Content Server problems

[jesscat]

I am running 8.2 on XP, trying to start the content server for the first time (I've never used it before), and getting the "Port xxxx not free on 0.0.0.0." I've gone through all the threads I can find on this topic, as well as the user manual, and I've tried every suggestion I've seen: disabled all AV, tried port numbers ranging from 8787 to 45000, rebooted and then started Calibre first thing with nothing else running, run netstat to see if anything is using the ports I'm trying (nothing is) - but I'm getting this error on every port I try, and I've tried many, many ports, many many times.

Does anyone have any other suggestions?

[kovidgoyal]

Go to preferences->tweaks and try changing what ip address the server listens on to the ip address of your network interface.

[jesscat]

I'm not quite sure what the ip address of my network interface is - is that what I get as the ip address when I do an ipconfig /all? If so, changing the tweak to that value isn't solving the problem.

I'm reluctant to accept that I'm just not going to be able to use the content server, but I've run out of ideas and am not knowledgeable enough about this area to know what else to try. Could it be a router setting (I don't think I have anything unusual...)? Anyone have any other thoughts/ideas?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by jesscat

I'm not quite sure what the ip address of my network interface is - is that what I get as the ip address when I do an ipconfig /all? If so, changing the tweak to that value isn't solving the problem.

I'm reluctant to accept that I'm just not going to be able to use the content server, but I've run out of ideas and am not knowledgeable enough about this area to know what else to try. Could it be a router setting (I don't think I have anything unusual...)? Anyone have any other thoughts/ideas?

The router should only affect access from OUTSIDE your LAN. (note: Use of a WiFi Router and a Separate Router for the Wired LAN can appear as 2 separate, ISOLATED networks)

What happens when you click the 'test' button on the Content server configuration page?
(my XP SP3 Firefox starts and asks for the username/password assigned to the CS)

[chilady1]

Originally Posted by jesscat

I am running 8.2 on XP, trying to start the content server for the first time (I've never used it before), and getting the "Port xxxx not free on 0.0.0.0." I've gone through all the threads I can find on this topic, as well as the user manual, and I've tried every suggestion I've seen: disabled all AV, tried port numbers ranging from 8787 to 45000, rebooted and then started Calibre first thing with nothing else running, run netstat to see if anything is using the ports I'm trying (nothing is) - but I'm getting this error on every port I try, and I've tried many, many ports, many many times.

Does anyone have any other suggestions?

I am having the same problem. Couple of things I have done:

1. Increased the timeout to 300 seconds
2. Change the port a couple of times, finally did cmd prompt and 8080 is listening and not used by any other application.
3. Turned off Airport mode on iPhone thinking it could be interferring with wifi.

I am running Win 7, latest version of Calibre and Stanza 3.1. This works fine at home, Stanza sees my catalog with no problem. Once I leave the house, that's when the problems start. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

[itimpi]

CHilday1 Am I correct in inpreting what you are saying to mean that you are OK using the Content Server when you are at home and able to access it via your local WiFi network, but what you want to do is also access it when away from home? If so this is completely different problem that revolves around how to set up your router to allow access from the public internet.

[jesscat]

Originally Posted by theducks

The router should only affect access from OUTSIDE your LAN. (note: Use of a WiFi Router and a Separate Router for the Wired LAN can appear as 2 separate, ISOLATED networks)

What happens when you click the 'test' button on the Content server configuration page?
(my XP SP3 Firefox starts and asks for the username/password assigned to the CS)

The "test" button on the content server configuration page is grayed out - I can't click it. Could this indicate something about the problem? (I too am on XP SP3).

(And if it matters, I have only a single router for both wifi and my wired lan.)

wrt Chilady's post - I don't see the field for the timeout setting? And I'm not sure what you mean by you "did cmd prompt." Did these things eventually result in success? I'm a little unclear from your post.

[jesscat]

And in case it matters, or means anything to anyone, the error messages I'm getting in the log are:

[23/May/2011:20:00:15] ENGINE Shutting down due to error in start listener:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\wspbus.py", line 184, in start
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\wspbus.py", line 147, in publish
File "site-packages\cherrypy\_cpserver.py", line 90, in start
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\servers.py", line 53, in start
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\servers.py", line 251, in wait_for_free_port
IOError: Port 8080 not free on '0.0.0.0'

