of your ISP requesting the IP address and returning the results to your computer. Here is a analogy. Imagine you live in California and you want to find my phone number in New York. Your phone book couldnt possibly contain all the possible names and numbers that you may want to look up, but it could contain a number to call to do lookups for New York. You consult your phone book and find New Yorks number and call it, asking for my number. New York is a big place. So it breaks down the lookups by county. It knows what county Im in and get the number and returns it to you and no one has to carry around every single name to phone number mapping in the world. And IP addresses can be dynamic? Imagine that once a day at a random time your phone company changed your telephone number. If there was no way to look it up no one would be able to call you! This is what a dynamic IP address effectively is. Its a changing phone number. The number used to find your computer on the Internet can be different each time you log on, or at the discretion of your ISP. Dynamic DNS is like a live phone book that updates itself when your number changes. It knows your number at any given time so that people can connect to you. To make sure the dynamic DNS server has your proper IP address, your computer must run an update client to let the server know when your IP address has changed. A real example, please? Alice has a computer with a dynamic IP address running a webserver. Her friend Bob wants to see her web page. Alice tells Bob that the hostname of her computer is alice.no-ip.com. Bob types into his browser, http://alice.no-ip.com/. His computer contacts his ISP to get the number for alice.no-ip.com. His ISPs DNS server doesnt know that one, so it checks with the root servers. The root servers tells Bobs ISP the IP address of No-IPs nameservers and his ISP looks up alice.no-ip.com there. He receives the number and connects to Alices web page. Now, to be sure Bob got the right number Alice has an update client provided by No-IP running on her computer. This update client informs No-IP.com when her IP address changes so that Bob will get the right number. Alices often changing Internet address, her IP address, can always be found by Bob when he uses alice.no-ip.com as her hostname. To wrap up... This is just the basics of DNS. DNS is a complex system created for reliability, not easy understanding. But once the basics are understood the complexity is easily avoided. If youd like to learn more about the DNS system and how it works, talk a click on over to Wikipedia and do some research. Ill get you started with a few links. Hostnames IP Addresses DNS Dynamic DNS

Using A Toshiba Security Camera systems with No-IP™ by Kurt von dem Bussche

Using a Toshiba Camera systems with No-IP by Kurt von dem Bussche Overview If you are unfamiliar with the advantages of using No-IP™ services to view your security cameras over the internet, we highly suggest you read this guide. If you are lucky enough to own one of the IK style security cameras that is manufactured by Toshiba, you can utilize a much easier method of updating your dynamic IP address. The Toshiba cameras have a built in DDNS client similar to our DUC software client, but instead this client uses a hardware MAC address. So by using the cameras built in client there is no need to have a PC/Mac running at the remote location to update your IP address. How it Works In order to use the built in DDNS client you will need to either have the No-IP™ Enhanced or Plus service. You will first want to log into the admin section of your Toshiba camera with the root user and password. Once logged in go to the Network -> DDNS section. This should bring up a page that looks like the image below. Take note of your cameras MAC address. It is the string of numbers and characters circled in red. We suggest you write this down on a piece of paper for the time being, you will need it in a minute. For DDNS select "ON" and for UserID you will have to enter the login email address for your No-IP™ account. Then enter the corresponding password for your account and in the DDNS server field enter "hardwareupdate.no-ip.com" without the quotes. Be sure to hit "Save" at the bottom and your camera will then reboot. The next step is to go to our home page at www.no-ip.com and log in. After logging into your account, go to "hosts/redirects" and click modify on any host in your account. Look for a link that says "Advanced Records" and click there. At the bottom of that page you will see a link that says "Manage Hardware Devices". After Clicking on this link you will see a page that looks like this. Enter the MAC address that you saw on your camera. Hopefully you wrote it down, Then simply select which host name you would like to be updated by the camera and click "Create". It is as simple as that. The first update should be sent by your camera in about 5 to 10 minutes so be patient. After that, when ever your IP address changes your camera will send the update to us so you will still be able to locate and view the camera.

