Login Server Down?
 

Who are we supposed to contact when there is issues with the login server? No one can connect, without spamming login attempts! Please advise.

Ya it is getting to be pretty frustrating as this is happening often yesterday it was down over 12 hours. There seems to be nobody really monitoring it because it goes down for long periods of time.

thirded.

THis is stupid. I've been trying to login the last 4 and a half hours. TO no Avail. It is ridiculous. What the hell is the point, anymore?

If you can get to this website to post, then the login server is up. They run on the same PC and there are no problems right now and it has been fine all day. So, if you are having an issue logging in, it is on your end. What is the message your are getting when trying to log in exactly? You aren't even able to get to the server select screen?

When I get to the server select screen, it is blank; there isn't a single server displayed.

It has been doing this all evening.

I haven't changed a thing to my configuration on my computer between today and yesterday; that which would cause this.

Step 1) Run eqgame.exe -patchme (like i always have)

Step 2) Enter account name (TetsuoK) & password

Step 3) Click connect

Step 4a) "A Connection to the server could not be reached etc etc
b) "Error: Timed out
c) "Logging in" -- 5 or 10 minutes goes by and I restart program. go to step 1)
d) I get to server select screen and everything is blank
e) I get to server select screen and it lists my servers, I click on my preferred Server (VZ/TZ) and then am told "A connection error occurred"

Forced to go to Step 1.

Been doing this the last 5 hours. Its ridiculous. I havent' changed anything in my system since yesterday, and it worked fine all the way until 4am this morning.

wanted to also add: When I navigate www.eqemulator.net in my web browser (And leaving it up in the background) , i have a greater success rate in getting to the server select screen,but only marginally so. Might be out of coincidence.

From command prompt, I have pinged the eqemulator.net server numerous times and only received a success rate of about .03% in a single return by my logs.

FYI: With no changes with my setup, With no changes with my LAN, WAN, or ISP Network config, I finally logged in at 1am PST.

All pings stayed the same to all other locations I was bouncing it to.

I just managed to get on to the eqemulator.

The login server needs work.

traceroute shows traffic being dropped at the gateway from reach to infolink from here. I'm not convinced it's the server.

Login server does need work but trust me this time it was your connection.

A lot of people I've helped , swore up and down, their PCs where not the culprit - I can tell you, if you browse a lot of 'underworld' sites, get a lot of 'free' software, and/or exchange email without protection. then you probably have 'donated' much of your bandwidth to the 'internet snakes', which in turn will slow you down with online games, etc.

This link has a compilation of links and things I do, when I help friends clean up their polluted pcs.
Even if you don't think I'm right, even if you think you're OK - you should try this anyway (it will only make your PC better ).

Every person on the server has the same problems at the same time. Thats 100+ people on our server. I dont think that its client related.

Yes, the login server has had issues as was already mentioned in this thread. We are saying that in this particular case, it wasn't a login server issue, it was client side. No one else had the problem at the time that this guy was.

well, i did everything in that faq/guide described. It made a noticeable difference in speed on my computer, and I was analyzing packets with wiseroot. I didn't have any spyware doing anything rude to my system, but I did have alot of registry that was obsolete.

I disabled QoS and that made a world of difference for sustaining connection and eliminating lag death.

weebroot however did not have a working link.

Maybe look that one up again when you have some freetime.

Thanks for the advice, but i'm still noticing connection problems to the login server.

This might help....
 

I had problems like this once, everyone else was connecting but I couldnt and what it came down to was my DNS cache was fucked up some how so I fixed the issue by flushing DNS cache.

Dunno what system you using but here is a guide for both.

