"Could not contact custom update server."

ericab · Mar 28, 2013, 1:37 AM

its been months, since ive been able to check for updates via the webUI.
i get this: https://www.dropbox.com/s/saorkr8b4ur15je/shot_130327_183357.png

same goes for installing new packages; i get this error:
"Unable to communicate with www.pfsense.com. Please verify DNS and interface configuration, and that pfSense has functional Internet connectivity."

if i SSH into my pfsense box, and ping google.com for example, all is well.
all PC's on my lan also ping just fine.

can someone give me some help with this ?
i need to get some new packages installed.

machine info:
Version 2.1-BETA1 (i386)
built on Fri Mar 22 22:56:09 EDT 2013
FreeBSD 8.3-RELEASE-p6

(note; yes its a nightly build, but a week ago i was on v2.0, and still had the same issue.)

stan-qaz · Mar 28, 2013, 3:11 AM

What does your: System: "Firmware: Settings" page, "Updater Settings" tab look like?

ericab · Mar 28, 2013, 4:03 AM

hi stan;

this is what ive got;
http://db.tt/Y5bkchMZ

stan-qaz · Mar 28, 2013, 4:32 AM

I'm not an expert at this so someone else may have a better answer.

The link there got cut off, is it: http://snapshots.pfsense.org/FreeBSD_RELENG_8_3/i386/pfSense_HEAD/updates/

This is the latest file there, it looks newer than the one you are running:

pfSense-Full-Update-2.1-BETA1-i386-20130327-0729.tgz

Version 2.1-BETA1 (i386) built on Fri Mar 22 22:56:09 EDT 2013

pfSense-Full-Update-2.1-BETA1-i386-20130322-2256.tgz

If nothing else, visit the site and download the file to your computer (not the pf sense box) then do a local update from the first tab on the firmware page, click the enable button to get started.

cmb · Mar 28, 2013, 4:45 AM

Seems that's probably correct. That URL is longer than the text box is wide, it's likely all there. Since packages can't be fetched either, it's probably a general connectivity problem from the firewall. Either it can't resolve DNS, it doesn't have a default gateway, something preventing it from initiating traffic to the Internet.

stephenw10 · Mar 28, 2013, 9:39 AM

DNS issue would have been my first guess but:

@ericab:

if i SSH into my pfsense box, and ping google.com for example, all is well.

So perhaps not. :-
As a test you could try fetching the package list manually:


[2.0.2-RELEASE][root@pfsense.fire.box]/root(1): fetch -o /dev/null http://www.pfsense.org/packages/pkg_config.8.xml
/dev/null                                     100% of  106 kB  242 kBps

That's under 2.0.2 as you can see. In think 2.1 is using the same package list but I'm not certain of that. Useful test anyway.

Steve

ericab · Mar 28, 2013, 4:26 PM

thanks for all the replies !

@stan,
thats a good idea, but the whole url is there, it just extends beyond the text box

@cmb,
all machines on my LAN and the pfsense box itself can perform name resolution; and i have a default gateway assigned…however, my default gateway is a private address 192.168.1.142; as my pfsense box is behind another router; but 192.168.1.142 is assigned on the DMZ.. not sure if this matters, but could this be a port forwarding issue ?

@stephenw10,
fetching the package list via ssh works as advertised

some other observations:

does this matter?
http://db.tt/UP1OYg85

also,
when i traceroute to pfsense.org... i get this:
http://pastebin.com/rAekJxRG

it goes on and on. is there an upstream problem ?

stan-qaz · Mar 28, 2013, 6:00 PM

You have the exact DNS setup I show on my status page.

My traceroute from here ends at the same spot yours does, likely that they disabled the responses traceroute needs beyond the last one that responded.

I have no clue why it isn't happening, if I get time today I'll try changing my updater to the snapshots and see if it picks up a new one, been doing it manually up to now.

stephenw10 · Mar 28, 2013, 8:06 PM

Yes, pfsense.org does not respond to pings.

Steve

ericab · Mar 28, 2013, 10:57 PM

@stan-qaz:

You have the exact DNS setup I show on my status page.

My traceroute from here ends at the same spot yours does, likely that they disabled the responses traceroute needs beyond the last one that responded.

I have no clue why it isn't happening, if I get time today I'll try changing my updater to the snapshots and see if it picks up a new one, been doing it manually up to now.

ok thanks,
i wouldnt mind doing it manually myself,
but its not being able to update/install packages that's really something i cant live with.

ericab · Mar 29, 2013, 7:37 PM

does anyone have a solution ? ???

stan-qaz · Mar 29, 2013, 11:21 PM

I gave the auto-update from the snapshot server a try and got the same response you did.

Looking at what is going on I believe I see the problem's cause. The update and snapshot servers store the files in a very different format, the updater apparently doesn't see the snapshot server as a valid update source.

Updates: http://updates.pfsense.org/_updaters/amd64

Snapshots: http://snapshots.pfsense.org/FreeBSD_RELENG_8_1/amd64/pfSense_RELENG_2_0/updates

Manual method is working just fine for me, the shell's manual update will likely work too.

ericab · Mar 30, 2013, 2:26 AM

thanks for the reply stan;
im not 100% sure what the end result should be on the servers custom updater url should be, but int he end i dont think this is the fix for this, as addon packages are not gotten from the mentioned url's.

there is for sure something else going on here.

ericab · Apr 2, 2013, 1:52 AM

any help ? ???

i can see in the logs:

php: /pkg_mgr.php: XMLRPC request failed with error 5: Didn't receive 200 OK from remote server. (HTTP/1.0 303 See Other)

cmb · Apr 2, 2013, 5:39 AM

Run:
fetch http://www.pfsense.org/packages/pkg_config.8.xml

then:

cat pkg_config.8.xml

what's in that file? Should show more about what that 303 is. You're not getting a 303 from us.

ericab · Apr 2, 2013, 10:26 AM

well, the file contains what its supposed to… so this isnt an IP issue... hmm

ericab · Apr 3, 2013, 2:27 AM

so if this isnt an IP issue, where in the filesystem can i look to remedy this ? ???

wallabybob · Apr 3, 2013, 7:20 AM

@ericab:

so if this isnt an IP issue, where in the filesystem can i look to remedy this ? ???

As of a few hours ago the dropbox postings associated with this topic had all disappeared. That makes it hard for anyone who longer remembers the details to find them. (I think it is better practice to post text associated with the topic in a reply, possibly quoted or in tt (TeleType) style and to post graphics such as screen shots as attachments.)

Since fetch allegedly gets the file correctly but the package menu apparently doesn't PERHAPS one or more files were corrupted on your recent install.

PERHAPS your file system is nearly full. What is the output of pfSense shell command```
df


PERHAPS your hard drive is failing (developing bad blocks).

cmb · Apr 3, 2013, 8:03 AM

Browse to pkg_mgr_settings.php (no link, type in manually), are you pointing to the real package server there or somewhere else? Some outside sites give instructions to run a script that changes your system's packages source to some other server we have nothing to do with. Given the 302 and the fact you can manually fetch the package list, that seems likely.

ericab · Apr 5, 2013, 7:10 AM

well nothing worked;
i decided id wasted enough time, reinstalled and built up from scratch.

problem solved.