Remote Control Using VNC and No-IPÃ¢âÂ¢ by J.P. Kleinhaus

This guide works under the assumption that you already have a No-IP account. If you havent already set up an account, please start by reading our Getting Started Guide before continuing with this article. You can create an account for free to try this out; if you have questions then please visit our support pages for more information. Overview With the readily available access to cheap broadband connections these days, more and more people want to put that bandwidth to work to access another computer over the internet. While there are several tools available to do so, one of the more popular offerings is called VNC. A major benefit of VNC is that its available for many platforms and certain versions of it are free for personal use. If youre going to use it commercially, you should make sure to license an appropriate version. One major obstacle to overcome when trying to connect to a remote machine is that most locations that you want to connect to will only have a dynamic IP address instead of a static IP address. Typically, when you want to access your remote computer over the internet, you enter the IP address of that computer into your remote access software (VNC for the purposes of this guide). With a dynamic IP address, the IP will be constantly changing and getting into your remote computer from off site could be next to impossible. No-IPs innovative services can help you overcome this tricky problem. Quick Example Lets say you signed up and configured your No-IP account to use one of our existing domains. Next, you install our No-IP.com DUC (Dynamic Update Client) software on the machine at the location you will want to access. Now you install the VNC Server component on the target machine, and the VNC Viewer on any machine that will be used to connect remotely. The next step is to make sure that your router and any firewalls are set up to allow inbound traffic on ports 5800 and 5900 to the local network (LAN) IP address of the target machine. Now, whenever you want to access the remote computer over the internet, you just type in the host name you created, i.e., "myhome.myvnc.com," into your VNC viewer and youll be connected to your remote machine. In the event you have more than one location that you need to access, you can just create another host name on our site and install the DUC software and a VNC server at that location as well. On a side note, if you will be using our service to connect to more than one location, we highly recommend you implement the Sub-Account feature that is included with the Enhanced service and DNS Plus service. You can read about it here So how do I get started? Just follow these simple steps and youll be on your way. Download the VNC software you wish to use. Install the Server application on the target machine. Configure VNC Server to accept inbound connections. Start the VNC Server. Configure the router and any firewall software to permit inbound connections to the VNC server. Install and configure the VNC viewer on any machine that will be used to initiate the remote connection. Open the VNC viewer and connect to the remote machine using the host or domain name you created in your No-IP account. Step 1: Download the VNC software For this article were using the VNC software available from Real VNC. Real VNC makes the software available free for personal use; please make sure that you properly license your copy if its going to be used in a commercial or business environment. Go to this page to download the free version of the software: http://www.realvnc.com/products/free/4.1/download.html. Fill out the form and follow their instructions in order to get the software from them. Step 2: Install the VNC Server application on the target machine Locate the downloaded executable on your machine and run it. Click Next Click to accept the agreement (if you dont, the installation will fail) and click Next. Choose the location on your hard drive to install the application, then click Next. At this time were only going to install the VNC Server. Click Next. Here you can choose to rename the default folder where the program icons will reside then click Next. Decide whether you want the VNC Server to run as a system service (recommended). Choosing Service Mode will allow the VNC application to restart automatically in the event of a system reboot (intended or not). You should select both options in this window unless you have a compelling reason not to. You can always register and start the service later if youd like, but its easier to do it now. Click Next. Review your choices then click Install to begin the process. Click Next. If youve reached this point without error, youve successfully installed the VNC Server. Click Finish to exit the setup application. Step 3: Configure VNC Server to accept inbound connections. Once youve installed the VNC Server software, you need to configure it for incoming connections. This includes specifying a password to use for connections. This is very important, as youre going to be exposing this machine to connections from the internet and you need to ensure that youve taken adequate precautions to prevent intruders from accessing any information that resides in it. Locate and open the VNC Server application you just installed. If you installed it to the default location, youll find it under Start --> All Programs --> Real VNC --> VNC Server as shown below. Since this is the first time that youre running it, you should open the "Configure VNC Service" program to set up your password. Go to the Authentication tab, select the VNC Password Authentication option, and click Configure. In the box that pops up, type in the password to be used to allow remote access to the machine. Good passwords use a combination of letters (both upper and lower case), numbers, and punctuation, but of course it should be something you can remember when trying to connect. Enter the password, then click OK, then OK again. Step 4: Start the VNC Server. If you set up the VNC Server as a service during the installation, but havent yet rebooted the machine, you may have to perform the following steps. Go to the Real VNC Server folder (Start --> All Programs --> Real VNC --> VNC Server and click on the following: "Register VNC Service" followed by "Start VNC Service." This will prepare the VNC Server to receive connections. Using it in service (as opposed to user mode) mode ensures that in the event of an unattended reboot of the computer, the VNC service will start automatically. When the server is successfully running, you should see the small VNC icon in the system tray. Step 5: Configure the router and any firewall software to permit inbound connections to the VNC server. Router and firewall configurations vary tremendously by user. We cant get into every possible combination of hardware and software within the scope of this article, but you will need to open and forward ports 5800 and 5900 in order to successfully connect to your VNC server. You can check the availability of those ports by going to our page at http://canyouseeme.org/ and testing them with that tool. If you need more information on port forwarding, have a look at therouter port forwarding primer on our site or consult the documentation for your router. Step 6: Install and configure the VNC Viewer on any machine that will be used to initiate the remote connection. The installation of the VNC Viewer is substantially the same as the server installation in Step 2 of this document. Obviously you would choose to install the Viewer instead of (or in addition to) the Server component. Its pretty self explanatory but you can refer to the steps above if need be. Step 7: Open the VNC viewer and connect to the remote machine using the host or domain name you created in your No-IP account. Now youre going to open a connection to your remote machine using the VNC Viewer. Open the Viewer software which should be in Start --> All Programs --> Real VNC --> VNC Viewer A connection box will pop up asking you the name of the server you wish to connect to; input the name of a host you have created in your No-IP account, then click OK. Note: Please remember to use your own hostname, not the example we have provided here ;) Next, a window should pop up asking you for the password. This is the password you explicitly created earlier. Click OK. Congratulations! Provided youve set everything up properly, you should now be presented with the desktop of your remote machine. Depending on how youve configured the remote machine, you may see a standard Windows username and password box. In that case you would input the normal logon information used to access that machine as if you were sitting in front of it.