Windows
````````
at command prompt type:

c:/ipconfig /flushdns

you should get a message like:

successfully flushed the DNS Resolver Cache

Linux
````````
In Linux the nscd daemon handles DNS Cache so to flush you need to restart the nscd daemon.

at console type:

/etc/init.d/nscd restart


Also
``````````
On both Windows or Linux take a look at your HOSTS file and make sure eqemulators loginserver address isnt stuck in there with 127.0.0.1 infront of it. Heh, ya sounds stupid but happened to a friend of mine and we couldnt figure out what was stopping him from connecting to loginserver turns out localhost was infront of the loginserver address in his HOSTS file.

Hope the DNS Cache Flush helps you. Take care.

I'll try te flushdns tonight, and i'll recheck the hosts.

I just had a thought though.

What ports are necessary for the login server, and my preferred EQEmu server?

I am plugged into a router (wireless, but it is a rangemax, so it runs everything else wonderfully).

How can I configure the router for port forwarding? I used to plug right into the gateway, but now I do not. I have a static IP on my LAN, so port forwarding should work as a beautiful alternative, so long as I get the right port configuration.

Does anyone have this information?

THank you, again.

Just to clarify.. when I say HOSTS file I dont mean eqhost.txt.. I mean the HOSTS file. I dont remember the actual path on windows or linux but you can easily find it by doing a file search and it shouldnt have any extension, should just be called HOSTS.

Also, something to look into if you are running a firewall is to make sure your firewall isnt blocking the loginserver address or the loginserver port. A friend of mine was running his eqemu server on Vista Business Edition and windows firewall was treating eqemulator as suspicious software and was blocking it, my friend had to open up windows firewall and set it to allow the connection.

theres actually a ton of ways that your pc can stop you from connecting to the loginserver. I suggest you make a list of all suggestions youve tried and start checking them off as you try them, soon or later you'll get it solved through trial and error heh.

hope you get it working, take care.

small error on my part...
 

made a small error on my part concerning flush dns was typing fast and didnt check my typing.. command for windows should be

at c:\

type:

ipconfig /flushdns

if using Vista you will have to run as administrator. you can do so by clicking start menu then type cmd in search box. right click on cmd icon and click run as administrator, then cd.. until you get to the c:\ prompt. now type the ipconfig /flushdns command. dont use vista much sorry about my inaccuracy lol.

I took the final plunge.

After numerous work arounds. reconfigurations of the router, or the gateway, linetests, speed tests, variations between my vista machine and my xp machine, I have reformatted my XP (problem) machine.

I was due for one for the past year; its been 3 reinstalls of XP, 2 years, and 1 memory and harddrive upgrade since I've done it last.

So far, i'm installing all drivers from the bottom up, and we will see where it goes from there. I'll post a final update the moment after i press "login."

It worked. the format helped the zone death/etc.

I also plugged my computer directly into my router as opposed to using wireless, and the problems are now virtually 0.

Kind of a shame, because i hate wires going around the apartment. but oh well. It fixed the problem entirely.

ack
 

i went through and tried everything that was posted here and a few other threads (specifically http://www.eqemulator.net/forums/showthread.php?t=25327) and still not allowing me to login to server select.

i just got a new computer and have everything setup and i get as far as the login. my other computer is not having any problems.

disable firewall, changed exceptions for which programs allowed etc.

i also use WinEQ2 and have tried it with and without this (just using the shortcut with "patchme" and setting compatability) and changing affinity on eqgame.exe to cpu0. boooooo :(

my only stab in the dark guess is it might have to do with my computer sending/recieving information from the login server (duh?) but im using same connection as i was on prior computer and was not having this issue (except when others were aswell when login server was down/bad)

my computer:

Time of this report: 1/6/2009, 21:22:44
Machine name: HOME
Operating System: Windows Vista™ Home Premium (6.0, Build 6001) Service Pack 1 (6001.vistasp1_gdr.080425-1930)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: HP-Pavilion
System Model: FK791AAR-ABA a6650f
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Processor: AMD Phenom(tm) 9550 Quad-Core Processor (4 CPUs), ~2.2GHz
Memory: 6142MB RAM
Page File: 1507MB used, 10892MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 10
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
DxDiag Version: 6.00.6001.18000 32bit Unicode

fixed my own problem YAY!
 

lol, so i reinstalled and it worked!!!

when i first installed i hit the shortcut and computer is so fast it updated too many files before i canceled i am assuming, so if you forget and it DLs from EQ live make sure you reinstall. OMG YAY! hahaha