And sometimes something like (similar except I thought the "trying to bind" might be relevant):
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STOPPING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STOPPING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE HTTP Server cherrypy._cpwsgi_server.CPWSGIServer(('0.0.0.0', 18080)) already shut down
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE HTTP Server cherrypy._cpwsgi_server.CPWSGIServer(('0.0.0.0', 18080)) already shut down
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Stopped thread '_TimeoutMonitor'.
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Stopped thread '_TimeoutMonitor'.
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STOPPED
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STOPPED
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus EXITING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus EXITING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus EXITED
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus EXITED
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] Trying to bind to single interface: 10.0.0.4
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] Trying to bind to single interface: 10.0.0.4
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STARTING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Bus STARTING
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Started monitor thread '_TimeoutMonitor'.
[23/May/2011:20:55:50] ENGINE Started monitor thread '_TimeoutMonitor'.
[23/May/2011:20:55:55] ENGINE Error in 'start' listener <bound method Server.start of <cherrypy._cpserver.Server object at 0x034BEB50>>
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\wspbus.py", line 147, in publish
File "site-packages\cherrypy\_cpserver.py", line 90, in start
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\servers.py", line 53, in start
File "site-packages\cherrypy\process\servers.py", line 251, in wait_for_free_port
IOError: Port 8080 not free on '0.0.0.0'

[chaley]

@jesscat: are you running a network firewall that blocks network connections? Many "security suites" do this, as do dedicated firewalls like ZoneAlarm. If the program doesn't know about calibre, it might refuse to permit the calibre server to listen for connections from network (to act as a server). Calibre would see this as a failure to open a port.

The fix is to tell the security program that calibre is permitted to act as a server. How you do that depends on the security program. Somewhere in its configuration you should see 'firewall rules' or 'network access permissions' or some such. More than that I can't say.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by jesscat

The "test" button on the content server configuration page is grayed out - I can't click it. Could this indicate something about the problem? (I too am on XP SP3).

(And if it matters, I have only a single router for both wifi and my wired lan.)

wrt Chilady's post - I don't see the field for the timeout setting? And I'm not sure what you mean by you "did cmd prompt." Did these things eventually result in success? I'm a little unclear from your post.

You can't test because you failed to start at all as indicated in your next message.

You need to set your FW program to 'Allow' (I think this is the one) calibre-server.exe

[jesscat]

Originally Posted by theducks

You can't test because you failed to start at all as indicated in your next message.

You need to set your FW program to 'Allow' (I think this is the one) calibre-server.exe

The only FW I have running is Windows, and I have calibre-server.exe in the list of exceptions already. I have no other "security suite." I run Nod32 AV, but I already tried disabling it entirely, and that made no difference. I have a spyware program, but I disabled that as well. I simply cannot think of any other application that could be blocking it.

[chilady1]

Originally Posted by itimpi

CHilday1 Am I correct in inpreting what you are saying to mean that you are OK using the Content Server when you are at home and able to access it via your local WiFi network, but what you want to do is also access it when away from home? If so this is completely different problem that revolves around how to set up your router to allow access from the public internet.

Hi itimpi - Yes I am back. You are correct, I have no issue accessing my catalog from my home Wifi network although it does slug along, not that fast but I have a large # of books so that sounds about right. I have in my set up http://myipaddress:8080.

The issue based on former conversations with Dropbox vs. Sugarsync not working for the Calbre2opds functionality is that now, I am trying to generate my catalog via Calibre server. When I leave the house, I cannot access the catalog and I thought I had set my network up to allow access to Calibre. Help?

[EvilWayz]

I don't know about the op, but my test button is grayed out, because the server can't start. I'm a little closer to the problem, since now it tells me port on 192.168.1.101 is not free, instead of 0.0.0.0. I've tried several different ports, same message.

[itimpi]

Originally Posted by chilady1

The issue based on former conversations with Dropbox vs. Sugarsync not working for the Calbre2opds functionality is that now, I am trying to generate my catalog via Calibre server. When I leave the house, I cannot access the catalog and I thought I had set my network up to allow access to Calibre. Help?

To do this yopu have to know the public internet addess of your broadband connection (not the address on your home network), or use a service like www.dyndns.org to handle that for you. You then have to tell the router to allow inbound connections on a specific port and that those connections have to routed to the PC/port that is running the Calibre server. The details of how to do this will be different depending on the make/model of router you have and possibly also whether you are using an ADSL or Cable broadband link.

This is all possible (it is how I have my own home network set up), but is not for the faint-hearted

[kovidgoyal]

IOError: Port 8080 not free on '0.0.0.0'

is raised only if an attempt to connect to that port on localhost succeeds. Run this code:

calibre-debug -c "import socket; s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET); s.settimeout(10.0); s.connect(('127.0.0.1', 8080)); s.close(); print 'Something is listening on 127.0.0.1:8080'"

If you dont have anything listening on port 8080 on localhost, that must return a Connection refused error.

EDIT: Changed the command to print out a message when something accepts the connection