Bugzilla – Bug 15029
Add localhost to default allowedHosts list
Last modified: 2009-11-19 08:25:31 UTC
7.4.1 Server was up and running with a Squeezebox connected to it fine. Only just managed to get everything running correctly earlier today after starting install on the weekend (due to IE Cookie Problem reported earlier). While 7.4.1 Server was running and player was connected the computer went to Hibernation due to inactivity. When the computer was brought out of Hibernation, Squeezebox Server was running, player was connected and was able to search the library and play music just fine, but I was completely unable to access the Web based user interface. Everytime I tried to pull up the main Web UI or the Advanced Settings UI, I just got Internet Explorer error messages - nothing at all. In addition, I was not able to stop the server from either the Tray Icon or from the Control Panel. I rebooted the computer and Server appeared to come up fine and Squeezebox worked fine but still couldn't access the UI's at all and still couldn't stop or start Server. I renamed the preferences file and rebooted the computer and this time it came back up working okay (but all my settings were gone of course). I'm still trying various things to see if I can narrow down exactly what circumstances trigger the error but in the meantime I thought I should report it. May be different symptoms if Web UI is open vs. closed when system hibernates and if Squeezebox Player is "on" or "off". There is also the possibility that it might be affected by the particular preferences I had set ? Attached is a screenshot of what I got when I tried to run the Web UI as well as a copy of the server preferences file that I had to rename in order to get things to start working again. I'm hoping that by looking at the server preferences file, you can see what has become corrupted or at least reproduce the error on your end.
Created attachment 6260 [details] Screen Shot of IE when trying to load Web UI
Created attachment 6261 [details] Corrupted Server Preferences File
Michael: your thoughts on this one? could server password protection cause this type of error? Neill: do you see this error happen when you disable server password protection?
I've been slowly (bit by bit) restoring my preferences / settings in an effort to trigger the error again but so far I have not yet hit upon the cause. I haven't yet turned on the password protection again so can't tell you if that makes a difference. Starting from a clean preferences file, I have reentered all the player preferences (did not crash) and pointed to the music library (did not crash), configured SuperDateTime (did not crash). Perhaps I'll try adding the security back as the next step. It's a bit difficult to test since I'm trying scenarios of Web UI open, and Web UI closed, Player on, Player off, at the time of hibernation to try and cover all the basis. Wish I could remember the state of everything when the original crash occurred. I was really hoping that the corrupted preferences file would give you a clue. Can you rename this file and copy it over to an install of 7.4.1 on a Windows Machine and see what happens when you try to run (recognizing that you won't have the same player name so perhaps this won't be a true test) ? I should mention that during my subsequent testing, while I haven't had a complete crash, I have had one or two instances where the WebUI started to load and then froze (with the message that the page was loading) and I had to close it and launch it again. It always came up on the second try though.
Quick update ... I have managed to reproduce the problem. Definitely not related to password security. The only things I changed in my last test were: - I changed from a local music folder to a network music folder (ReadyNAS) - I changed Security settings to block incoming connections but provided exception for 192.168.1.* (which should be everything on my network) - I rescanned the music library - Web UI and Settings UI both open When the computer hibernated and I restarted, I closed these windows and attempted to reopen - UI's were crashed. I restored the server preference file that I saved just before I made the changed listed above and then rebooted. Everything came up fine. Working on narrowing down which of these changes is the culprit - will advise further
I found the problem ... prior versions of SqueezeCenter automatically created two "Allowed IP Address" entries the Advanced/Security settings page. One for "127.0.0.1" and one for your machines current IP address (e.g., 192.168.1.200). Version 7.4.1 only creates a single "Allowed IP Address" in the default preferences file. This is the current IP address of the local machine (e.g., 192.168.1.200). This means that when the user turns on the "Block Incoming Connections" option, which is normally off, unless they know to add the additional exception, the UI"s will be blocked from accessing a server running on the same machine. When I put back the "crashed" server preferences file I uploaded to you, I confirmed that I could not access the UI from the local machine but I had no problem accessing from another computer on my network since I had set the exception to 192.168.1.*. When I added the exception 127.0.0.1 from the remote computer, I then had no problem pulling up the UI locally. It should be a very simple fix to correct the program so that it always recreates the exception for "127.0.0.1" and then this problem will go away. It's a bit frustrating that this version of the Server has introduced such minor oversight type glitches (the use of cookies without create the privacy exception and then not creating an exception for the local machine) and that I've had to spend so many hours trying to track them down ...
I checked the code history and couldn't find any related change in > 1 year. Didn't go further back in time. I'll make this an enhancement request as it's not a bug.