What is Greylisting? by David Jonas

Greylisting is one of the newest weapons in the arsenal of anti-spam techniques. It relies on the fact that most spam and viruses only try to deliver themselves once. Greylisting temporarily denies the first attempt, telling the spammer to try again (450 Please try again later.) On the next attempt the message is accepted. If a mail server passes this test enough times it is added to a whitelist so that it does not have to pass the greylisting test again. No-IP.com jumps the gun a bit and adds common email servers like eBay and Yahoo! Groups to the whitelist since we already know they are legitimate senders. No-IP.com greylists all mail arriving at mail2.no-ip.com. Under normal circumstances, no properly configured email server should send mail directly to mail2.no-ip.com. So email that mail2.no-ip.com sees is already suspect. But, rather than reject it outright and take the chance of losing legitimate mail, greylisting provides a comfortable in-between that reduces spam and keeps the valid mail flowing! Examples Heres an example. alice@sytes.net sends a message to betty@no-ip.com. Betty is using greylisting. So, on the first attempt to deliver Alices message Bettys mail server denies the message and makes a note of the attempt in a database. Alice is sending through a normal email server which tries again after about four minutes. When Bettys mail server sees this second attempt it checks the database and finds the previous note. Bettys mail server marks the note as validated and accepts the message. Betty receives the message with only a four minute delay. Read on to see what happens when a spammer tries to send to Betty! Heres a second example showing how greylisting protects Betty. Alices computer becomes infected with a virus and finds Bettys address in her Outlook addressbook. The virus reports the address to a big spam gang. Surely Bettys inbox will be overflowing with junk soon! The spammers add Betty to their list and begin the onslaught. The first attempt is made and Bettys mail server temporarily rejects the message just like before. But wait! Spammers arent normal mail servers! They are not going to waste time and resources to try to send Betty the message twice! So Betty is unaffected by the failed spam attempt and her inbox remains spam-free. At worst, the spammer tries again and the message gets through. But Betty just cost that spammer more in time and resources. More information To read more about greylisting take a look at the following links or consult your favorite search engine: Original Greylisting Whitepaper by Evan Harris Greylisting.org - A site dedicated to Greylisting Wikipedia Entry for Greylisting

