Confusing intranet issue for work...fixed!

[Miramonti]

I've never had to troubleshoot this issue because 'it just worked' in Windows XP, but now that I'm on Windows 7, it's not working at all and I have no clue where to begin.

I have stock trading software that uses http addresses such as:

http://localhost:7400/placeOrder?symbol=IBM&action=BUY...etc...etc...

to indirectly send orders into my brokerage software's api. A small middleman java software application is listening on port 7400 for the http address, and then sends the order request to the brokerage api in the respective syntax that it needs.

But when I send this address from my software, which the browser usually would load instantly, the browser doesn't receive it. And if I load it directly into the browser manually, nothing happens and it won't 'load' and pass it along for the middleman software to process.

It seems Windows 7 doesn't like localhostort addresses. I've disabled my firewall but this address still does not get to my middleman software that's 'listening' on port 7400.

Any ideas what might be going on or how to get around what Windows 7 is restricting me from doing?

 

[spidey07]

add it to your hosts file. Maybe it's not in there.

the only reason localhost works is because there is supposed to be an entry in the host file for 127.0.0.1. You could try 127.0.0.1 to see if it's a name resolution problem.

 

[Miramonti]

No luck. I added it to the host file - "127.0.0.1 localhost" and when loading it manually into firefox, I get the message in the status bar: "Connecting to local host"... and then "Waiting for locahost..." but its hanging there. And when I tried to send the 'url' from my initial software, the browser still isn't getting it as well.

 

[imagoon]

Are you sure the app is loading? If it is, are you sure it is configured to listen on local host? Are you sure it is not firewalled (rules do apply to localhost)? If you do a netstat -a do you see a program listening on port 7400?

 

[Miramonti]

Are you sure the app is loading? If it is, are you sure it is configured to listen on local host? Are you sure it is not firewalled (rules do apply to localhost)? If you do a netstat -a do you see a program listening on port 7400?

I've turned off the firewall (online armor) and Windows firewall is disabled.

The program appears to be listening:

netstat -a shows:

TCP 0.0.0.0:7400 [mycomputername]:0 LISTENING

I tried putting this address (with 127.0.0.1 as well as using 'localhost') into an internet shortcut on the desktop, double-clicking to see if the browser tries to load it, but the browser isn't receiving it.

 

[imagoon]

Is there anyway to see if the program is actually running? The JVM could be up but the script is hung?

 

[Miramonti]

Is there anyway to see if the program is actually running? The JVM could be up but the script is hung?

Yes, its running. It's has different functions, one of which is to watch quotes that it gets thru the brokerage api, and it's currently displaying quotes in realitime properly. That's not something I use it for specifically, but I always have some ticker symbols in it for this reason, to make sure it's working.

 

[seepy83]

Can you tell us what software it is?

Do you know if it's supported on Windows 7?

 

[Miramonti]

Can you tell us what software it is?

Do you know if it's supported on Windows 7?

It's called Autotrader, which has been out of development for a while. It has no claims to being supported by win7.

I'm concerned tho that when I set an internet shortcut with this localhost (or 127.0.0.1) string as the url, and doubleclick it, it doesn't open up a tab or try to load in the browser like happens in windows xp, even without Autotrader running.

I can however change the shorcut's url to something like www.amazon.com and doubleclick on it, and the browser properly opens up a tab and goes to the website.

 

[nickbits]

telnet localhost 7400

does it connect or timeout? if it doesn't connect either the software isn't running or have have a firewall problem

my guess is that the windows firewall isn't really disabled

 

[Miramonti]

telnet localhost 7400

does it connect or timeout? if it doesn't connect either the software isn't running or have have a firewall problem

my guess is that the windows firewall isn't really disabled

I enabled Telnet...what's the exact command to enter? I tried 'localhost 7400' and a variety of alternatives but I keep getting 'invalid command'.

/edit: I rechecked the services and the firewall is disabled. I went ahead and stopped the security center as well.

 

[nickbits]

I enabled Telnet...what's the exact command to enter? I tried 'localhost 7400' and a variety of alternatives but I keep getting 'invalid command'.

"telnet localhost 7400" is the command

 

[seepy83]

open 127.0.0.1 7400

or

open localhost 7400

edit: if you're at a regular command prompt, use the command that nickbits gave you. If you're at a telnet prompt, use the ones I posted.

 

[Miramonti]

The problem is solved, and it seemed to be related to how Win7 defaults its intranet security settings on installation.

I had been using firefox and maxthon to test it, which were surfing fine but not processing this intranet url. I decided to try it with IE, which in hindsight I should have done at the outset of problems.

On the first IE test, an Info Bar alert popped up and said "Intranet Settings are now disabled. Click here to enable them."

[/edit: it 'disabled' the settings by loading the url and then worked, and I never had to clicked 'enable'.]

And that's it. Now it works in all browsers.

I wasn't actually able to get a response when telnetting 127.0.0.1 7400, it just hung waiting, but the program is successfully receiving these urls when the browser loads them and passing the order onto the brokerage software properly.

Thanks everyone for the assistance in trying to resolve this odd issue, its much appreciated.