My thing was that it seams that the people runing the LS are being gracious enough to run it but they are not supporting it as much. There is this torn state between keeping comunity together and letting someone else in on what could be a "security risk" situation. What I am trying to say is that it is very frustrating when stuff goes down and nobody is really around to contact because people in charge are not as involved anymore. A community this big needs at least one person that is on top of the LS and heavily still involved if we are going to all depend on it. To have all these server admins and devs frustrated because they are unable to do anything for their community when the LS goes down because whoever is running it is unreachable is really a bummer for everyone. I really ask that the EQEmu people look into this cause it is getting worse and worse. If you want to keep the community together then it needs to be a fully supported community.

Report when it is having problems on irc in #eqemu and Doodman or Rogean will reboot it.

Whoops. Double post; see below.

For what it's worth, I've never once been able to ping eqemulator.net or complete a tracert -- every time I've tried, it times out after the hop to ge2-edge.mia.infolink.com [64.251.0.71]. That said, I can still access the site, although sometimes it acts like it's loading but doesn't actually load anything at all, and sometimes I'm able to log into the login server. So it's a bit of a mystery to me.

Also, I've had problems with my Linksys Wireless Range Expander, which seems to interfere somehow with my ability to connect to the actual servers.

You can't complete a trace route to my servers either because I drop requests that are not needed, like ICMP for ping/tracert. It's a security/performance issue more than anything.

It isn't bandwidth/network problems with the server. If it we're, you would get 404 errors when hitting the forums. If your browser is running stateless, you can hit the web page when the server is acting up and two hours later, it will actually do whatever you told it to. It seems to be a process running on the box that starves everything else, imo.

The Login Server issues lately have really been getting out of hand. It was one thing 6 months ago when it would only happen for a few days a month, but now it is a regular occurrence that is happening weekly or even multiple times per week.

I think the problems are probably related to what I think is an increase in popularity and population on the emulator. It has increased the number of MySQL connections and I assume that is the cause of the failures. It is good that the project may be growing in popularity, but I am sure it would be much more popular if it wasn't for these Login Server issues. It is to a point where the Login Server issues aren't just an annoyance anymore, they are taking a toll on the entire project.

Just to guess as to the cause of the problem, I think that either the max connection setting or the idle connection timeout setting for MySQL are probably set wrong for the population that the emulator has now. Here is a post that describes a problem that appears to be the same thing that eqemulator.net is experiencing:

http://forum.siteground.com/showthread.php?t=2096

I am not saying that the settings listed in that post are the solution to the LS issues, but at least that is an idea of what might need to be looked into or adjusted to see if it makes improvements.

We need to see if we can get more support from Rogean or doodman to see if we can get this problem resolved. If they can't/won't do it themselves, maybe they could finally allow someone else access (KLS or Cavedude maybe) to the server host so they can play around with it. At least having access to someone that will be able to actively work on this, I am confident that the problem could be resolved for good or at least, improved greatly. Really, I don't see why they wouldn't want to spend the few hours it would take to work on this issue in trade for not having to deal with restarting MySQL multiple times per week.

The thing is that I don't remember Login Server issues like this ever happening on the old hosting. Even if they did, it wasn't nearly as often as they do since the hosting changed. So, the old host must have had better settings to handle the number of connections that it needs to. That being the case should mean that this should definitely be a resolvable issue and I don't see why a little time can't be spent on it. This is affecting thousands of members and the entire project as a whole. It is definitely one of the biggest factors holding back the emulator for a long time now.

We need to start working on a new, open-source LS, and put the old LS to sleep - The decaying LS is one big reason why I went Minilogin (it's not open source or open-anything, therefore, I don't want it).
It's incredible the recent amount of progress that has been made in such a short time, over and over again I've seen some of the new Devs prove statements like "it can't be done", wrong. So I'm sure a new Public LS can be made too.
The day will probably come, when you will all get up to a LS that's gone, never to come back again, and that will be a big blow to everyone. Loosing these forums, will not be so bad, as there are other forums around that can pick up the slack, but I guess it would be terrible to loose all the years of help posts, and history, someone might want to consider storing all this.

You need to start something that will go on for a long time, something that other people can pick up if you get tired and quit.