Synchronizing remote accounts for Backup and Reflector by David Jonas

pre { border: 1px solid #ddd; background: #f5f5f5; margin-left:20px; margin-right:20px; padding:.25em} Backup and Reflector customers should keep a list of valid email recipients updated with No-IP.com, letting No-IP refuse mail to invalid recipients at the SMTP level. This means less processing overhead for your mail server and No-IPs, as well as less spam. And it is a good thing to do for the Internet community at large. No-IP.com has a simple interface for synchronizing your valid recipients. Just POST a comma separated list to the URL below. URL: http://www.no-ip.com/members/mail/remoteaccts-rpc.php Required variables: email - the email address you use to log into No-IP.com. password - the password you use to log into No-IP.com. domain - the domain that the list applies to. action - can be REPLACEALL, APPEND, REMOVE. accounts - a comma separated list of accounts without the domain part. Here is a simple example script using curl: sync-accounts.sh #!/bin/sh EMAIL="user@no-ip.com" PASSWORD="ExamplePassword" DOMAIN="domain.com" tr "\n" , | xargs printf \ "email=${EMAIL}&password=${PASSWORD}&domain=${DOMAIN}&action=REPLACEALL&accounts=%s" \ | curl --data @- https://www.no-ip.com/members/mail/remoteaccts-rpc.php Basically, this script changes the one-item-per-line input list into a comma separated list then passes it to printf to format a URI for curl to POST. Arguments should really be run through a URI encoder, but I wanted this to be as simple as possible. If you have funky characters in your password or addresses, youll need to encode it. Say you have your list of recipients in accounts.txt, one per line, whenever you want to synchronize your valid recipients just run: ./sync-accounts.sh < accounts.txt There are a number of possible results: 200 Update successful 500 Authentication failed 510 Unsupported Action 520 Domain does not exist 521 Invalid domain format 530 Invalid accounts string 590 Systems error. Try again later. Here is a more complete perl example: #!/usr/bin/perl -w use LWP::UserAgent; use strict; my $myemail = user@no-ip.com; my $mypass = ExamplePassword; #my $url = http://www.no-ip.com/members/mail/remoteaccts-rpc.php; my $url = https://www.no-ip.com/members/mail/remoteaccts-rpc.php; die "Usage: $0 domain < accounts.txt" if @ARGV != 1; my $domain = $ARGV[0]; sub urlencode { my $s = shift; $s =~ s/([^A-Za-z0-9\-_.!~*])/sprintf("%%%02X", ord($1))/seg; return $s; } my @accounts = ; chomp @accounts; my $accounts_string = join ,, @accounts; my $ua = LWP::UserAgent->new; my $req = HTTP::Request->new(POST => $url); $req->content_type(application/x-www-form-urlencoded); $req->content( sprintf(email=%s&password=%s&domain=%s&action=REPLACEALL&accounts=%s, urlencode($myemail), urlencode($mypass), urlencode($domain), urlencode($accounts_string) ) ); my $res = $ua->request($req); if($res->is_success) { print $res->content; } else { print $res->status_line, "\n"; } ÃÂ

Configuring Sendmail for use with Alternate-port SMTP by David Jonas

code { display: block; padding: 0.25em; background-color: #f5f5f5; border: 1px solid #eee; } Configuring Sendmail is not easy. In fact, its a pain. So I took some time and waded through the m4 files and the hash maps and came up with some simple steps to getting your Sendmail configuration ready to use with Alternate-port SMTP. First, locate your configuration files. Usually they are in /etc/mail and that is the path we will use in this guide. Create an authinfo file. In your favorite editor open /etc/mail/authinfo and add a line like this, replacing domain.com with your domain and YoUrPaSSw0rd, obviously, with your password. All one line, remember: AuthInfo:smtp-auth.no-ip.com "U:domain.com@noip-smtp" "I:domain.com@noip-smtp" "P:YoUrPaSSw0rd" Save the file and protect it with chmod 600 /etc/mail/authinfo Then map the file as usual with (though typing make in most systems (e.g. Red Hat EL) does this for you): makemap hash /etc/mail/authinfo < /etc/mail/authinfo Next, edit your sendmail.mc file. Add the following lines in a logical place. Usually some of these will be in there, commented out. Just add these near the commented out ones. define(`SMART_HOST,`[smtp-auth.no-ip.com.])dnl define(`RELAY_MAILER_ARGS, `IPC $h 3325)dnl FEATURE(`authinfo, `hash /etc/mail/authinfo.db)dnl define(`confAUTH_OPTIONS, `A,p,y)dnl Now rebuild your config by typing make on most systems or running your usual m4 command. Then restart Sendmail Now try sending a test message via the sendmail command. If you see the words Sent (Ok: queued as ... in your logs you know it worked! If you see stat=Service unavailable you probably have a mistake somewhere. Increase the verbosity of the logging (define(`confLOG_LEVEL, `20)dnl) and look for errors. This configuration was tested with Red Hat EL3 and EL4 running Sendmail 8.12 and 8.13, respectively. Sendmail 8.14 should work as well. There are some differences if you are using Sendmail 8.11, like the format of the authinfo file. Please see your documentation for the changes.

Windows DUC 2.x Help by admin

Requirements: - Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP/Vista - Computer connected to the Internet Installation: You must have an account at No-IP.com to use the updater. Run the self-extracting file duc20setup.exe to unzip and install No-IP DUC. The installation wizard will guide you through the install process. Configuration: Configuration is simple enter the email address and password you use on the No-IP.com website. DUC 2.0 Auto-detects your network environment. It knows if you are connected to the Internet via Router/Firewall. Use the advanced button to override auto detection settings. Advanced Options: Run at Startup - This option creates a shortcut in your Startup folder. When Windows starts up the update client will launch automatically. Run as Service - Windows 2000/NT/XP users can opt for select this option to have the update client run as a service. This way the client will run without having to logon to windows. Override automatic settings - Use this option to override automatic IP detection settings. You can specify an IP address for given interface. This option is mainly for users with multiple network connections. Troubleshooting: How do I force an update? You can force an update by right clicking on the hosts windows and click update now. How can I refresh my host list? If you have made changes to your hosts on the website you can refresh the host lists by right clicking on the hosts window. After Launching the No-IP client nothing happens: Look in the task tray at the bottom right. Double click on the No-IP Icon to make changes to your settings. My problem isnt here what next? Please check out our FAQ for a list of other frequently asked questions related to No-IP. Legend: Update in progress, unknown status Host/group not being updated Server unavailable, will retry automatically DNS for host/group updated successfully DNS for host/group updated successfully Host is a web direct, not DNS entry Host/group not found, host list needs refreshing and/or Invalid IP Account banned and/or host disabled Too many updates today Invalid Username/Password New news to view Update not done due to scheduling

