mac-to-pc chats

[Kevin Justie]

Have confirmed that there are no differences in the Active Directory setups for these three users or their computers  -- except, as I mentioned before, that one is a local admin of her computer.  So I changed the other two people to be local admins of their computers and retested everything -- and still the same issues:  neither Macs nor the laptop can initiate chats with the two desktops.

Anti-virus is administered from a server, and there are no differences in how it's implemented on the desktops versus the laptop.  Nonetheless, I unloaded it on one of the desktops but was still unable to initiate a chat from Mac or laptop to that desktop.

All three computers have Bonjour and Pidgin "opened" in their Windows firewall; all three are on the same side of our network firewall, so it can't have any effect on them in terms of blocking anything going between them.

I am assuming Bonjour is running at startup, since the Pidgin buddy lists on the desktops show all online users, including their status and icons, and including even those computers that are unable to initiate a chat with them -- all before any chats are initiated either way.  Similarly, the desktops show up in the buddy lists on the Macs and laptop, all immediately after startup.

Not sure how I would go about checking permissions on Bonjour, given how many related files there are, but would permissions need to be changed after a regular install of the service?

Anything else to check / test / change?

kevin



On Jun 20, 2013, at 3:25 PM, Tres Finocchiaro <tres.finocchiaro at gmail.com> wrote:

> You have already isolated the problem to your environment by proving a local administrative user is fine.
> 
> Is there a chance your Active Directory settings or antivirus rules prohibit sending broadcast traffic?
> 
> The Bonjour service needs clients to be able to send broadcasts  in order to work.  Anything prohibiting that (firewall or otherwise) can break it.  There may also be permission issues with the Bonjour Service, which should be running, startup automatic on your PCs.
> 
> -Tres
> 
> On Thu, Jun 20, 2013 at 4:12 PM, Kevin Justie <kjustie at webrary.org> wrote:
> I've now added two more PCs to the network, and and it turns out (as you suggested) that the inability to initiate chats is not limited to Macs.
> 
> The three PCs are brand new, Windows 7 SP1.  Only difference is that 2 are (identical) desktops and one is a laptop.  Have re-checked to confirm that all PCs and Macs have the same subnet settings, and the same firewall settings (Bonjour and Pidgin, opened at "domain" and "home/work" levels (because the Macs are not on the domain)).
> 
> --  10.8 Mac CANNOT initiate chat with the two desktops (regardless of whether they're logged in as a regular user or an admin, which does affect PC-to-PC chats; see below).   Macs with 10.6 or older CAN initiate chats to all PCs (don't have any at 10.7 to test).
> 
> --  10.8 Macs CAN initiate chat with the laptop.
> 
> --  All three PCs CAN initiate chats with 10.8 or 10.6 Macs.
> 
> --  The two desktops CAN each initiate chats with each other and with the laptop.
> 
> --  The laptop CANNOT initiate chats with the desktops; in fact, Pidgin almost always crashes when I try to initiate chats with the desktops from the laptop.
> 
> --  All of the above are with the PCs logged in as a normal, domain-based user.  If, however, I log in as a local admin instead, then the laptop CAN initiate chats with the desktops.  It turns out, however, that it's only the laptop being logged in as admin that makes the difference:  if the laptop is logged in as a user and the desktop as an admin, only the desktop can initiate the chat (same as when both are users), but if the laptop is logged in as admin and the desktop as a user, then either one can initiate the chat.
> 
> And then to throw in yet another twist, the laptop's "regular" user is also an domain admin, but it takes being logged in as a local admin to enable the laptop to initiate chats with the desktops.
> 
> So, the bottom line is that all PCs can initiate chats to the Macs, the Macs can initiate chats to the laptop but not to the desktops, and the desktops can initiate chats to each other, but not to the laptop -- unless the laptop is logged in as local admin.
> 
> Does this make any sense, or provide any clues as to what the underlying issue may be?
> 
> kevin
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> > On Mon, Jun 17, 2013 at 5:37 PM, Kevin Justie <kjustie at webrary.org> wrote:
> >> Hi Daniel,
> >>
> >> Tweaking the firewall worked -- thanks! -- but only as long as the PC was using DHCP.  That's how it was set up (by somebody else), but I prefer to have static IPs for staff computers, and when I changed it to a static IP, the initial chat messages from Macs were again ignored/not received.  Computers are all on the same network:  Macs are 172.16.3.x, DHCP gave the PC a 172.16.4.x number, and I changed it to a 172.16.7.x number.  Why would an IP change like this affect those Mac-initiated messages, if the firewall is no longer blocking them?
> >>
> >> kevin
> >
> > Please reply to the support mailing list, not to me directly.
> >
> > I'm pretty sure that the Dynamic vs Static IP address assignment is
> > something of a red herring (as is the Mac vs. PC part of the
> > situation).
> >
> > My guess is that there's some sort of routing or network restriction
> > that's preventing connectivity between the machines.  It's hard to
> > guess what's going on in your network that would specifically be
> > problematic - I'd make sure that the IP ranges are on the same subnet
> > (Bonjour relies on this to be the case).
> >
> > -D
> 
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> 
> -- 
> - Tres.Finocchiaro at gmail.com