Re: Port Weirdness

billy@west.co.za ("Billy Wheeler") wrote: :On 18 Mar 97 at 21:04, Blake Buzzini wrote: : :> I'm running Informix Workgroup Server 7.12 on NT4. I'd like to disable :> all tcp/ip ports except the ones actually in use as a security :> precaution. Trouble is, I'm not sure what ports the WGS uses! I've :> tried enabling both 1525 and 1529, but the darn thing *still* doesn't :> work! Does anyone have a definitive list of ALL'the ports used by WGS7? Do read at the end of this post of the dangers of this, and that you may not gain any security at all. :I'm swinging in the dark here (as we all know how much *I* love NT), :but have you tried 1526? I seem to recall that this is the default :port under NT... A little more swinging: 1. Any port can be used depending on your setup. 2. The sqlhosts "file" is no longer a file, but entries in the registry. On my NT 3.51 where I have OnLine 7.12.x installed I find some information here as follows: a. Start the registry editor (on C:\\WINNT35\\system32\\REGEDT32.EXE on my machine). b. Find the window saying HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE on Local Machine. c. Under SOFTWARE you should find INFORMIX. Then SQLHOSTS. Under this you should find entries for your for ??? something which I forgot what it is - some connection or whatever. Under each of this you will find an actual entry (in the right pane of the window) for SERVICE: saying REG_SZ: servicename Now you have found the service name used. Now is the time to find the corresponding service number. I couldn't find any such in the registry. There is however a SERVICES file on my machine under C:\\WINNT35\\system32\\drivers\\etc This does contain entries for the servicenames found above. I can't remember if I put them in there. May be the Informix people have magically started to understand things and they put it in. Anyway here I find a port number. Whether this is the right one or not I have no clue, nor have I tried to test it. It may be a starting place. There are also different TCP/IP entries in the registry under the same HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE window under: \\SYSTEM\\ControlSetXXX\\Services\\Tcpip Under this I can find a reference to the above directory where the SERVICES file is, so may be this is what NT does to find it. Why there are more ControlSetXXX entries I don't know. (I don't even know why they are there at all.) I still remember I said NT was to a large part easy to administer :-) First you don't usually go into the registry manually. All well written programs set it up correctly for you. Although non well written programs should normally be scrapped you do sometimes have to work with them, and may have to look at the registry for this or other reasons like yours now. At this level then, the ease of administration is not allways true. (Do be carefull with doing direct changes using the regedit tool.) However it isn't necessarily as hard as it looks at first glance. Here at least all the setup information that's spread over 1000 files in Unix is assembled in one place. Also there is a simple GUI tool to look at it, although one should be as carefull with manual changes as one is in Unix in all it's myriad of setup information files. Microsoft have possibly put a little too much information in here, but it is at least possible to get a lot out of it. NB! All I have done above I have done without reading anything significant about the registry. I have so far just poked around and found some interesting stuff. It's at least quasi documented in the form of more or less intelligible names. Much of what I have said may however not have much relevance to your problem, or be outright false. Now for one last important thing. If I where you I would be *very* carefull with the type of changes you try to do. NT has been notoriously known for it's lack of security at the level you are working. Before you go on you should check with experts in the field whether you will actually gain any kind of security. Nils.Myklebust@idg.no NM Data AS, P.O.Box 9090 Gronland, N-0133 Oslo, Norway My opinions are those of my company The Informix FAQ is at http://www.iiug.org