Managing Round Robin DNS with a script by David Jonas

pre { border: 1px solid #ddd; background: #f5f5f5; margin-left:20px; margin-right:20px; padding:.5em; overflow:auto; } If you have a round robin DNS entry and youd like to be able to add and remove IPs via some script-fu, here is a simple API to do it. Be warned though! If you remove or update an IP with this API we wont be able to tell you where it used to point! URL: http://dynupdate.no-ip.com/roundrobin.php Required variables (GET or POST): email: your login email. Subaccounts not supported password: password for the account host: host part of the hostname (send host=- if updating the root of the zone) domain: domain part of the hostname label: label of the round robin entry to be changed ip: IP to be added or updated. Ignored for removal action: can be ADD, UPDATE, REMOVE The url will return 1 line of text. Possible replies are these: 200 Update successful 500 Authentication failed 510 Unsupported Action 520 Invalid host or domain 521 Invalid label 522 Invalid IP Address 530 No action performed; would remove last remaining IP 590 Systems error. Try again later. And here it is in action on the linux commandline using cURL: echo "email=user@example.com&password=SeCrEt&host=rr&domain=example.com&label=SERVER1&ip=10.1.1.1&action=ADD" | \ curl --data @- http://dynupdate.no-ip.com/roundrobin.php Ã¯Â¿Â½

How to configure Dynamic DNS on DD-WRT by David Jonas

If you arent familiar with DD-WRT take a look-- its worth your time. This amazing firmware replacement for literally hundreds of routers such as the Linksys WRT54g or ASUS WL500G enables features only found on very expensive equipement, and even then only sometimes and never all together. One such feature is a Dynamic DNS client that supports No-IP.com. Flashing your router with the DD-WRT firmware can seem quite complicated. To get started read over the DD-WRT Wiki. It sounds daunting, but if you go with supported hardware there really isnt much to it. We cant get into the specifics of flashing your router, but follow the guides online and youll have it up and running in no time. Once you have DD-WRT installed, setting up dynamic DNS with No-IP.com is easy. Follow our Getting Started Guide to create an account and a hostname. When you get to the section, "Configure your router" jump back to this guide. Log into your DD-WRT router, usually by going to http://192.168.1.1/. Click the Setup tab, then the DDNS tab. Choose No-IP.com from the DDNS Service drop-down list. In the fields that appear enter the email address that you use for your No-IP.com username, your password, and the hostnames that you would like updated. Click Apply Settings In the DDNS Status fieldset you will see a log of the updates! Most DD-WRT users have some home router configuration under their belt. But if you are new to it or you just want to learn a couple tricks, keep reading. Were setting up port forwarding next. Port Forwarding on DD-WRT To configure port forwarding I will first outline the steps then give a more detailed explanation with screen shots. Create a DHCP reservation for the computer listening for the ports that will be forwarded on the Services page under DHCP Server. Go to NAT / QoS and the Port Forwarding tab underneath it Click Add, then enter a name for the service, the outside port, the protocol, the internal IP address, and the internal port number. Check Enable. Click Apply Settings That was easy, right? No? Follow along with this example: First we need to create a DHCP reservation. This makes the router assign the same IP address every time a computer connects to it. What well need is the MAC address and the IP we would like to assign. Luckily DD-WRT provides us with this information on the DHCP Clients fieldset. To get there, click Status then LAN. See the MAC address and IP address near the bottom of that page? Copy the MAC address and remember the IP. Well enter that information on the Services page under DHCP Server Static Leases. Go there now. Scroll to the bottom of the long Services page and click Apply Settings Got to the NAT / QoS tab. The Port Forwarding tab below it should be active. Click Add and enter a name for the service that is being forwarded, such as Webserver or Bittorrent. Next, enter the port. For a webserver use port 80. If your ISP blocks port 80 try port 8080 or another easy to remember alternative. Select the protocol. You can leave it as Both, but most services use TCP. Enter the IP address you created the reservation for. You remember it, right? Next enter the port that the connections will be forwarded to. This is often the same number as the "Port from" column, but if you had to pick an alternate webserver port, enter 80 here. Click the checkbox in the "Enable" column, then click Apply Settings. And youre done! You can test your configuration with this handy tool: canyouseeme.org If it doesnt work and you are trying to forward ports for a webserver, try entering the IP address that we created a reservation for in a browser on that network, for example, http://192.168.1.100/. If this brings up the website you are trying to forward ports to, then you likely have a typo in your configuration. Check over each step paying close attention to port numbers and IP addresses. If it does bring up the website you expect make sure the webserver service is started and your firewall is allowing connections.