No matter what, the Public Login Server as it is now should never be fully open source. Not only does it contain the information needed to hack player accounts (including GM accounts), but it may also contain the information to allow hacking directly into EQLive servers. If that is the case, then an Open Source Login Server would probably be a quick way to get SoE spending money to try to get the project shut down. There are just too many security issues with making the current Login Server Open Source.

The only way to have it as open source would be for the authentication to actually happen on the EQEmu Server (individually to each server) instead of at the Login Server. I don't know if there is an easy way to do this other than having the Login Server allow any username/password to login (like minilogin does), and then forward that info onto the server that they try to connect to for authentication to happen. It would probably be able to work similar to the Minilogin, accept instead of forwarding the IP of the account that is logging in, it would just foward the password that they used to log in. Then, the password would just be saved as MD5 to reduce the readability of it.

The problem with that is it would need to be hosted by someone trustworthy, since I don't think it is safe to just enter your password on just anyone's Login Server. It probably wouldn't be hard for them to set it to log passwords/accounts and even if they are kept as MD5, that can still be cracked. Any time you are entering a password somewhere, you should always feel that it is as secure as possible. By allowing anyone to run a Login Server, it opens up a bunch of issues that could potentially cause more impact to the EQEmu Project than the current Login Server issues have been causing.

I am sure there is a good solution that we will eventually all come to, but for now, I think our best bet is to try our best to get the current Login Server issues resolved wether that mean contacting doodman/rogean to help with it or give access to someone active on the project, or maybe research if there is anything else that could potentially help from outside the Login Server. The issue could even maybe be helped just by adjusting the default rates that servers make connections to the Login Server. It could also possibly even be helped by more servers running almost all dynamic zones. I don't know this for sure, but I think zones have some sort of connection to the Login Server, and if so, having 200+ static zones is probably not helping the Login Server issues. Multiply that by a few servers and it starts adding up quick. Maybe if enough servers could adjust their own settings, it would help to fix or at least reduce this issue. That might be a long shot, but it is probably worth considering.

It would also be a really good idea to have a backup of the entire site from time to time in the case that the host server dies. Losing all accounts, wiki pages and forum posts would be devastating to the project and would probably be the end of it. It would take a very long time to recover from a loss like that and losing the wiki pages would make everything much more complicated.

I think if minilogin was changed to use username and password vs. IP address more people would be able to use it, and that itself would reduce the load on the public login server. I'm sure it would not be to much to accomplish this to whoever holds the source.

I know the biggest reason why people shy away from minilogin is the extra steps involed to make boxing happen without getting accounts booted. I'm still unsure why the login needs to be controlled by a select few, if the binaries are released the source is still protected.

We want to grow and having huge downtime is never a good thing. I Know this is all wasted words since this topic has been hashed over for a long time now, and it still is as it was.

Yes, this topic has been discussed a million times on these forums, but Angelox is right, almost anything is possible even if people say that it is not and that has been proven multiple times in the emu lately. I know that every since FNW gave up on getting Anniversary to work with the emulator, everyone has just said that there will probably never be an update to the client version of EQEmu. I hope to personally prove that wrong very soon if/when I finalize SoF enough for it to be fully playable :) Before, I was one of the people just spitting out the same thing I had heard time and time again that there would most likely not be anymore updates due to the massive work required to do it. Eventually, I learned enough where I thought I would attempt to see how far I could get on updating it myself. I failed ALOT and am still not done, but am getting very close to having a playable SoF client for EQEmu.

My point is that it seems like everyone (myself included) has just accepted the state of the Login Server as our fate and spits out the same thing over and over that there isn't anything we can do about it. The fact is that I don't know anyone who has actually even tried to do anything about it, or even discuss it with Rogean or doodman assuming they could maybe be contacted on the IRC channels. Until I hear it from them directly, or at least someone I trust to provide accurate information, I don't know if I can believe that it would be impossible to get this issue resolved.

