Random XDA musings, part 4

[Jason Dunn]

Now that I have a wireless device, the possibilities suddenly become vast - until I run into the limitations of software designed for a disconnected paradigm. #1 on my hit list is ActiveSync. For the past two years, my fellow MVPs and I have been begging, pleading, and practically whining to the ActiveSync team at Microsoft to give us ActiveSync that listens on an IP and a port instead of a USB or serial connection. Nothing yet, but hope springs eternal right?<br /><br />Think about it like this: broadband connections are flourishing (not as fast as some had hoped, but they're becoming very common), and even in the case of "non-static IPs" like my cable modem provider, an IP address remains the same for quite some time (I've had the same IP for eight months). There are also <a href="http://www.tzo.com">dynamic DNS services</a> that will give you a domain address and client software to keep the IP up to date. Bottom line: today, your PC connected to the Internet can be found and accessed easily.<br /><br />Now what if ActiveSync listed on a specific port? Any requests coming into that port and IP address would require authentication (perhaps checked against known partnerships), and if they pass security checks, a remote ActiveSync would occur. Any new email, new appointments, or new contacts from your desktop PC or Pocket PC would be synched to both devices. You'd always be up to date! If your Pocket PC suffered a hard reset on the road, perhaps there would be a way to initiate a new partnership to get your data back onto your device.<br /><br />I know that you can do some of the same things with RAS and an Exchange server running MIS, but I'm talking about a relatively simple tweak to ActiveSync that would open up a lot of possibilities to those of us who don't have Exchange servers in our office. Microsoft is so focused on the Enterprise audience that they get a little myopic when it comes to creating solutions that work outside the Enterprise.<br /><br />Perhaps this is also an opportunity for a clever developer to create an application that would act as an intermediary and trick ActiveSync into thinking that the remote Pocket PC was really local?

[jeff]

I got Internet ActiveSync up and running really well under the original Pocket PC OS. All I had to do was open up ports 5678, 5679, 990, and 999 on my home router and put my home PC's IP address in the WINS field of whatever network connection I was using. Then I'd make my connection either via ethernet or modem and hit the sync button in the old ActiveSync application. It worked every time.

Now I can't figure out how to set things up properly with the Connection Mangler. I do the exact same setup with a CF ethernet card and it immediately tells me my connection settings aren't able to make the connection. The 2002 OS update was far more steps back than forward my uses.

Jeff

[pradike]

:) Jason - you are on target with all of your observations & comments.

As a fellow newcomer to the world & potential of wireless PDA use via my Ipaq, I can see that the only missing link is the sync (Activsync) capabilities on a more reliable & flexible basis.

With WIFI locations popping up all over the place...its beginning to look like a typhoon of use around the corner in late 2002 or early 2003. Hotels, airports, and restaurants have already gotten the message, and are ramping up for 802.11b. Businesses will hopefully begin to get over their paranoia on security (you can set up security that is at least as good as wire-based networks today) and also grow in adopting this fine technology.

The two obstacles, however, are 1) Microsoft's adoption of the improvements you identify and 2) whether or not the WIFI locations become "revenue streams" or "utilities". If those locations are looking to use WIFI as a "fee-based money maker"... few users will adopt it mainstream, whereas, if the 802.11b sites are used to attract more business towards the core competencies of the locations (sell donuts, coffee, whatever)...they it could really take off.

Lost in all this is the fact that Bluetooth may get blown away in the mainstream, if the costs and availability of WIFI come true. There are mostly advantages and few disadvantages of WIFI over Bluetooth. The few new devices (phones, headphones, etc. pale in comparison to the general WIFI flexibility & scalability.

Hope your ideas are forwarded to the "gurus" at Microsoft!

[Jason Dunn]

Jeff - that's interesting. I thought it *might* have been possible, so thanks for confirming that, but the steps you described are beyond the abilities of most users. Let me know if you get it working! If you do, sounds like it might be a good step by step for Thoughts to host. 8)

[mel]

There's a program called PocketHosts that basically lets you map a static IP to a WINS name. I have used this program occasionally when connecting my laptop and Pocket PC in 802.11 AdHoc mode. You might be able to put in your desktop's static IP and connect from anywhere. I've never tried doing this but it might work...

[ARW]

I understand what you're saying Jason and it would be nice for those of us who aren't on the corporate Exchange arrangement.

I have no way of knowing what msft's plans are, but I wouldn't be surprised to see the wireless carriers offering to host your email etc... on an Exchange server that they administer. They would of course have to charge a small monthly fee for this and we would of course eat up "minutes," but it would allow the carriers another revenue source, provide msft another outlet for their products and allow individuals a hosted/managed Exchange option.

Time will tell in any event.