Setting up No-IP on a WowWee RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ by Kurt von dem Bussche

If you have not heard of the RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ from WowWee corporation you are missing out. The Rovio is a great little toy, gadget, security camera... Well I am not sure how to describe it accurately other than it is neat. Take a look at their product site and check out the Rovio If you have a RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ device at a location where there is no computer to run a Dynamic DNS (DDNS) update client then you are in luck. The Rovio contains its own DDNS update client that accomplishes the similar task as our own Dynamic Update Client. The below screen shot shows just how easy it is to have the RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ update a dynamic host name on the No-IP system. Simply select "No-IP" from the Service Provider drop down. Type your full host name in the Domain field. For example "somehost.no-ip.com" Enter your login email address to No-IP.com in the Username field. Enter the corresponding password in the Password field. Confirm the password and leave the Overwrite IP field un-checked. Be sure to check the Enable box at the top of the page Click the Update button to complete the setup At this point you will have the RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ device updating No-IP with your current IP address. To access your RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ from a remote location you will still need to configure your firewall or Network Router. The RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ is setup by default to listen on Port 80 which is typically blocked by most residential cable and dsl providers. If this is the case you may need to switch the port to a higher number that is not blocked. We typically recommend "8080" or "8000" for a port. More information on setting up your RovioÃ¢âÂ¢ can be found in the documents included with the product as well as at this site: Rovio Support

How to Flush Windows DNS cache by R Pujols

How to Flush Windows DNS cache The following walk through will guide you through clearing your DNS Cache. Every time you venture onto the Internet DNS resolutions are being made and your computer stores many of them. Caching these resolutions can speeds up your web activities because your computer no longer has to ask another computer where something is located. Eventually there will come a time when a bad entry is stored. There are generally two ways to remove these entries. First is to allow 24 hours to past. During such time your computer will seek out and make the necessary DNS updates. Second would be to Flush Your DNS. First Step to Flushing your DNS, is to open your Windows Command prompt WinXP: Start, Run and type cmd and press enter. Vista: Start and type the word Command in the Start Search field. Finally right click the command prompt icon and select the option to Run as Administrator. In the open prompt, type ipconfig /flushdns (without the quotes). You should receive a message of your success as confirmation when the cache is cleared. Flushing the cache removes all the information stored within the cache, forcing the computer to find the new DNS information.

Bridging your DSL Modem by Josh Greenwell

Bridging your DSL Modem DSL and Cable modems can cause quite a headache these days when you are trying to create a port forward on your router. Your DSL provider sells you a specific modem (e.g) Motorola 2210, Westell 6100 but doesnt inform you that if you have a router connected to your dsl modem, you wont be able to access your computer from the internet. If you have been checking and re-checking your port forwarding settings on your router, disabled all your firewalls and virus utilities to only have canyouseeme.org still report that it can not get to you. Then there is a good chance you may need to bridge the gap between your modem and your router. If you look up the make and model of your DSL/Cable modem and find it on portforward.com, there is a good chance that modem is acting like a small firewall/router and is blocking the inbound traffic. Configuring your DSL Modem On most DSL modems, setting bridge mode is relatively simple. On the bottom of the modem is a sticker which usually has the ip address that allows access into the configurable GUI inside the modem. A standard for many of these modems is the 192.168.1.254 address. Placing this into a web browser address bar will send you to the modems GUI page which looks something like this Normally the advanced button isnt selected at first so you may need to click on the button to expand the options below it. WARNING! Changing these settings on your modem may make getting assistance with connectivity level issues difficult with your ISP! Be sure to tell them if youve placed the modem into bridged mode!At this point you would want to find the link listed as PPP Location (or PPP Options/Settings) which would pull up a page like this You now have a few settings that allow you to change the configuration of your modem. The standard setting should be PPP on the modem, this is how your ISP verifies your username and password with the network. For bridged mode you would select Bridged Mode(PPP is not used) This is used for when you have an alternate client that will control the PPP settings of your network (i.e. your router) Configuring your Router This is where is gets a little tricky as now you have to configure your router for PPPoE so that you can place your ISP username and password into the correct fields so that your internet connection works! For the best reference I would suggest consulting your Routers manufacturer as there are many different brands and model of routers that it would be too much to contain here. However, there is a general setting that you would be looking for such as connection type, this would need to be set to PPPoE for most configurations. For example: AT&T DSL uses PPPoE connection configured with your Username@isp.net and a password that you created during a registration process. Setting your router to the PPPoE with your username and password would allow your router to function as the required PPP client that your ISP requires. Congratulations youve just configured Bridge Mode! Once the modem resets, you can go check your service again at canyouseeme.org. If you experience any issues connecting to the internet, you will want to undo this change and contact your Internet Service Provider (ISP).

