Hosting for Absolute Beginners

tinkthank · #1 March 29th, 2004, 03:51 PM

Would anyone be kind enough to either post here or post a link to some information on what an
Absolute Beginner (such as: myself) needs to know to "host" MP games on a Windows computer? I found the information posted here by very helpful people to be fascinating, but not explicit enough for the Absolutely Computer Illiterate (such as yours truly).

Some of the Things I Would Like to Know:
- The Obvious (Is Not Obvious To Me): How do I figure out my IP address? (I dont need that if it is PBEM, right?) Someone told me this changes from day to day, how do I find it out? How do I figure out which "Port" to use?
- Safety: Someone told me that if others find out my IP address and port information, they can "hack" my computer, that I should never let others know this. Is this true? So when hosting a DII game, I am making an exception for nice DomII players who will never hack me because they are per definitionem cute and cuddly and friendly etc., or is there some trick I must know? Does somehow a "router" come into play here, and can that cause problems?

Thanks very much.

Tuna-Fish · #2 March 29th, 2004, 04:06 PM

To find out your ip-address, start/run "cmd", then when the black window pops out type "ipconfig". The second value should be ip-address.

Port can be anyhting as long as all players are using the same port. Also, as ports under 1024 are reserved for special use, it's customary to pick a (considerable) higher one, like 20000.

And for safety: Think of your ip-address as your home-address. If no-one knows it, no-one can ever come throw stones at your windows. Also, if no-one knows it you will never recieve mail or have anyone visit.

For you to ever get anything from the web you have to send in your address. For example your ip-address will be visible to the webmasters of every web-page you ever view. When you loaded this page your computer sent your ip-address and a page request to shrapnelgames.com (69.56.133.50), that then processed the request and sent a reply to your address.

So, trying to hide your ip-address is rather futile...

Minrhael · #3 March 29th, 2004, 04:35 PM

Not to hijack the thread, but since it's here, I think I finally got mine set up host but as I really don't know what I'm doing, anyone want to try to connect to 192.168.1.100 6060 and tell me if it's working? Thanks!

Minrhael · #4 March 29th, 2004, 04:55 PM

Bleh, just realized I can't have DHCP going for that, can I? Have to play around a bit more I guess, don't bother trying to connect

ywl · #5 March 29th, 2004, 05:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tuna-Fish:

And for safety: Think of your ip-address as your home-address. If no-one knows it, no-one can ever come throw stones at your windows. Also, if no-one knows it you will never recieve mail or have anyone visit.

To further the analogy, some people just drive around and throw rock to every window they see. So, even hiding your address (real or ip) won't save you as long as your house is facing the road or on the internet.

Minrhael · #6 March 29th, 2004, 05:05 PM

Ok, think I finally got it, if anyone is feeling generous with their time, please try 24.197.202.97 6060 and let me know, thanks very much!

Gandalf Parker · #7 March 29th, 2004, 05:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Minrhael:
Ok, think I finally got it, if anyone is feeling generous with their time, please try 24.197.202.97 6060 and let me know, thanks very much!

Works fine for me.

Gandalf Parker · #8 March 29th, 2004, 05:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by tinkthank:
Some of the Things I Would Like to Know:
- The Obvious (Is Not Obvious To Me): How do I figure out my IP address?

Your IP address is part of everything you do on the net. I can see your IP address in your Posts (though I think thats only a moderator button), and in your emails, and in Posts you do to newsGroups. Any website you visit can see your IP address. Just about any connection you make has your IP in it although most programs (email browsers newsgroup) doesnt show it to you becuase if figures you are interested in all that.

But yes if you are a dialup connection then you get a different IP everytime you dial in. There are alot of ways to find out such as using your control panel in windows. But the easiest is probably using the fact that websites see your address. There are alot of sites that will tell you what they see. Try this one...
http://iso.hsc.wvu.edu/ip.asp

Quote:

(I dont need that if it is PBEM, right?)

No you dont need it for PBEM

Quote:

How do I figure out which "Port" to use?

Actually you can use any of over 65000 ports that arent already in use. The problem is that some ports are known to be used by certain programs and can report that you are running things you arent. Such as a port which might cause your ISP to think you are infected, or cause people who are searching to think you are running a service susceptable to attack. For me I stick between 7001-8000 which seems pretty unused.

Quote:

- Safety: Someone told me that if others find out my IP address and port information, they can "hack" my computer, that I should never let others know this. Is this true? So when hosting a DII game, I am making an exception for nice DomII players who will never hack me because they are per definitionem cute and cuddly and friendly etc., or is there some trick I must know?

**growl**. Sorry but thats a pet peeve for me. The proper term is "crack" not hack. Only tv/movies/newsmedia mix up hacker and crackers.

But thats beside the point. The information you were given is true enough but not really a big deal. As I already covered your IP address is not secret info if you are using the internet. And its more of a worry for people who have the same IP all the time like DSL and Cable Users. Also, attacks tend to come because a search found a program running which is vulnerable. Crackers will probe thru huge blocks of IP numbers to see if certain programs are running then come back to test and see if they are properly patched. If you ran your game on a port which seems to be one of those programs then you might get a return test but even then they would find out that you arent running what they think. I doubt very much that anyone would recognize Dominions2 and certainly would have no idea how to use it to reach anything else on your machine. Dont worry, your machine is made much more susceptable by things like Outlook Express than by Dominions2.

Quote:

Does somehow a "router" come into play here, and can that cause problems?

Pros and Cons to security. There is such as thing as a ridiculous amount of security. Routers, hubs, firewalls, virus scanners, etc etc. All can add to your security but if you stack every security thing that you ever hear of then it can get in the way of you doing things you want to use the computer for. You may have to take an extra effort to learn the thing you are using as security in order to find out how to tell it that you want to let certain people come thru on certain ports.

--
System Administrator and Host of www.alt-hacker.org
the home of the alt.hacker newsgroup

[ March 29, 2004, 15:26: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

tinkthank · #9 March 29th, 2004, 06:15 PM

OK thanks, that was helpful. I will try to test it out when feeling brave.
And quite honestly, never heard of the term "crack", ever (in regards to computers), and despite being a computer idiot I do read lots of newspapers and watch all films in the English original (I live in Germany).

Alneyan · #10 March 29th, 2004, 06:44 PM

Hacker should mean someone who knows a lot about how computers actually work, so hackers would be expert Users knowing how to tweak a computer, make a program, and the list goes on. On the other hand, a cracker is someone attempting to break through computers, sites, and so on.

So while hacker usually means "computer literate" (in short, feel free to expand), cracker is more specific to illegal activies. But both words are often mixed, and hacker is used to describe what should be cracking. I am not sure if I make much sense though... *Grumbles*