[ChrisD]

Hi,
Activesync does not allow the user to select the port it uses. It is hard coded to use specific ports. See http://www.cewindows.net/wce/20/protocols.htm

Also, keep in mind that any decision to open these ports to the internet may put your system at risk. I have not test and do not know if ActiveSync is secure enough to prevent unauthorized use of your desktop!

[msprague]

There's a program called PocketHosts that basically lets you map a static IP to a WINS name. I have used this program occasionally when connecting my laptop and Pocket PC in 802.11 AdHoc mode. You might be able to put in your desktop's static IP and connect from anywhere. I've never tried doing this but it might work...
You can download Pocket Hosts at http://zimac.de/files/phosts.zip.
On your Pocket PC 2002 device go to ActiveSync | Tools | Options and make sure the "Include PC when synchronyzing ..." is checked and make note of the computer name listed. Now run Pocket Hosts on your device and enter this same computer name and its IP address.
After doing this I was able to connect my AudioVox Maestro to my Nextel i1000+ phone, dial in to my ISP, and Sync to my computer at work which has a static IP.
It works for me! :D Of course you also must have network syncing enabled on the desktop for this to work.
However, I don't know if it works with XDA devices and Phone Edition since I still don't have one of those. :wink:

http://michael.sprague.name/pocketpc/

[ChrisD]

Hi,
The Phone Editions work the same as the rest of the Pocket PC family do when it comes to ActiveSync. So if you've exposed your desktop to the internet and setup a partnership first, you can sync with it.

This solution with the hosts function is really something that Microsoft should include in rom. It would fix multiple issues with network sync as well as wireless.

There's a program called PocketHosts that basically lets you map a static IP to a WINS name. I have used this program occasionally when connecting my laptop and Pocket PC in 802.11 AdHoc mode. You might be able to put in your desktop's static IP and connect from anywhere. I've never tried doing this but it might work...
You can download Pocket Hosts at http://zimac.de/files/phosts.zip.
On your Pocket PC 2002 device go to ActiveSync | Tools | Options and make sure the "Include PC when synchronyzing ..." is checked and make note of the computer name listed. Now run Pocket Hosts on your device and enter this same computer name and its IP address.
After doing this I was able to connect my AudioVox Maestro to my Nextel i1000+ phone, dial in to my ISP, and Sync to my computer at work which has a static IP.
It works for me! :D Of course you also have to have network syncing enabled on the desktop for this to work.
However, I don't know if works with XDA devices and Phone Edition since I still don't have one of those. :wink:

http://michael.sprague.name/pocketpc/

[nwarren]

Bizarre - I've been trying to install MIS on Exchange 2000 this very evening. But with little success! So many pre-requisites - the last one being the presence of MQ Series (I guess for the transaction processing). I don't have that available so am going to have to call a halt.

Going to next have a look at Afaria from Excellenet - they've got a free 10 user version that you can get by answering a quiz. Not sure whether it's got PIM syncing included yet.

I really need remote access syncing, so I'd be interested in any other solutions.

[that_kid]

I have a setup that works fairly well. I have a vpn server(pptp) setup that lets me logon to my home domain. I'm on a cable modem so I use a dynamic dns service no-ip.com I can get on the net using my aircard 510, then start a sync session which then logs into the vpn server. Once I'm logged in, my ipaq finds my laptop and syncs with it. I like this solution as I don't have many ports open on my router, plus I can use the vpn session to administer the servers at my house or connect to the second half of my network(over ipsec vpn) at my parents house 350 miles away. Now all I need is a faster wireless connection for my ipaq.

[GregWard]

Just a thought but I suspect that any workaround will be highly susceptible to OS upgrades - even minor ones. This area strikes me as very close to "edge" from a security point of view - so any solutions (albeit innocent ones) may get caught up with MSoft's next attempt to bolster security. All it needs is some nasty so and so to use the same loophole to start loading Trojans (or something) and MSoft will have to come down on it like a ton of bricks.

So - for what it's worth - if you get a solution that works I wouldn't get to depend on it too much - just in case.

The long term - right - solution has to be to have it built-in.

[Crash Biker]

I have successfully ftp'd and installed a brand new app to my iPAQ from my iPAQ using my CF WiFi card (twice).

Example one I used terminal services to control my Win XP Pro desktop to download the app, connected via activesync on iPAQ, double clicked the .exe via terminal services, clicked yes twice and then confirmed default install directory on the ipaq. Worked perfectly, wasn't pretty but I thought it was very cool.

Second time I ftp'd app to the ipaq, then used activesync to sync my files back to the pc, then used terminal services to doubleclick etc.

I have also proved that I can use my iPAQ bluetooth connected to my Ericsson R520m to dial my home PC via its modem. Activesync works great through this link also. It is slow (14400) but plenty for resyncing any new email in the last couple of hours. This also feels secure(ish) in that its a direct telco link and not via the internet.

