DNS

Just a quick warning, due to a hardware failure primary DNS is down for viewdata.org.uk, irrelevant.com and most of my domains. Secondary should continue serving though for the time being. This will affect ALL services, so if you can't access any of my websites, that's why. I will fix in the morning. I hope.

Edit 8am 2011-09-22. Wake up to find that DNS is still holding out, but my webhost has suspended the account for going over usage on disk space (on an unlimited account, go figure..)

Why it had to happen at the exact same moment, I don't know. Sod's law I guess!!

Edit 3pm 2011-09-22. DNS was back up this morning on temporary hardware. Hosting back online at 12 noon. Everything seems OK now. Thank you for your patience.

TiVo code injection

There may be one or two of you reading this that already know about TiVo. The quickest description for those that don't know about it is to say it's a PVR, like Sky+, but that's like saying Nescafé is good coffee. If you were about ten years ago, when it was last sold in the UK, you might remember the "it pauses live TV" adverts. But that's one of the most least useful features. A TiVo learns about what you watch, finds other things you might like, and remembers things from one year to the next. Most people never knew this, and the likes of Curreys, Comet, etc, seemed to have received little training on what it could do, so didn't try and sell the boxes they had. When Sky brought out Sky+, put all their marketing effort behind it, and all but gave the boxes away, it was the death toll for TiVo in the UK.

Thomson, the only people who licensed the TiVo software in the UK, only produced the one model, back around 2000, and had dropped it by 2002. At £399 for the box, and either a tenner a month subscription, or £200 for a lifetime sub, it was perceived as a little expensive for the feature being advertised!

Roll on to 2011. The old UK TiVo boxes still work, busy recording from Sky, Freeview, Freesat, Cable, or anything you feed into them. TiVo Inc finally strike a deal with Virgin Media to license the TiVo software on their cable boxes. Simultaneously, they announce that the EPG service they have provided for the last decade for the old boxes will cease on 1st June.

Cue much gnashing of teeth from us long-time users.

Long and short of it is that the "community" is going to set up a new server to supply the necessary EPG to the existing boxes out there. The trick will be telling the new boxes how to use it.

For boxes that have been modified with network cards, or for people who are happy pulling and upgrading discs, this is not an issue - upload and run a script, load up a new disc image, all are possible.

For unmodified boxes, where the only connection to the outside world is their daily call via the telephone line, it looked like being a problem. This is the task I took on addressing.

Stage 1 - the telephone call
Currently the TiVo dials an 0800 number to a standard ISP POP, logs in using it's service number, and connects to the TiVo servers on a specified IP address. It's safe to assume that the dial-up number will be withdrawn from service come June 1st.

Changing to another number is relatively easy - you can specify a dial-prefix in the TiVo GUI, and if you put an entire number in there, it will dial all of it. But where to connect to.

By setting up a simple dial-up server, using an obsolete modem rack and terminal server, I can now accept calls from TiVos, and connect them to the internet.

Stage 2 - redirecting to the new server
Once connected to the internet, the TiVo connects to a webserver on a specified IP address in order to check the service status, post it's logs, fetch software and guide updates, etc.

By passing the connection from the dial-up server to the internet through an old Firebrick firewall box, I can spot connections for one particular IP address, and redirect them to another!

This means we can accept calls from unmodified boxes and connect them to the new server, with only a simple change to the telephone number required, that can be done via the standard TV menus and remote control.

Stage 3 - updating the TiVo
One of the points that has been made is that the replacement server is using software that does not implement all the facilities that the original servers provide. This means that the softwre on the TiVo box still needs to be modified in order to use the new server. This looked to be an issue..

However, with full control of the server, it should be possible to send updates to the box. The standard way is to send a "runme" script, which the box will execute before loading the guide data updates, but this needs signing with a private key that only TiVo Inc hold in order to pass the security checks on the box.