Setting up Pop3 email on an iPhone by Josh Greenwell

Using your iPhone with your No-IP POP3 service Youve signed up for the POP3 service, but you cant be tied down to your office computer? We can relate! So weve decided to write up a guide that can help all of you iPhone users access your POP3 mail on the go! By now Im sure most iPhone users have played around with most of their settings and probably added a mail account or two, right? If its been a generic account like Gmail then most of the settings were automatically filled in for you, so lets begin with getting your POP3 Mailbox information into your iPhone.Access your Settings button from the iPhone home screen(or wherever you may have placed it) and access the "Mail, Contacts, Calendars" link Most likely youll see any other accounts that you may have created, so go ahead and click "Add Account" Which brings us to the next pageClick Other and then add mail account, then well finally get to do some configuration.Here youll enter in your basic account credentials: Your name, your full email address, and your POP3 password. Once youve gotten that in hit save. Be sure to select the POP setting at the top, commonly IMAP is the default setting for a new account on the iPhone. Now you need to tell your iPhone what server youre going to be operating on. For the Incoming Mail Server information youll want to place: POP3 server: postoffice.no-ip.com Username: username@yourdomain.com Password: your_pop3_passwordNow that youve gotten your Incoming Server configured lets work on the Outgoing Server.For the Outgoing server settings: Outbound server: smtp-auth.no-ip.com Username: username@yourdomain.com Password: your_pop3_passwordALMOST DONE! Now we need to configure the ports for your servers, so lets get back into the Mail Settings and click on our New account. First off lets go to the Outgoing Mail server, click on the SMTP option and click on the Primary server which should be smtp-auth.no-ip.com Heres where youll need to make a few small changes, we need to turn SSL off and use the Port number of 25. Once youve done that you can back out to previous screen for the next step. Now we need to configure the Incoming Mail Port. Click on the advanced button and you should be brought to this screen.The Default should be SSL on with Port 995 but you can also set this to SSL off with port 110 if you wanted to. That should take of everything now! Now back out to your home screen and access your mail application.Whoa, I hope those arent all from people reading the guide...

Advanced Monitoring: How to by Josh Greenwell

Need help monitoring a server? No problem! With our Advanced Monitoring service (coupled with our Plus DNS) you can be sure that your service will be protected. Our service allows you to monitor up to 20* different records to ensure uptime and, in the case of a failure, automatic failover to an option of your choice. You can also configure the service to send out notifications so that youre never out of the loop. With No-IP Advanced Monitoring, you can monitor anything that has a network address. A few examples would be: web server, mail server, FTP server, router, VPN device or file server. How it Works The Advanced Monitoring service performs a check to each of your selected servers once every five minutes from two geographically different servers (with a third on backup). If two of these servers come back that your service is unreachable, the service is placed into offline mode (if selected) and the host is updated to the offline option within 60 seconds. Meanwhile, the monitoring service continues sending a check every 5 minutes to verify that the server is still offline. If the service reports that its back online, your settings will be reverted to the online settings. Getting Started To start, youll need to purchase the service from either the "Monitoring" tab of your account or from services page. Be sure that youve already activated your No-IP Plus service as well as that is required to utilize the failover service. Without it we have no way of performing the change for you! Its now time to start configuring: Click on the "Monitoring" tab Click Configure" next to your domain Nothing there yet, so click add Select the service you want to monitor from the drop-down menu and click next Choose the record that you would like to check Weve now reached the bread and butter of this service. Here you make the specific rules for the monitor to follow. For example, I selected a TCP check as that is seven times out of ten the best route to go with configuring a monitor. In the drop-down menu, youll notice a huge list of available ports to monitor. If you dont see yours, please contact us and well get it added in. Ive selected to check the TCP port of 3389 (common RDP)-- this says that monitoring should send a TCP request to 3389 once every five minutes to verify that the port is accessible or not on my hosts current IP address. By setting the monitor to active and the offline options to yes, the monitoring service will then perform the check and any time the host is unavailable on that port it will switch over to one of my selected offline options. You may have a question like "where do I set my offline options?" In order to set the offline options you must not have the monitor active and modify the host from the "Hosts/Redirects." In the host, youll find a section labeled "Offline Options." Here youll set your preferred option-- be it a new IP, URl, or a configurable offline page. After youve set your offline option, you can come back to the service and activate the monitor. Be sure to select the offline options here as well. You can also configure notification settings regarding the monitor with the ability to specify what events youd like to be notifed on. Click "Create" and youve added your first service to be monitored. Now what can I do? And what do these messages mean? You can check on the status of any monitor in place by going to the "Status" section under the monitoring tab. You can also view the logs of any of your monitors by selecting "Configure" and then "Log." You can filter your log based on status to get an idea of the frequency of your services up/down time. There are three messages that you may see from time to time: OK, which means that everything is online and no errors at this time. Warning, which means that something could be wrong with the service, or it took a longer time than normal to be reached. Critical, there was a failure on the on the service. Hopefully youll always have green! Where do I go for help? You can always call on us. Feel free to give us call during our business hours or submit a support ticket and one of our representatives will be more than happy to assist you. *Need more than 20 records? Submit a Support Ticket requesting a price quote.

