multi-client server

Rudolf has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hello, I've been fooling around making a chat program for my friends and I and it works alright except for timeouts and the fact that - my main problem - I can not figure out how to get a client over the internet to connect to the server. The program works correctly over a private network using private network addresses like.. 192.168. or 10... etc. However I am not sure what I need to do for a client to connect to my computer from their computer at home. at the moment in my code I use INADDR_ANY, which Im not entirely sure the meaning of. I have also tried using my external address ( the one you find if you ask for your ip on google ), There is probably some knowlege I am lacking so any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!!

use v5.14;
use Socket;
use IO::Socket;
require('server_lib.pl');
flush_system();

socket(SERVER,PF_INET,SOCK_STREAM,getprotobyname('tcp'));
setsockopt(SERVER,SOL_SOCKET,SO_REUSEADDR,1);
my $my_addr = sockaddr_in(5555,INADDR_ANY);
bind(SERVER,$my_addr) or die "cant bind";
listen(SERVER,SOMAXCONN);

REQUEST:
while(accept(CLIENT,SERVER)){   
   if (my $pid = fork){
     next REQUEST;
   }
   else{ #child     
      close SERVER;
      my $ip = get_ip(*CLIENT);
      my $user_name;
      
      if(recv(CLIENT,$user_name,1024,0)){
        if( user_exists($user_name) || ip_exists($ip) ){
           send_to_ip($ip,"User name exists (please restart);\n");
           say "Attempt to duplicate name '$user_name' from IP: $ip";
           next REQUEST;
        }
        else{
           cache($user_name,$ip);
        }
        my $conn_msg = "{$user_name Connected}";  
        say "$conn_msg: $ip";    
        global_send($conn_msg);
        
        while(recv(CLIENT,my $data,1024,0)){
            last if !ip_exists($ip); 
            my $msg = "[$user_name] $data";   
            say $msg;            
            unless( special_command($msg) ){
                global_send($msg); 
            }        
        }
      }
      my $disconn_msg = "{$user_name Disconnected}";
      say $disconn_msg;
      global_send($disconn_msg);
      remove_user($user_name);
      exit;
  }
}
continue{
   close(CLIENT);
}
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Re: multi-client server by tobyink (Canon) on Jul 21, 2012 at 01:36 UTC
Firstly, you may have a firewall, so make sure the port in question is not blocked by it. Secondly, most home Internet connections these days use NAT. This is typically a feature of your router which allows multiple machines on your local network to hide behind a single public IP address. Most routers have a settings panel somewhere allowing you to map external port numbers to internal machines. `perl -E'sub Monkey::do{say$_,for@_,do{($monkey=[caller(0)]->[3])=~s{::}{ }and$monkey}}"Monkey say"->Monkey::do'`	[reply]
Re^2: multi-client server by Rudolf (Pilgrim) on Jul 21, 2012 at 03:59 UTC
right, thats great information thanks. I opened up the port I just need to test it out now. But there is not a specific ip addr I should be listening on with my server? Should my current code work?	[reply]
Re^3: multi-client server by mbethke (Hermit) on Jul 21, 2012 at 06:14 UTC
Binding to INADDR_ANY just means to listen on all available interfaces no matter what their address. As you're likely to have just one (real, apart from the loopback) network interface that's just what you need. The port forwarding on the router takes care of the rest.	[reply]
Re^4: multi-client server by Rudolf (Pilgrim) on Jul 21, 2012 at 14:28 UTC
Re: multi-client server by linuxkid (Sexton) on Jul 21, 2012 at 17:54 UTC
make sure you have that port open on your firewall and all incomning requests go to the server's ip --linuxkid imrunningoutofideas.co.cc	[reply]

--linuxkid