My first thought was to brute force a signature for a simple file that could be used as a launcher for other scripts, but that looked like it would take an unreasonably long time.

However, some digging about in the client code and monitoring the transfers to see how the daily call mechanism works revealed a vulnerability that could be used to download and execute a script.

It was much simpler than I expected!

(Full details have been removed since this blog post was first published to prevent abuse outside the areas where service is not provided.)


Stage 4 - updating the TiVo
Now it's up to someone else who knows what changes need to be made!


PS: This is for the UK Tivo running software version 2.5.5 - I have no idea if this works on other versions.

Finally!

Finally, after canablising and repairing motherboards of three dead A5000s I now have a working fileserver again! At last I can get on with the important tasks in life - getting set up to run a viewdata BBS up at the Acorn World show up in Huddersfield next month.

There will be intermittant access to it in the run up period; if anybody wants to re-live the glory days of being online in the 1980s, then watch this space for access details.

(And for those reading this on Facebook, click "view original post" below to get to the actual blog entry..)

Econet and furry batteries.

Firstly, I think I'm going to disable keyboard navigation on Opera, after yet again managing to press something that sent me forward or back a page and lost all I typed when I came back here. Let's try again.

OK, it's been a while since we had an update.

I've replaced my econet network cabling with some of PhilB's brand spanking new econet socket boxes. If you're into econet, then I really must recommend these. They link together with standard Cat5 fly-leads or cable, and have built in terminators where required.

That didn't help with my A5000 econet problems, however. Indeed, shortly afterwards the blasted thing wouldn't power up at all.

I put a plea out on comp.sys.acorn.misc and very soon have three offers of replacement machines. They really must be a nice bunch on there!

But a but of reading up has enlightened me to a standard problem with A5000s - Acorn, in their infinite wisdom, decided to solder Ni-Cad batteries directly onto the motherboard. You would have thought they would have learned their lesson with the exploding battery packs on the Masters. Anyway, after 15+ years, these batteries grow fur, and leak battery acid all over the place, wrecking tracks and burning the legs off chips..

So, with two replacement machines here, plus my original, I have three fury batteries, and none of the machines will work properly. I clean out Maplin of tagged Ni-cads (they don't have anything remotely pin compatible, so I'll have to solder them in on leads.) and rip out the batteries and clean up as best as I can the boards here. One looks like it's had it, with a fair bit of damage. The second required one track repair, and that is now firing up to the desktop. The third, my original machine, looks OK, but still won't power up. I'll have to get back to that.

Next task is, of course, to rebuild a whole machine. I'm going to use the SD-IDE drive I got from Mark at retroclinic, which is already formatted. I just need to work out how to copy disc-to-disc on a machine with only one IDE interface, as it is reluctant to co-exist with another drive.

I may have to set up another fileserver, fire up the A5000 with the hard drive, and copy everything off across the econet, then copy it all back again. Assuming the econet works now .....

Econet ...

More on my econet blues.

I've now got a stable econet running with two Model Bs and two Master 128s. Wahay!

It seems that the network socket boxes I made myself some 25+ years ago were misbehaving. There was no strain relief on the cables, so some of the messing about recently tugged the cables, and introduced a short inside one of them. I guess all the dried out sellotape inside wasn't enough to insulate them any more!

So, one problem down. I've got a working econet between the Beebs. But the lot still goes down as soon as I plug the a5000 into it. Station not listening. Sigh.

Interesingly, with the A5000 powered off, the econet runs fine. If I set *Stations running repeatedly and power up the A5000, I get a valid reply from it, briefly, before it actually starts booting up, but as soon as it does, the econet dies.

I've also tried running netmonitor as I connect the A5000, and it seems that it's throwing all sorts of junk onto the lines. It doesn't look like valid packets, just garbage, enough to crash netmonitor, but it's something to investigate. Since I've now tried multiple econet modules, and the only thing between the module and the econet cabling is L8, I'm going to try bypassing that (the Masters don't have this, so it can't be essential, since they use the same econet modules) and see what happens...

