Setting up a Webserver

I'm using a wifi shield / board [black widow] and trying to setup a webserver. Everything seems to work fine within the LAN. I'm able to access it / ping it however, when trying from another computer on the internet[not connected to my lan] it doesn't show anything. Does what i'm looking to achieve require a static IP? or should i modify my router settings?
i tried modifying port 80 on my router to redirect to the local ip address of the wifi shield - yet no change.

the same has been a limitation when tried with the ethernet shield as well?

could someone explain how this flows and suggest some pointers on troubleshooting?

cheers,
Pracas

Ok... for anybody else looking i got this from async labs...

But the general answer to your question is that you need to modify
your router to allow port forwarding to the Arduino on the LAN. If
you don't have a static IP as your WAN address (pretty rare to have
this these days), then you'll also need dynamic DNS setup to point
back to your WAN address.

As a short example, if the Arduino is on your LAN at address 10.10.0.7
and is listening on port 12345, and your WAN address is say
74.125.19.104, then you would setup your router to forward all inbound
traffic on port 12345 to IP address 10.10.0.7. Then on the PC that is
on the internet, you would type in http://74.125.19.104:12345. When
the traffic hits your router, it would then know to forward this
traffic to IP address 10.10.0.7.

Will update after checking this

You need to setup port fowarding on your router to foward incomming traffic on the port you chose to the arduino on your LAN. For external connections without a static IP address, use a fowarding service like no-ip free below to route the client request to your router. I've used this without any issues and it is a very simple setup.

Could you describe what type of router you have?

Could you describe what type of router you have?

Who? I use a Netgear WGR614.

Sorry zoomkat, I meant pracas' router.

Most home ISPs (cox, verizon etc) block port 80 (http), 443 (https) and 25 (smtp email) inbound. They dont want home customers running public webservers from their houses.
I havent used that board but you should be able to set the port. The example above would work 12345, but most people use 8080 or 88 as its easier to remember.
I only mention this because if the board defaults to port 80 and it works in your lan but doesnt work outside it may be the port is blocked at the ISP and doing the port forwarding on your router wont fix that.

Most home ISPs (cox, verizon etc) block port 80 (http), 443 (https) and 25 (smtp email) inbound.

First time I've heard of this, and I know several people (around the globe) who host from a home machine.
Also, if they'd block port 80, even if its inbound only... it'd make browsing the web nearly impossible for regular users.

I'm curious to hear who (with what ISP, and which location) has the issue mentioned.
(mainly since I find port80 an easy one to (ab)use, since a lot can be done with a http stream)

you obviously dont know anything about routing. Your ISP blocking port 80 INBOUND has nothing to do with you browsing websites.

As I said before and can add to the list now.
cox, verizon, comcast, time warner, att, sbc/yahoo

you may want to check these links:

that post came off a bit strong. sorry :wink: no offense meant.

I have to agree with jointtech here. An ISP blocking port 80 inbound would have zero affect on someone surfing the net.

Not to get into a huge discussion but the basics are blocking an inbound request is done all the time. That's all a firewall does too and people surf with them turned on all the time. It's just a bouncer who doesn't let anyone in. When some packets arrive from some random hacker web server the bouncer says "Sorry, private party." and kicks them aside. But when you click a link on the way out the door your packets say "Hey, I'm going to yahoo.com, k? and in a minute some yahoo packets are going to be coming this way. They'll ask for "Tony" Let them in, OK?" And the bouncer says "OK." And now you're surfing the net.

But when you click a link on the way out the door your packets say "Hey, I'm going to yahoo.com, k? and in a minute some yahoo packets are going to be coming this way. They'll ask for "Tony" Let them in, OK?" And the bouncer says "OK." And now you're surfing the net.

I think that's a bit simplistic, but it is a nice analogy.

K.I.S.S. :wink:

I even had one ready in case someone said "Ya, that's the firewall, not the ISP router." involving a gated community and a security guard. :stuck_out_tongue:

I'm in IT and am a contact for Marketing so I have to come up with simple analogies all the time.

Ok guys... i was away whole day yesterday trying to get it to work... so couldn't update... i use a modem ITI DNA A-i provided by the indian state telecom operator BSNL.

I got it working - only thing to note is this modem/router type does not support looping, so if i try to access my ip from within the local network, it doesn't work... and i was trying to fix this all day yesterday :-[

Thankfully i got it working before i messed up the firmware of the router...

is it advisable to make my wifi device dmz?

i dont see any reason for that. if you only forwarded the one port you are using on the arduino to the arduino lan IP theres no need to mess with anything else.

Heres a simple LED On/OFF Video using the Black Widow