unable to load bbq* files into Stokerlog

Gentlemen, I have saved my 1st pork butt cook profile as a bbq*file, the program default. Now, when I try to open it, I get an error that the program can't open/read the file, but as soon as I acknowledge the "OK" button a new instance of the Stokerlog pops up without any of the file info.. By the way I would like to thank Amir for the awesome program. I ran a cook for 20+ hours from my wireless network connection without a fault.

Also, I'm trying to forward a port for connection outside my network. I have a home server whose port (https: 443) is forwarded without a hitch but I can't seem to set one up for the Stoker no matter what I try. I have a static address and have tried numerous ports as well. I have a Netgear WPN824v2 and use a pair of Netgear XE103G Powerline adapters for a wireless connection to the Stoker.

Any expertise on the wireless would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks guys
Rick

Thanks for the kind words Rick.

Can you expand on what you are doing when openning the file? Are you double clicking on it?

I have done both single and double clicking with the same results.

Thanks

Ok, a bit more . You saved the file. You gave it a name. You see the file listed in a folder. But when you try to open it, you get an error that it can't be openned?

Rick,

I've seen more than one router refuse to forward to the stoker with a static IP. I can't tell you why, but it happens. Try it with an auto IP. Also find if your router will allow a reserved IP address by MAC address.

Ken

Amir, the following is exactly what appears:

Can't open/read file C:\Documents and Settings\Rick\My Documents\Pork Shoulder 12-28-08.bbq

Thanks
Rick



Originally posted by Amir:
Ok, a bit more . You saved the file. You gave it a name. You see the file listed in a folder. But when you try to open it, you get an error that it can't be openned?[/QUOTE]

Ken,

I have address reservation set up for all pieces on my system including the Stoker. I'll keep trying. Thanks for your input. It is likely something simple that is being overlooked.

Also, this problem is for access from outside my network like at work or another internet connected computer. I have it setup on my network and working fine.

Do you use an http or https or something different? If so what port? I'll try it.

Thanks
Rick


I've seen more than one router refuse to forward to the stoker with a static IP. I can't tell you why, but it happens. Try it with an auto IP. Also find if your router will allow a reserved IP address by MAC address.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Rick Schuebel:
Ken,

I have address reservation set up for all pieces on my system including the Stoker. I'll keep trying. Thanks for your input. It is likely something simple that is being overlooked.

Also, this problem is for access from outside my network like at work or another internet connected computer. I have it setup on my network and working fine.

Do you use an http or https or something different? If so what port? I'll try it.

Thanks
Rick


I've seen more than one router refuse to forward to the stoker with a static IP. I can't tell you why, but it happens. Try it with an auto IP. Also find if your router will allow a reserved IP address by MAC address. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Rick,

You still need to set up the stoker for DCHP, that way the router knows exactly what to do. If the stoker is set for static, you need to fix that first.

Make sure you forward your port to 80 for the stoekr to work(ie 8085 - 80), then from the outside world, you type http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:8085 , should work.

You can reset the stoker ip address by entering all 0's the ip address. This will make it use the DHCP to get it's address.

Ken, thanks for the info. I have my router set up as DHCP and the Stoker address set to be accepted. I found out earlier this afternoon, after calling my service provider Time Warner, that they block ports
21 - FTP
22 - SSH
23 - Telnet
25 - SMTP
80 - HTTP
The only one they allow open is 443 - HTTPS
unless, of course, you buy their routers or other networking equipment then they will open up the ports to you.

Go figure. I'll try another angle.

Thanks again
Rick

I am getting the same error.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Rick Schuebel:
Amir, the following is exactly what appears:

Can't open/read file C:\Documents and Settings\Rick\My Documents\Pork Shoulder 12-28-08.bbq

Thanks
Rick



Originally posted by Amir:
Ok, a bit more . You saved the file. You gave it a name. You see the file listed in a folder. But when you try to open it, you get an error that it can't be openned? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>[/QUOTE]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">WPN824v2 </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
The main problem is the router. It will not allow port translation. Some router will allow you acceess to restricted ports by translating ports once they hit your router, thereby bypassing the ISP communist practice of port filtering. I access my stoker from the outside world by like this. http://krown.dyndns.org:8035 , go ahead and try it, I'm cooking pinto's and monitoring a dehydrator full of jerky. Please don't update settings. My router translates port 8035 to port 80 and forwards it to my stoker on ip address 192.168.100.35 .

I use a Netgear Prosafe FVG318, but less expensive models will do the same thing. Make sure it has port translation, and ip address reserve setting as well.

I dont seem to be able to get in... page not found.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by D Casten:
I dont seem to be able to get in... page not found. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I had it turned off for a few minutes, try again.