Wish me luck!

Edit: 30th July. I made a little adapter to plug onto the pins on the bottom of the econet module rather than allowing it to mate with the motherboard, bringing out the connections to a DIN, so bypassing L8. Made no difference. Damn.

Econet woes..

I've posted before about my problems getting the old-style Econet back up and running. I'm still having problems.

I'm also limited by the machines I have available to test things out with...

BUT so far, I've got the following working.

• Station 103, a Model B. This one one of the ones I obtained recently. Along with my 6502dvd second processor this is running a Level 2 fileserver.
  
• Station 101, a Model B, pretty vanilla. This is one of my original machines that ran the BBS 20 years ago.
  

Both of these are working fine, talking to each other quite hapilly.

And because I now have a known working pair of machines, I can now determine that...

• at least one of the cables I was using to test things with, doesn't work.
  
• the Master 128, station 40, I was running the fileserver on before will only occasionally see station 103, giving variouslly Net Jammed, Not Listening or Not Present errors.
  
• the A5000 still can't see anything, nor anything it. Since I swapped over the econet modules in this and Station 40, it looks like both may be dead.
  
• ..as might be a loose module I tried, which came loose in a box along with two others, one badly repaired, and a pile of chis... I don't like swaping them about in Stn 40, though, as it's under a replay board that I have to take out first.
  
• a Master 128 from the recent haul behaves exactly the same ...
  

So, I've got two Model Bs working, but nothing later. If I had at least one Master that was working 100%, then I could start swapping modules about to test them.

The only other econet-fitted machines are a Master with no battery pack (well, it DID have one, but it was a bit of a mess, and the keyboard has lots of dead keys anyway..) and a German Model B which has a dead PSU.

Time to drag out the other Masters that don't have econet fitted, see if I can get any of the modules working. After that, it's time to desolder the line drivers..

Sigh...

Rescued beebs!

Thanks to a lovely couple in Marple, I today collected a pile of ex-school equipment! Two Masters and a Model B were the least exciting bits - there were lots of software and manuals and documents about how the school econet had been set up. 5 seperate networks with at least three fileservers! I got two of the fileservers, but unfortunately no bridges.. also included, a pile of slightly rusty floppy drives, some with discs still in them, a Music 97, grafpad, light pens, some experiment boxes, and lots of spare chips ...

Anyway, photos are up on my nice new flikr account here.

Fustration 2

OK. Time for an update.

I connected the A5000, Model B and clock box all up with a known good T-piece and still they cannot talk to each other.

I swapped over the Econet modules in the Master downstairs and the A5000, which still didn't work.

I connected them all back up, using the new run of cable, etc. and fired up Level 2 fileserver on the Master, and the Model B can see it and logion!! Finally a result that tells me something - the Model B works, the Master works, the econet module in it is the one from the A5000, so presumably both of those work. And, the new cable run works! But the A5000 can't see the FS on the Master, and still neither can log into the L4 on the A5000. Drat.

So... it must be something in the A5000 that's causing me problems other than the econet module, which given the buffers on the module blow first if there is a line issue, means it most likely is a software problem.

Of course all this power cycling of the A5000 has thrown up more issues; the poor thing has two elderly hard discs in it, and the second one seems to be dying - I'm getting all sorts of strange transfer errors on power up, even before the "RISC OS / Acorn ADFS" banner appears. One thing after another ...

OK then, let's go solid state: I try to fit an SD-IDE adapter I got off Mark of retroclinic when we were at Byte Back and after some hunting for hform, got it formatting a 2GB SD memory card. But it keeps failing. A quick email to Mark and he reminds me that there's a 512MB limit on RISC OS 3.1 .. argh. I'd forgotten all about that one; used to hit it all the time with DOS machines way back when... (At least it didn't do what one client machine with a caching IDE controller did to me once - let me initialise a 1GB disc, and as we were copying data to it, as we hit the 512MB, looped back to the start of the drive and trashed the partition tables and directory...)

