Sockets between two remote machines

[frederm2004]

I hope this is simple enough. I have written a very simple little app that runs on a windows 2008 server machine. It simply listens for connections on a specific port. It then accepts any connection to this port and begins processing the data based on the messages. All of this works locally. I.e. when on the same machine using 127.0.0.1.

The problem is that when I test from two remote machines the socket seems to drop (close) on its own. I am not sure if this is a server 2008 config issue or something else. The socket connects to the little app on the server and identifies itself. data is shared between the two connections. But after 10 seconds I do a ping and the socket is closed. (the ping is an internal process of the app, this ping works locally). I need the connection between the two machines to be continuous.

My hunch is this might be a firewall issue but not sure what to look for.

So to summarize - the app, when local, works. Does as expected.
The app when remote, does accept connections, does process the information and does send the initial data back to the client (which is the socket id).
The problem is that i use a time limited Read on the server (10 seconds). when no data is rx in 10 sec I send a ping to the connected PC to see if still alive. It should be. But is not. So it dropped somewhere in that 10 second window.

[frederm2004]

btw: this is vb.net using visual studio 2010. I was just wondering if anyone know of any extra setup on the server side to keep the socket from closing when using the read timeout method.. it appears this method may not be stable and can leave the socket in an unusable state. SO this could be the issue.

[frederm2004]

here is the code:

again:
        ns = sck.GetStream
        ns.ReadTimeout = 5000
        ns.InitializeLifetimeService()
 
        Try
            bytesread = ns.Read(readBuffer, 0, 255) <--- when 5 seconds is up this caused an exception.  But socket ns is also now closed because of this on windows 2008 server.  Not on windows 7 home.
            Console.WriteLine("Bytes Read:" & bytesread)
 
 
            If bytesread > 0 Then
                data = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetString(readBuffer, 0, bytesread)
                message &= data
                Do While message.Contains("$")
                    pos = message.IndexOf("$")
                    If pos > -1 Then
                        cmd = Mid(message, 1, pos)
                        message = Mid(message, pos + 2)
                        If ProcessCommand(sck, cmd) = False Then
                            Console.WriteLine("Process Command returned FALSE on Command:" & cmd)
 
                            'If isPrinterSCK Then PrintSckt = Nothing 'no longer a Printer PC connected
                            sck.Close()
                            totalconns -= 1
                            Console.WriteLine("SOCKET HANDLE: " & sck.Client.Handle.ToInt32.ToString & " Has Disconnected" & "  Total Active Sockets[" & totalconns & "]")
                            Exit Sub 'kill thread
                        End If
 
                    End If
                Loop
            End If
            GoTo again
  Catch ex As Exception
            Dim m As String = ex.Message
 
            'time out occured
            'check ex value here.
            'if timout occured on read on PC Print Client then send PING command to see if connection still open.  If so resume wait.
            ' Console.WriteLine("Exception occured.  PrintSckt Value:" & IsNothing(PrintSckt))
            ' Console.WriteLine("Exception contain TIME:" & m.ToLower.Contains("time"))
 
            If IsNothing(PrintSckt) = False Then
                '    Console.WriteLine("Value of PrintSckt: " & PrintSckt.Client.Handle.ToString & "  sck: " & sck.Client.Handle.ToString)
 
 
                If PrintSckt.Client.Handle = sck.Client.Handle And m.ToLower.Contains("time") Then
                    Console.WriteLine("Socket Connection Status:" & sck.Connected)
                    If SendSckMessage(sck, "PING#$") Then
                        ' Console.WriteLine("Ping sent to Printer Client")
                        GoTo again 'are we the Printer PC Connection?  if so we don't die until we are told to.  no time out here.
                    End If
                Else
                    Console.WriteLine("PING attempt failed to Printer Client")
 
                    If IsNothing(Err) = False Then Console.WriteLine("Unexpexted error[" & Err.Number.ToString & "] :" & Err.GetException.ToString)
                End If
            End If
 
            If IsNothing(ex) = False Then Console.WriteLine("Application error:" & ex.Message)
 
            totalconns -= 1
            Console.WriteLine("SOCKET HANDLE: " & sck.Client.Handle.ToInt32.ToString & " Has Disconnected via Exception" & "  Total Active Sockets[" & totalconns & "]")
        End Try
 
        If PrintSckt.Client.Handle = sck.Client.Handle Then PrintSckt = Nothing : printsckid = ""
        Try
            sck.Close()
        Catch ex As Exception
 
        End Try
 

[frederm2004]

Line #7 of the above code is the timed read that is in question. when it times out an exception is thrown. On line 48 we send a ping to the connected PC. To let it know we are still alive. This is where the error occurs. The routine that runs this states the socket is now closed. When I run this same code on a windows 7 box with both client/server on same machine the error never occurs. My thought now is to get rid of the timed read all together and have the client ping to let the server know it is still there. I have my reasons for doing it this way. It appears that the block read will exception out when a socket closes.