Radio Sites Strangly Silent

[alyork]

Hi.

When we use itunes radio the stream comes in using NAT and seem to work fine.

When we go to sites like jackfm.ca and 1049clearfm.com we get the "Connecting to media..." message and nothing happens.

Was wondering if anyone knows how to fix this problem.

- Al

[rboynton]

Are you using Puresight site filtering or Kaspersky antivirus?

[alyork]

Yes both Puresight and Kaspersky. Neither of them are giving any indication of a problem being detected. Puresite doesn't even have a block music option.

[rboynton]

we have problems with downloading some files but not others. It seems that some files are downloaded in multiple streams and others are not. You may want to try putting these sites in the puresight manual classification "allow" list and see if that helps. What I've also done to troubleshoot things is see if I can download the files I want on my proxy PC.

[alyork]

We have trouble downloading files from some sites as well. iTunes is a good example.

Randomly putting URL's into Puresite is not acceptable in my mind especially when its tough to figure out which site is having problems. And especially when I've got multiple clients converting to Wingate.

We tested using a PC that connects directly to the internet bypassing Wingate and we have no problems. Also we backed out to Winproxy and it worked OK as well.

The issues I see here is lack of reporting on the part of Puresite and Kaspsersky or serious proxy bugs in Wingate.

- Al

[jasona]

actually the itunes issues are more likely to be caused by the cache. To make iTunes work through WinGate's Proxy Server, you will need to disable caching for the iTunes url:

Open the Gatekeeper -> System Tab -> Caching -> What to cache
Select 'Specify which requests will be cached'
Click 'Add Filter'
Click 'Add Criterion'
Select 'This criterion is not met if...'
Select 'HTTP URL'
Select 'contains'
enter 'itunes.com'
Click Ok, then OK.

You may need to delete your current cache to make this policy work. To do so;
Stop the WinGate engine.
Navigate to C:\Program Files\WinGate\
Delete the folder called "cache"
Start the WinGate engine

[logan]

The problem with your audio stream is more likely to be caused by KAV than PureSight. KAV needs to have a file in it's entirety before it can scan it for viruses and decide if the file should be passed to the client or not. This means the client has to wait for KAV to finish downloading and scanning the stream before the client receives any of it, hence the elongated "Connecting to media..." message.

This problem can be easily overcome by enabled drip-feeding in the WWW Proxy. Enable drip-feeding will let WinGate pass the first 75% of the file to the client as it is downloaded. It will then hold the last 25% back to scan the entire file before deciding whether to finish passing data to the client, or to quarantine the download.

- Gatekeeper -> Services -> WWW Proxy Server -> Plug-ins -> Enable "Drip-feed data to client if bigger than XX kB"


Unlike conventional audio video streams where there is a beginning and an end to the stream, radio streams are a bit more difficult. Radio streams have a beginning when you start listening, but they have no end. This means KAV cannot scan the entire stream before passing it on to the client and drip feeding won't work. In this situation, you should add the URL's where the radio streams originate to KAV's overrides.

[alyork]

"This problem can be easily overcome by enabled drip-feeding in the WWW Proxy. Enable drip-feeding will let WinGate pass the first 75% of the file to the client as it is downloaded. It will then hold the last 25% back to scan the entire file before deciding whether to finish passing data to the client, or to quarantine the download.

- Gatekeeper -> Services -> WWW Proxy Server -> Plug-ins -> Enable "Drip-feed data to client if bigger than XX kB""

Good idea except the Plugins Drip-feed panel Apply button stays grayed out and the settings don't seem to stick unless I stop and restart Wingate.

Ok some more testing.

Restarted the radio stream between each change as the stream kept going if I made changes on the fly.

If both Kaspersky and Puresite are disabled in WWW Proxy Server the radio streams in OK.

If I enable just one of either Kaspersky or Clearsite the stream stops. Adding override URLs and drip feeding makes no difference.

Both plugins must be disabled for the radio to work. This seems like a more basic problem than tweaking plugins.

Also tested on 2 different networks with the same results. I feel a bit like I'm beta testing or something. One thing that maybe unique is that both these stations are in Canada and owned by the same Canadian company, Rogers.

Has anyone else tried them yet? jackfm.ca and 1049clearfm.com

- Al

[alyork]

Hmm. Found another URL specific to Rogers buried in one of the log files. I'll test using this to see if it solves the problem.

- Al

[alyork]

Figured it out.

Both Kaspersky and Puresite needed to have this url http://38.99.208.186/ckvx for each station in the overrides. Specifying just the IP number didn't work.

Also, when "Drip-feed data to client if bigger than XX kB" is enabled, the radio stream breaks up every few seconds.

I'd like to say that was fun but it wasn't. I'm finding problem determination in Wingate to be somewhat challenging.

- Al

[logan]

Hopefully the new policy framework in WinGate 2008 will help make problem determination much easier for everyone. It can automatically detect where problems exist and lead you right to them, rather than making you guess the problems like WinGate 6.x.

[alyork]

Hopefully the new policy framework in WinGate 2008 will help make problem determination much easier for everyone. It can automatically detect where problems exist and lead you right to them, rather than making you guess the problems like WinGate 6.x.

Oh nice. When will we be seeing WinGate 2008?

[labull]

Yeah, Logan. When? :)

[logan]

Yeah, Logan. When? :)

Wouldn't you like to know :).

But seriously, I honestly don't know what our release date estimate is right now. I guess it depends on when the beta is started and how well it goes.

[labull]

Well just hurry! The suspense is killing us!