So, rather than limit the format and waste 75% of the 2GB card, I've found some 512MB mini-SD cards on eBay for 99p with free delivery, so ordered one of those. I've disabled the second IDE drive in the A5000 for now, as there wasn't anything on it I need at the moment, and I hope I can copy everything off it when I get the new card. I've got master/slave issues to work out on that yet ...

And then, once the A5000 is all up and running on the new drive, I can try and find out why it's not liking the econet any more..

Fustration

Don't you just hate it when things just will not work.

Some time back, I pondered running econet over 2 spare pairs in a cat5 cable that was already runinng ethernet from the ground floor to the atic.

After much discussion on the mailing list over the merits of running econet without the earth connection, I tried it, and it worked, and all was good. However, the Beeb was not really decorative enough to keep out, so has spent almost all the intervening time in the cupboard!

I finally made enough room in the spare room to get it set up on a desk there, but there was no direct cable from the atic where the filesever is to that room. After much swearing, I did manage to run another cable there, and duly crimped RJ45 sockets on the ends, and transferred the Econet DIN-Cat5 cables over. And it didn't work.

All I get on the Master is "Station 10 not present" drat. It's got a clock though...

So I try..

• Adding a crossover (by re-crimping one end) but that made it worse - didn't even see the clock...
  
• Visually checking all the connections at each end...
  
• Spending half an hour looking for the cat5 tester, then a little longer for a battery, just to confirm that the line is absolutely fine...
  
• Added the earth connections to the DINs, now I have enough wires to use...
  
• Set up a Model B in the attic, which also cannot see the server right next to it..
  
• Tried a new drop lead from the server to the econet sockets..
  
• Disconnected all the new cabling and brought the terminate upstairs, still no joy..
  
• Reset the econet station number on the server and tried another version of !Server..
  
• Power cycled the server several times doing all this..
  

And it still doesn't work..

All I lave left I am able to do is disconnect everything, link the B and the server and the clock together using T pieces and open up the server and re-seat the econet board.. it USED to work...

Sigh...

Copying files between machines...

I'v almost got the BeebEm AUN Emulation working... but I wanted a copy of the Map file from the A5000 on the (windows) laptop. Now I'd previously played with trying to get ftp, samba and nfs servers working, but failed miserable. So how did I do it?

Run BeebEm and log it into the econet fileserver on the A5000, which still has $ as ADFS::IDEDisc4:$.

Created a new SSD file in drive 0, and un-write protected it.

*DIR $.!Boot.Resources.!Internet.Files
*Info AUNMap
(gave me length of file as 6E3 bytes)
*Load AUNMap 1B00
*Disc
*Save AUNMap 1B00+6E3

Ejected the disc, loaded it into DFS Explorer, dragged the file out to my desktop.

Simple ...
:-)

Software or Hardware?

:-)

That's BeebEm talking to my a5000 running L4.

Actually, it's still somewhat unreliable. It works most of the time
in Master 128 mode, with ANFS 4.25, but in Model B with NFS 3.60 it
seems to get stuck.. I think it's a timing issue, I found my
initial problems with it re-sending the scout after I'd ack'd it once
already was cured by waiting a short time before creating the ack.
This may be something similar.

I'm glad to get so far, though - going to be unable to do anything
with it after this weekend for a few days, so it's good to stop on a
high note!

I'll keep playing in any spare moments over the weekend to see if I can get it any
better... and I've yet to check it still talks to itself ...

Rob

BeebEm Comms ...

Just thought I'd show a couple of screenshots..




Yep.. that's logging into CCL4 (viewdata BBS) and some random MUD using CommStar on an emulated Beeb... via telnet ...

Still a little more work to do before it's polished, but so far, it's working...