Verifying your No-IP domain with Google Apps by Support Staff

Verifying your No-IP domain with Google Apps There are three different methods that Google will use for verification: Domain Verification SPF Record DKIM signing Weve recently added the ability to add your own DKIM records to your account! From the Hosts/Redirects tab select the host youd like to modify and then click on the DKIM link within the Advanced Records section. Follow the instructions given to you by Google and paste in the corresponding values. If you were not given a DKIM record from Google do not panic, most verifications are done by the simple TXT entry that is described below. For the remaining two TXT records, you would need to modify your root domain(yourdomain.com) from the Hosts/Redirects tab of your account. Within the next screen youll find the advanced records section which includes a link for TXT entry labeled as TXT. Google should have provided you with the string required for your verification. If an SPF record was requested it should look something like the following: v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all. This ensures that the Google Apps mail servers are authorized to deliver mail from your domain. Lastly, a domain verification can be made using a unique string(security token) given to you via your Google Apps control panel. This string is usually 68 characters long starting with google-site-verification followed by 43 characters. This again is added via the TXT link on "advanced records". How to check While Google will have its own method of verifying that the task has been completed, you can too by performing a DIG operation on your domain. This can either be done from a terminal window or at sites that have created such tools. The syntax to perform your DIG would be: dig yourdomain.com TXT +short and you should see your entry in the answer section for TXT.

How to Forward Ports on a TP-Link Router by Deven Reza

How to forward a port on your TP-Link router. The pictures on this guide are from model TL-R860 Firmware 3.3.0 Build D51109. The instructions in this guide can be used with other TP-Link routers and firmware, although slight differences may be present. You just got your new camera system or VNC installed and want to use No-IP for an easy host name to remember. You have registered with No-IP, created a hostname, added the IP address and go to use the hostname, but cannot connect or find the server. Everything is setup correctly within No-IP, so why is it not working? Port forwarding is probably the missing link to the process. This guide will explain how to forward ports on a TP-Link router. To login to your router, open up your browser and type in your routers internal IP. The default IP address for TP-Link is 192.168.1.1 You will be prompted for a username and password. If this is your first time logging in to the router, the default username and password is admin. (You should change these upon login to keep your network secure) Once logged in, you will see a screen similar to this: From the left hand navigation, click the following: Forwarding > Virtual Servers > Add new Now you are able to add the port that you wish to open. For some DVRs it is just one port, others require more ports to be open. For example, if you wish to open port 1720. Type 1720 into the Service Port field. Enter in the internal IP that you wish to be open on 1720 (this would be the IP address of your DVR or device). If you are unsure what the internal IP address is, you can go back to the home page and see the default name and internal IP addresses of the devices that are currently connected to your network. Once you know the IP address of the device, enter it into the Ã¢â¬Å IP AddressÃ¢â¬Â field. Now, set Ã¢â¬Å ProtocolsÃ¢â¬Â to Ã¢â¬Å AllÃ¢â¬Â and set Ã¢â¬Å StatusÃ¢â¬Â to Ã¢â¬Å EnabledÃ¢â¬Â. Click the Ã¢â¬Å SaveÃ¢â¬Â button and you have now successfully port forwarded that port! If you have multiple ports to forward repeat the process until completed. Open a browser go to 192.168.1.1 > Login > Forwarding > Virtual Servers > Add new > Service Port (IP you wish to forward) > IP Address (which device you wish to open) > Protocols All > Status Enable. NOTE: If you open port 80 on your router, you will now have to login to the admin settings of the router using the following IP address: http://192.168.1.1:8080