Groove Client - Communication Port Requirements

[Martin D]

Hi,

I'm working with a client who connects their Groove client using a public
ISP. They're experiencing problems and I suspect the the ISP may be
unitentionally blocking TCP ports needed for Groove to work. Can anyone
advise me please:

1. What TCP ports are needed to be open for the Groove client to function
correctly?

2. How you can check that the required TCP ports are open on an ISP
connection?

3. How the Groove client can be used to check that communications are
working properly [e.g is there a feature as part of the Groove client
communications manager that enable you to check that connections and
communications are working as they should]?

We've checked that it's not the firewall on the client pc that's preventing
communication and we're fairly confident that it's soemthing to do with the
ISP connection.

With thanks for any feedback and advice you can provide - Kind regards,
Martin...

 

[GWON]

Here are the ports that Groove uses.

Local Subnet only via Broadcast udp/1211. This is used for local subnet
presence discovery. Ideal for closed or ad-hoc network peer discovery.

Inbound: 2492 is used for pure peer-to-peer communications. It is not a
required inbound port, but can be more efficient when allowed.

Outbound:
tcp 2492 The primary Groove protocol and the most efficient. Ideally it
should be open inbound also, but it is not required.

tcp 80 Groove will fall back to tunneling the Groove protocols inside of
HTTP. It works and will traverse most firewalls and proxies, as it looks
just like HTTP, although its contents are still 192 bit encrypted.

tcp 443. This is an alternative port from the 2492 that Groove uses by
default. It is the native Groove protocol and is not HTTPS.

The advantage of 2492 is that Groove will talk and listen on 2492 allowing
for direct peer-to-peer communications.

443 is the next best option, but peer-to-peer is not allowed. All traffic
is routed through a Relay server.

80 is the last option. It suffers from the normal expected protocol
performance issues when tunneled. All traffic is routed via a Relay when
using port 80. The advantage with 80 is that it will work in virtually all
network situations where outbound HTTP is allowed. It even picks up and uses
many of the proxy firewalls automatically.
See
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/office/grooveserver/2007/guide/GDEPG_09.mspx?mfr=true for more information.

 

[Martin D]

Many thanks for this.

I'll now do a little more research on these ports with the ISP we're using
to find out if this is the reason we can't get the Groove client to
communicate properly.