Rob

Byte Back

Well, I spent much of yesterday in the outskirts of Stoke-0n-Trent at the 2009 Byte Back retro-gaming event.  Due mainly to the efforts of Dave More from Stairway to Hell, and the BBC Micro mailing list, there was a huge Acorn and BBC micro presence. It was my first trip to a show for at least two decades, so I met lots of people I'd only heard of before, and had lots of great chats and saw lots of wonderful bits of kit.  Seeing the Domesday was definitely a highlight. All in all, I had a whale of a time, and I even manged to get my old viewdata bbs back up and running for the first time in 20 years, all on possibly the largest econet still working in the country.   Well, with nine stations and three different types of fileserver...

Oh, and there were lots of video games there too.

I didn't take many pictures, just a few to set the scene those I did are here... Mine is the last photo of a table with the A5000 running Level 4, and a Model B running the Autonomic host software.  (I had more stuff with me, but no room!)

It only took 20 years...

Back in the 1980s, the computer I used pretty much exclusively was the BBC Micro.  I had written a fair bit of software for it, including two products sold commercially, and a number of items I was commissioned to write.  I ran two dial-up bulletin boards and a moderated chatline/forum thing on Prestel. I was a committee member of ClubSpot 810, responsible for the BBS listings, and was employed by Micronet 800 in the Technical Help Department.

Most of what I did at home, including a multi-line viewdata bulletin board, was run from an "Econet" network I had at home.  Using a slightly modified BBC Master ET and a 10MB hard disc. (Yep, ten megabyte... I've got nearly a million times more space on the home LAN now!)  It used to take over 30 floppy discs to back-up, and the external drive unit was almost the size of a Mini-tower PC today!

By the end of 1989 and after two house moves, a new family and a full time job, most of the Beeb stuff was packed up and in boxes.  Over 15 years later, in about 2006, after two further moves, with nostalgia in my mind, some of it got unpacked again.   The hard disc seems to be unwilling to perform any more, but I did still have some backups.  In odd moments over the next year, and with an A5000 obtained from Freecycle running as a filesever, I managed to get a network up and running again between a stack of machines balanced on an overly small desk, and after a few false starts, restored a backup set!  Then we found out we were having a baby, and all time for tinkering stopped.

Three years later, with the addition of an ethernet card in the A5000, and much help from members of the BBC Micro mailing list, I got IP working and the A5000 on the LAN.  Unfortunately I was unable to find any SMB, FTP or NFS server software for the A5000 that would run on the RISC OS 3.1 A5000 , so nothing would actually talk to it.

In steps a RISC PC... It only took three days of snatched minutes here and there to get it to log into the Econet server across the ethernet.. and I finally had a machine that the riscos samba server would work on.  It crashes a LOT, so it's going to be unuseable, so I'm going to have to try another protocol, but at least it's a start: I mapped a drive on one of the PCs, and was able to list the directory!

So, over 20 years since I was last able to properly access this data, it looks like it's going to be available again!

I'm thinking that I'll have to move it all from the A5000 onto the RISC PC, and run the econet fileserver on there, then just use the A5000 as a gateway between the econet and the ethernet -that way I don't need to have both machines on as much - most of the time I'm going to want to be accessing it from a PC.

Once that's all done - next task is to sniff some of the AUN traffic (econet over ethernet) and adjust BeebEm's econet support to use that protocol - it will be rather cool to have an emulated BBC Micro talking to a real one across the networks!

Google Apps as Mailto in Opera

Just a quick note this one.

To make mailto: links work in Opera 9.62 when you use Google Apps for your email, you need to do the following -

In Opera, Tools > Preferences > Advanced > Programs

Double-click the mailto: line

Set as 'Other application'

Porgram is: C:\Progra~1\Opera\opera.exe

Parameters are: https://mail.google.com/a/irrelevant.com/?view=cm&fs=1&to=%t&su=%s&body=%m&cc=%c&bcc=%b&tf=1

Remember to change "irrelevant.com" to your own domain, just as it appears in the URL when browsing mail normally!  Also, your path to opera.exe may be different - some guides suggest just using "opera" on it's own, but this didn't work for me.