My home lan routes to the internet via a NAT router that will let me remap any external ports to different internal ports so using that I could remap the activesync port numbers to my hearts content and guarantee that any activesync traffic would go to my personal pc.

If that worried you then go with a VPN as suggested.

If you don't like that then dial up via a modem just long enough to start activesync and get your dynamic ip address, then drop the analogue dial up and go via internet or vpn.

It seems to me that the combination of terminal services, an old fashioned dial up modem and (if needed) a router with NAT would get you any combination of service and security that you wish.

Again, I'm not claiming that this is especially pretty, but we expect kids to have to learn to drive before we give them a permit and let them drive and I simply don't think everything in computing terms will always be instantly achievable without a bit of effort. There really is nothing complicated here, it's just not familiar yet.

Hope this is of some interest (other than proving my lunacy)

Cheers

Crash

[that_kid]

I tried the bluetooh deal but I the card I have for my laptop is doesn't seem to work that well. After I initiate my first sync session I cannot sync via bluetooth anymore. For whatever reason the bluetooth stack on the laptop locks the bluetooth serial port and it won't work until I restart windows again. I have the ambicom cf card in my laptop. I may have to go with the socket card since I've heard good things about it.

[fmcpherson]

I'm thinking what would help here is a reasonably priced, consumer-grade VPN device akin to the Linksys Cable/DSL routers. Then you could VPN in to your home network and do a network sync. That would in turn resolve the security issues.

[that_kid]

fmcpherson
They're available right now. I have a pair of linksys vpn routers and they work great, only thing is they use ipsec which I prefer, but the client in pppc is pptp. Now there is a company www.snapgear.com who make a vpn router that does both pptp and ipsec. I had one of their top models but the pirce of that one wasn't too appealing(I broght 2 linksys vpn routers for less). They do have a slimmed down version for around $250 that does well and all of them are based on embeded linux. The only cavet is some of the menus were a little hard to follow but for $250 you can have both pptp and ipsec endpoints. No setting up servers or opeing ports to your network.

[Jason Dunn]

Very, very interesting. It seems like I'm the only one who didn't know how to do this? :lol:

[jdhill]

Very, very interesting. It seems like I'm the only one who didn't know how to do this? :lol:
I'm sooooooooooooooo disappointed in you Jason !!! I thought you knew everything !!! :wink:

[Jason Dunn]

I'm sooooooooooooooo disappointed in you Jason !!! I thought you knew everything !!! :wink:

I can muck with firewalls, ports, TCP/IP, and most other networking things easily, but when I see WINS I just have brain lock. I STILL don't understand it..!? 8O Someone explain it to me as it relates to this topic.

[TBone]

I wasn't really aware that it did. My laptop doesn't use WINS at all when I network sync--I do have to have the network name of the host set up in PocketHosts, but once I do that it works flawlessly. As far as I'm aware, net Activesync works pretty well if you're within the network or if your computer is openly present on the Internet at large. If you're behind a firewall--well, I guess then it depends how easy your firewall is to administer and how much networking you know, but even then it's really all just about opening those 4 ports.

[jdhill]

WINS was created by Microsoft to supply the equivalent of a dynamic DNS. Prior to MS standardizing on TCP/IP, you might have been running IPX/SPX or NetBUEI (sp?). They needed a name resolution service and they wanted it to be dynamic so that a client could register and un-register it's NetBIOS name and address.

Now that most networks use DNS and many are using the Windows 2000 dynamic DNS, there is not much need for WINS any longer.

However, most home networks don't have a DNS server. They also don't have a WINS server. Fortunately, a Windows PC can act like a WINS server and resolve its own NetBIOS name to an IP address.

That's why you normally need to put your home PC's IP address in the WINS field on your Pocket PC's TCP/IP configuration. And that's only necessary if you want to ActiveSync with or access other network resources on that PC. You must have some type of name resolution available since the partnership includes only the name, but ActiveSync over the network is using TCP/IP and needs to know the IP address.

Another alternative on a PC is to use a HOSTS file for TCP/IP host names and IP addresses or an LMHOSTS file for NetBIOS names and IP addresses. There is software available for the Pocket PC that can provide the function of the HOSTS/LMHOSTS file, but using the IP address of the PC in the Pocket PC's WINS field is the simpler solution.

[Jason Dunn]

OH MY GOD! I ACTUALLY GOT IT TO WORK!

http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/giantgrin.gif

Thanks so much everyone for your bits of wisdom - I pieced it together, opened the right ports, used Pocket Hosts, and it worked. Wow. I LOVE learning new things, so thanks for educating me!

[that_kid]

That's great Jason, glad you're up and running. :D

[Jonathon Watkins]

So an old dog can learn new tricks then! :wink: :D