All of the time that has been wasted due to the Login Server is just ridiculous. As I said, it was one thing when it was only down on occasion, but it is to the point where it is well beyond being a minor nuisance or inconvenience. I have no doubt that we are losing players almost every time that it goes down.

I hope this is not coming off as me being upset about the issue. I am not upset, I just think we need to take a different approach with it. Instead of passively just accepting the way that the Login Server has been acting up, I think it is time to take action. I know that work has already begun on making an alternate Login Server of some sort. I am sure that the source of that one won't be open source either. It is just disappointing that it comes to needing to re-invent the wheel. The current Login Server code is perfectly fine. I believe the only issue is with the configuration of the host server it is on. This whole issue could have possibly been resolve long long ago by just having someone that is actively involved in the project managing the server and getting it configured properly.

When things come to push and shove, stuff gets done, and it is already past that point IMO. I am sure it is only a matter of time until we have an alternative to the current Login Server. I just wish that Rogean and doodman would realize how dire the situation is and maybe lend a hand in resolving the issues with the current Login Server. I don't blame them for the current state of things and I think we are lucky that they have kept everything running as well as it still does even though they aren't involved in the project at all anymore.

Maybe the new Login Server will be done around the same time I get SoF done, and eqemu will be more popular than ever :D <--- I'm an optimist after-all!

There's already a whole lot of people that use it (Minilogin) as-is. I get 'thank you' emails and PMs all the time from Minilogin users, they just don't post because they got their own thing going with friends and family.
I really am not interested in the public login anymore, even if it is not open source, there still is nothing else 'open' about it - and if it does one day come to and end, MiniLogin will keep EqEmu alive.

EDIT; By 'thank you' emails, I mean for all the help we gave people getting them going under MiniLogin.

I'm thinking, since Minilogin looks for IP address, have a script that converts the incoming username into a unique number, and insert it into the account table/ip.

If Minilogin could use the encrypted username/password string as a unique identifier (think of it as an account ID rather than a username & password), that might work. In other words, allow everyone to login with whatever username/password they want to, but if you enter the wrong one, you won't see your characters. On the plus side, it would be relatively easy to engineer, and you wouldn't have to worry about registering user accounts. On the downside, it could create a lot of confusion if you enter in the wrong username or password, not to mention server admins tracking down a specific account. At the very least, this might make a good idea for a Minilogin2.

However, I agree, something needs to be done sooner rather than later. Ideally, the underlying issue for the downtime can be resolved now, and we can look toward a better way to handle the inherent negatives of having a central loginserver (limited ability to make enhancements, single point of failure) in the long run.

You're right about that - already with the PHP script we have, there are a lot of accounts made because a mistaken username was entered (never to be used again) - I can imagine a large scale of this.
What about improving the current PHP login to where you require username, and maybe some more information like a valid email (each email is entitled to a stated amount of accounts). The username then converts into numbers, letters are according to their order in the alphabet (ex. angelox = 1.14.7.5.12.15). Passwords are not encrypted, but that could and should be done.

I agree 110 % with this :) And i think your idea to use a unique number for accounts BRILLIANT :D

Decentraliuzation of Emu will be the death of its development.
Instead of having all our devs and coders working on a single source code, we will have devs only working on their own server code and only features that they deem important for that server. And after couple of months - all those servers code will be incompateable with each other.

I realy wish the LS control holder would just finaly make his appearence and share the control over it with a few more people who can keep it running.

For my server, I have been developing a hybrid login system where you can use both the public login server and my private patcher client. My patcher does some very minor additions to your client but when you quit, all of those changes are reverted so you can play on other servers. I would love to share the code but then I've breached my server's security since so much would be exposed about the handshake generation and decryption. Perhaps once it is refined for production use...

I do agree, decentralizing will deteriorate the community. I was hoping that given enough time, Doodman would be tired of dealing with the server and pass it along. I guess I shouldn't hold my breath.

Is it possible to have the login server mirrored to some other site that has a better internet connection? It seems like somebody with a dial up connection could serve it better than where ever eqemulator.net is being hosted.