Thanks Sky

OK... Seems like my months of correspondance with sky has finally reached somebody who knows what they are talking about. I'll refrain from naming the very helpful chap who phoned me out of the blue yesterday, just in case he gets inundated with support calls, but the upshot is that Sky have given me permission to use a particular work-around for the problem.

Now it doesn't actually fix the bug in their firmware at all, so doesn't really help anybody else who is in the same position, and I'm still waiting to hear about the GPL source code, but at least I can move on and stop worrying about their router upgrading itself to a broken firmware as soon as I reboot it.

Now to move on to getting the OpenWRT box in the middle of the network performing correctly..

Sky BB router woes

OK. Geting closer.

Thanks to a Commnuity Updates firmware version of 1.03.87, I was able to get telnet access to the Sky router in it's new version. A bit of digging shows that, at very least, there has been some changes to the firewall code. Here's the outputs from iptables --list on each version:

Old firmware:

#
# iptables --list
Chain INPUT (policy DROP)
target     prot opt source               destination
DROP       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           state NEW tcp flags:!SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state RELATED,ESTABLISHED
REAIM_IN   all  --  anywhere             anywhere
INPUT_UDP  udp  --  anywhere             anywhere
INPUT_TCP  tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere
DOS        icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request
ACCEPT     icmp --  anywhere             anywhere
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state NEW

Chain FORWARD (policy DROP)
target     prot opt source               destination
HTTP       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80
TCPMSS     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp flags:SYN,RST/SYN TCPMSS clamp to PMTU
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state RELATED,ESTABLISHED
FORWARD_UDP  udp  --  anywhere              anywhere
FORWARD_TCP  tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere
DOS        icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state NEW
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     icmp --  anywhere             anywhere
DROP       icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           state INVALID

Chain ALGS (2 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain BLOCK (0 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           LOG level warning prefix `[BLOCK]'
REJECT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80 reject-with http-block
DROP       all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain CONCHK (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain DOS (6 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
RETURN     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 1/sec burst 4 tcp flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
RETURN     udp  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 1/sec burst 4
RETURN     icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request limit: avg 5/sec burst 60
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 10/sec burst 5 LOG level warning prefix `[DOS] '
DROP       all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain FORWARD_TCP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ALGS       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp spt:6701
ALGS       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp spt:80
DOS        tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           state INVALID,NEW tcp flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
RETURN     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain FORWARD_UDP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
DOS        udp  --  anywhere             anywhere
RETURN     udp  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain HTTP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
CONCHK     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           STRING match GET

Chain INPUT_TCP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             www.routerlogin.comtcp dpt:80
SCAN       all  --  anywhere             anywhere           psd weight-threshold: 21 delay-threshold: 300 lo-ports-weight: 3 hi-

ports-weight: 1
DOS        tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           state INVALID,NEW tcp flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
RETURN     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain INPUT_UDP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
SCAN       all  --  anywhere             anywhere           psd weight-threshold: 21 delay-threshold: 300 lo-ports-weight: 3 hi-

ports-weight: 1
DOS        udp  --  anywhere             anywhere
RETURN     udp  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain REAIM_IN (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpts:1863:1864
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:5566
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:5190
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:4443
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpts:40000:40099

ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:1864
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:5566
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:5190
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:4443
ACCEPT     udp  --  anywhere             anywhere           udp dpts:40000:41000


Chain SCAN (2 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 10/sec burst 5 LOG level warning prefix `[PORT SCAN]'
DROP       all  --  anywhere             anywhere
#

