Hi !

I haven't been using Seti for a while now (had problems when I switched my computer to Linux and since problems were never resolved I never bothered)... Today came the email that they need additional processing power, so I decided to get it working on my work computer, which is Mac...

I installed BOINC app, but I can't connect to project. Error message is "The project is temporarily unavailable.". I checked with url i found in Event log and I I get xml with data back, but somehow BOINC doesn't recognize it.. I am behind firefall if this might make a problem (ports 80 and 8080 are opened).

Please help...
Andy

P.S.: My mac is "macOS Sierra (10.12.6) and BOINC manager is 7.8.3

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Well, BOINC would need port 80 for internet connections. But is this port really open, or is it open via VPN or proxy?
If you're using a proxy, you'll need to tell BOINC about that.

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Its very dangerous to leave port 80 open on the way in. Most firewalls are stateful, meaning that if the request(s) originates from inside the network, return traffic is allowed through automatically. Leaving port 80 open can leave you vulnerable.

That being said, I notice portions of the website are now secure so traffic might be coming in over 443, though I don't know if the "attach" process is over a secure channel or not. Just a thought.

We have firewall and then we use VPN to connect to "sister" company infrastructure.

I turned off the VPN and then tried to Add Project, with same results.

As for how ports are opened I wouldn't know how, but I can connect to outside world to pages running on ports 80 and 8080, I can also access some other ports like 21, 22 and some others. 443 is also open.

I think that problem is not tied directly to Seti@Home project. I tried with some other projects and got the same result.

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It seems it was network problem.

I connected via my mobile device and it started working... Sorry for bothering you guys... It seems that the site is somehow blacklisted on my company's network... But weird is there was no indication of that in Event log...

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Why would the client report that the link is being blocked by your company? To the client, all it knows is that it can't connect, which is what it told you.

Companies end up blocking SETI@home because too many people decide to use corporate assets without permission. In some companies that's a fireable offense.

One of the conditions of use for both BOINC and SETI@Home is that you have permission from the compter owner and the network owner to do so.
Owner in this context is to include employer where the computer concerned was provided by them for use on company business.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Not really.

The message is to vague to tell anything useful. It just said unable to connect to project, which is why I had to try several versions of client several other projects. If it would say can't connect (even in log) and why, that would have been helpful. Information like "check for firewall/proxy settings", would let me know that problem is with corporate network and not with my installation of Seti/Boinc. Especially if the check was done before even connecting to specific project, so that we could rule even that out. I actually run several from of urls shown in log file, and result for most of them was ok. So either some other call is made that is not logged and that one failed, or I am missing something...
But at least it works now (with using mobile connection), but it would be better if I didn't have to use external resources...

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Isn't checking firewall and proxy settings part of normal troubleshooting? Appropos, you checked your firewall settings and stated you had allowed port 80 and 443 through, suggesting you only did so on your local machine settings and not verifying with your company's settings. So back to: if your company is blocking SETI@home, how is the application to know blocking is being performed other than telling you "unable to connect"? Yes, it is absolutely vague. Most failures are because the programmer cannot check for every possible scenario and human intervention is still required - in this case making sure you're authorized to run SETI@home on your corporate network.