It's funny you mention www.dyndns.com. It's the first site I went to last night. I'm still putzing with it. Haven't quite got it set up yet. I'll ask you for further assistance if I can't get it right seeing you have the same setup.

Thanks
Rick


The main problem is the router. It will not allow port translation. Some router will allow you acceess to restricted ports by translating ports once they hit your router, thereby bypassing the ISP communist practice of port filtering. I access my stoker from the outside world by like this. http://krown.dyndns.org:8035 , go ahead and try it, I'm cooking pinto's and monitoring a dehydrator full of jerky. Please don't update settings. My router translates port 8035 to port 80 and forwards it to my stoker on ip address 192.168.100.35 .

I use a Netgear Prosafe FVG318, but less expensive models will do the same thing. Make sure it has port translation, and ip address reserve setting as well.[/QUOTE]

Boy, you guys are right. Loading settings seems to be completely broken. Not sure when it happened. I guess most people don't use it!

I will take a look to see if I can fix it quickly.

Technical problems, never mind..

Dito ""

Ken, I envy you. I have been having major issues with getting this thing set up to access from outside my network. I can access it just fine inside my network. I seem to have trouble with getting my ports to open up to the outside world.
All my ports show their status as "stealthed" when I use a port tool. It has to be a setting on my router (Netgear WPN824)that I'm overlooking. I have this week off work and have spent the bulk of it trying to figure this out. Any ideas?

Thanks
Rick

would a VNC work?

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Rick Schuebel:
Ken, I envy you. I have been having major issues with getting this thing set up to access from outside my network. I can access it just fine inside my network. I seem to have trouble with getting my ports to open up to the outside world.
All my ports show their status as "stealthed" when I use a port tool. It has to be a setting on my router (Netgear WPN824)that I'm overlooking. I have this week off work and have spent the bulk of it trying to figure this out. Any ideas?

Thanks
Rick </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Don't feel bad, these things kick everyones butt's including mine sometimes. I'll start off with some things I've found in the past.

#1, I used to think my port 80 was blocked by my ISP, Comcast. In this case, I was wrong, In other cases, not wrong, some Esp's block a lot of port to incoming traffic. In my case, the problem was 2 fold, first when using a static IP on the Stoker, the router would not forward port 80 to it. If I used DHCP (auto configuration), it knew how to do it. Very odd I know, but others have confirmed it. So my first recommendation is to reset your Stoker to auto. (change the first 3 digits to 255 and it will reset.)

If your router will allow, reserve an IP for the Stokers mac address. You can find this easily by pinging the stoker after it has obtained it's new address. Don't ask me how to do this in Vista, haven't tried, but under w2k, xp, it's Start-Run, CMD. This will give you the command prompt. At the prompt type ping 192.168.x.xxx These numbers should represent your stoker IP address. It should return some numbers indication how long it took to respond. If that's OK, type ARP -a , this will return the mac address of recently store IP addresses. Use the mac address shown to reserve an IP for the stoker. If you can't reserve an address, you'll have to check it each time you cook to insure you are working with the correct address.

If your ISP will not allow incoming traffic on port 80, you must use port translation. This translation tells the router that incoming traffic directed to one port should actually be directed to another port. In my case, I translate port 8035 to port 80.

If your ISP is blocking port 80 and your router does not support translation, you're out of luck. It would be nice if you could change the port on the Stoker, but it can't be done.

If you can translate, great, do that and forward both ports, 80 and 8035 in my case, and try it again.

You also need to know what IP address your router is using to connect to the Internet. This can be found user status on your router interface. Because this number changes, I subscribe to dyndns.org and have a free dynamic IP address for my home. Here is how that works, each time your router, it it reports the new IP address to DUNEDIN'S.ORG, who in turn updates it's records. So when I enter in an address of http://krown.dyndns.org:8035 in my INTERNET browser, all the elements kick into place and there is my Stoker. (not turned on now)

In reality, the best way to do this is text messaging anyway. My stoker reports all probes to me every 30 minutes. (you can set to any value, I found 15 minutes overkill, 45 not enough) I use my program for this, StokerTimers, but Amir's does the same thing. Mine has a couple of other benefits that Amir is going to add with his next revision. (reseting cooking temps by time or condition. IE ramps) This is an example of a ramped cook from yesterday. http://www.krownsoft.com/Stoker/20lbTurkey.JPG
His has many more features for monitoring at work, including sending a pic of the graph to your work. PIC don't work on my cell phone. Very Cool.

I hope this helps, BTW, Belkin make a good cheap wireless router that will do 2 of the 3 things you need for $39.00, sold at HomeDepot. It does both port forwarding and port translation, sorry no reserve IP's. I have a Netgear FVG318, may be a little overkill for most people, but I'm kinda anal when it comes to things like that. plus it's my job.