New Firmware

# iptables --list
Chain INPUT (policy DROP)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state RELATED,ESTABLISHED
DOS        tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
DOS        udp  --  anywhere             anywhere
DOS        icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request
PROXY      all  --  anywhere             anywhere
LOCAL_SERVICE  all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain FORWARD (policy DROP)
target     prot opt source               destination
OUT_FILTER  all  --  anywhere             anywhere
CFILTER    all  --  anywhere             anywhere
FW_BASIC   all  --  anywhere             anywhere
IN_FILTER  all  --  anywhere             anywhere
FW_UPNP    all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain BLOCK (0 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           LOG level warning prefix `[BLOCK] '
REJECT     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80 reject-with http-block

Chain CFILTER (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
HTTP       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80 

flags:FIN,SYN,RST,PSH,ACK,URG/PSH,ACK STRING match GET
HTTP       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80 

flags:FIN,SYN,RST,PSH,ACK,URG/PSH,ACK STRING match POST
HTTP       tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp dpt:80 

flags:FIN,SYN,RST,PSH,ACK,URG/PSH,ACK STRING match HEAD

Chain DOS (6 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
RETURN     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
SCAN       all  --  anywhere             anywhere           psd weight-threshold: 21 delay-threshold: 300 lo-

ports-weight: 3 hi-ports-weight: 1
RETURN     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 100/sec burst 100 tcp 

flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
RETURN     udp  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 100/sec burst 100
RETURN     icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request limit: avg 5/sec burst 60
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 10/sec burst 5 LOG level warning prefix `

[DOS] '
DROP       all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain FW_BASIC (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere
TCPMSS     tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp flags:SYN,RST/SYN TCPMSS clamp to 

PMTU
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           state RELATED,ESTABLISHED
DOS        tcp  --  anywhere             anywhere           tcp flags:SYN,RST,ACK/SYN
DOS        udp  --  anywhere             anywhere
DOS        icmp --  anywhere             anywhere           icmp echo-request
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           MARK match 0x2511
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain FW_UPNP (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain HTTP (3 references)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain IN_FILTER (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
RETURN     all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain LOCAL_SERVICE (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
ACCEPT     all  --  anywhere             anywhere           MARK match 0x2511
ACCEPT     tcp  --  anywhere             www.routerlogin.comtcp dpt:80
ACCEPT     icmp --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain OUT_FILTER (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
RETURN     all  --  anywhere             anywhere

Chain PROXY (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain SCAN (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination
LOG        all  --  anywhere             anywhere           limit: avg 10/sec burst 5 LOG level warning prefix `

[PORT SCAN] '
DROP       all  --  anywhere             anywhere

I'm no iptables expert, but maybe someone can help - why does this one not forward packets between the internet and machine on a different subnet behind a gateway on the LAN side??

Sky BB auto updates...

How to disable Sky Broadband's router's auto-upgrade .. at least until the next time you reboot it..

Unplug telephone line.
Restore back to 1.02.28 using the firmware image on the CD.
Use a URL injection hack to enable telnet.
telnet in!
ps -wax
look for "/usr/sbin/provisioning_ap"
kill it!

and for good measure:
nvram set "prov_last_attempt_time=2008-12-31 23:59:59"
nvram set "prov_last_update_time=2008-12-31 23:59:59"

although I yet don't know if this will actually stop it trying again.

Now you can plug the telephone line back in...

More Sky Broadband Mutterings

Here is a list of responses from Sky Technical Support with regard to my contention that there is a bug in the latest v1.3.87 firmware that was not present in the previous version:


Please verify if the Sky Broadband Router has been upgraded with the new version of firmware.

The problem would appear to be the IP address 192.168.0.0 this should be 192.168.0.1 (this was because I was describing the various subnets..)

I have escalated your problem to our fault management team for a solution, they will reply direct to you.No they didn't.

I have today replaced your broadband router which should be with you in 5 days. It was. On the old version. Whch worked fine, until this one upgraded itself too.

Until we know for definite that the same problem has occurred again then I wouldn't like to pin point the cause at this moment in time.

I have looked into this for and I have been advised to ask that you change the subnet on the other system to match with your system that connects.Oh, so I mess up my network to accomodate you? Even if I could. I've got things on seperate subnets for a reason!


We appreciate you pointing out this possible flaw with our new firmware. As you can imagine, this is a flaw that would not affect the majority of our customers, and as such, we were not aware of any possible issues. I have passed the details of this issue to our testing team, who will attempt to replicate the issue you are experiencing, and hopefully, find a resolution to this issue. However, due to the nature of firmware updates, it may be some time before a fix is in place. As a workaround to this issue, you can try connecting another router to your Sky router via an ethernet cable, and then make all the necessary adjustment to the second router. In theory, the Sky router would be used simply as a modem, and the second router would manage all your firewall rules. Ah, someone who appears as if they know what they are talking about. Unfortunately I can't just use the sky router "as a modem"..

So I asked for the source, which they have to supply under the GPL:
The source code for the firmware you are asking for cannot be given out over the telephone or in an email. However I am including the address you can write to regarding this matter.

Sky Broadband will only work with the Sky Broadband Box that we provided to you. We have launched our service in this way so that we can provide the best technical support should you have any problems.ROFLMAO


I apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused and any misunderstanding.
I have read all your comments that you have made and I like to address all areas of your queries:
1. Q. Your query relate to a daisy chain network.
1. A. As your queries relate to specialised area of expertise, Sky Broadband will only work with the Sky Broadband Box that we provided to you. We have launched our service in this way so that we can provide the best technical support should you have any problems.
2. Q. The upgrade of the firmware software version V1.02.28 to the current version 1.03.87.
2. A. In a situation where this sort of automation helps to maintain consistency, the application of security patches commonly occurs in this manner. This is part of the update to fix problems with a computer program or its supporting data; this also includes fixing bugs, replacing graphics and improving the usability or performance.
3. Q. (You’re aware, of course, that you have to publish the source for anything produced using existing GPL code.)
3. A. Our Programmers publish and apply patches in various forms. Because proprietary software authors withhold their source code, their patches are distributed as binary executables instead of source. This type of patch modifies the program executable the program the user actually runs either by modifying the binary file to include the fixes or by completely replacing it. Proprietary software has restrictions on use or private modification or with restrictions judged to be excessive on copying or publishing of modified or unmodified versions. These restrictions are enforced by either legal or technical means.
4. Q. I think this categorically proves now that there is a bug in the new firmware you are auto-upgrading. I know that this will not affect the majority of your users, however it is still a fault and it is affecting us.
4. A. As part of your terms and conditions of signing up to Sky broadband, you agreed to use our hardware that we supplied. For information on Sky Broadband Terms and Conditions please visit our website on the following link:
http://www.sky.com/portal/site/skycom/security
In full we do not allow open discussion on this area in any department with in the company and we are unable to furnish you with the information you require as explained above, we have now closed this case.

Did any of those Answers match the Questions? Did any of that make any sense at all? Either way, they seem not to want to talk to me any more. Strange that I've never heard from either of the other teams that my query was supposedly forwarded to.

Oh, and netgear don't want to provide the GPL sources instead; they say Ask Sky..

Spam...

Grr....

Almost 3,600 emails over the last 23 hours, the majority being delivery failure messages. Some a**h**e spammer is spoofing one of my email addresses as the 'from' address on their crap.

It's not the first time, but what makes it worse this time is it's a (normally) little used email address that gets forwarded to my main google mail account by virtue of 'getmail' running on a machine here. So every mail is fetched in full and resent out to google. So using up a considerable amount of my bandwidth.

Thank goodness I'm on an "unlimited" package, though how anybody is going to react to seeing thousands of emails eminating from my connection (even if they are all to myself) I do not know.

My SPAM folder, emptied automatically after 30 days, currently has 18,137 unread emails in it. Ouch.