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Question

how do find out what ports iPads use for various things

Apr 2, 2012 5:53PM PDT

Hi, I have 1100 iPad 2's and I connect to the internet on them through a third party proxy (provided by the county - its not optional) and they will unblock ports for me, but I have to tell them specifically what ones and what it will be connecting to on the 'other side' so to speak, which is fine, but I have given the easily findable ones from the internet, and yet things like updating over the air don't work.

Does anyone know a conclusive place I can find the ports and what they connect to for things like the over the air updates, or how to discover them? I am also having issues with some apps like cloudon and the like, so being able to discover the information myself would be handy.

Currently I have tried setting up an ad-hoc network and using wireshark, but even then we have not been able to tie down exactly what is causing them not to update - with that many devices, you can imagine that being able to update over the air would be a big help.

thanks

Charles

Discussion is locked

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Answer
With 1,100 iPads.
Apr 3, 2012 1:41AM PDT

I would think you would be able to call Apple and ask this question. Are you telling me they won't talk to someone with 1,100 iPads?
Bob

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you'd think
Apr 3, 2012 5:30PM PDT

You would think that I could call someone up, but the problem is, as far as I am concerned, that I am insulated from anyone at apple who actually KNOWS any technical details about anything by a bunch of sales focused 'experts' who basically direct you to google or apple's support forums and that's it, something which I managed to do myself. All they want me to do, it seems, is bin off my pre-existing systems and replace them with apple versions, even when I don't see how this would solve the issues that I have, which is exactly where my issue/frustration comes from.

If anyone has a concrete and actual apple technical contact (not some third party company trying to sell me something else) I'd be more than happy to give them a call/mail, but such people seem thin on the ground.

Thanks

Charles

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I wonder if this is what you are looking for
Apr 3, 2012 9:40PM PDT
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helpful but
Apr 4, 2012 5:24PM PDT

This is a helpful table, but its something I found before - the broadband supplier for schools where I am is run by the council and they maintain the firewall and proxy (you can imagine this never causes issues when you want to do something different to everyone else, like have a hat full of iPads) - to say they are reluctant to open up ports on the firewall is understating things. I sent them that list and they simply said they won't open all those ports, we have to be able to justify what we want ports open for, specifically, and further more, they ideally want to know what you will be connecting to on the other end - for example, the last lot of ports I sent them to get opened to try and resolve this issue was this :


"Source: phobos.apple.com, deimos3.apple.com, albert.apple.com, gs.apple.com, itunes.apple.com, ax.itunes.apple.com, ax.init.itunes.apple.com, ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net
Destination: All
Ports: 80, 443, 3689, 5297, 5298, 5353, 8000-8999, and 42000-42999.
Direction: Both
Action: Allow

Source: evintl-ocsp.verisign.com, evsecure-ocsp.verisign.com
Destination: All
Ports: 80, 443
Direction: Both
Action: Allow

Source: mesu.apple.com
Destination: All
Ports: 49255
Direction: Both
Action: Allow"

yet, still no joy.

Charles

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That's good to know.
Apr 4, 2012 3:23AM PDT

So far we use the Apple developer forums. Why? Well we are writing apps so that's all we worry about. If apple won't support your 1,100 unit base, maybe they are beginning the slide back to where they came from (pre-Jobs.)
Bob

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if they keep it up.....
Apr 4, 2012 7:45AM PDT

...they will have more unhappy customers and may be eventually "out of Jobs". Devil

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Back to work.
Apr 4, 2012 7:58AM PDT

If I was to sniff this out I'd get out my Apple and install LITTLE SNITCH on that. Then I'd run Ethernet to my Apple laptop then configure it to share my wired connection over the WiFi.

LITTLE SNITCH will help here. But then again some IT staffers are put off by such adventures or tools.
Bob

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Little snitch
Apr 4, 2012 5:32PM PDT

Hi Bob,

I have had a quick look at Little Snitch, it looks pretty handy, but I don't have a Mac, we run a fully windows computer network, however we have used sniffing tools to try and discover what ports its using, the problem being that our wired network is subject to the exact same firewall / filtering as the iPads, so I tend to only be able to see the first stage of anything thats happening, and seemingly we have opened these ports, at best it results in numerous requests to our ISP at worst it leads to us getting frustrated and giving up - its frustrating that I just can't find somewhere what ports each process uses, because it is fair to say that having some services blocked would be fantastic - we tried to find out conclusive ports to block to stop imessage working for example, but having blocked them, it still proceeded to work fine (but that's another issue)

Thanks

Charles

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Which is why I use a normal network when
Apr 5, 2012 2:05AM PDT

When I need to do this I use a normal network.

Remember that this is not about how to stop imessage as your top post was not about that. It's about what you asked about.

I have encountered IT staffers that work under grim conditions. That is, they would never be able to solve an issue since they work under conditions that prevent them from solving problems. Many burn out if they don't figure this out fast (that it's a mountain and they were given a toothpick to dig with.)

I agree something is missing from your story. I'll try to be as kind as I can and accept that most IT staffers are not allowed to call it in or talk to anyone in another country.
Bob

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Somehow I can't help feeling that there is something missing
Apr 4, 2012 9:18AM PDT

here.
1100 iPads are not purchased by going to Best Buy.

Somewhere there is an Apple Education Account Exec who should jump through hoops to find the answers to this question.
Calling 1-800-APPLE is not the way to go


P

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UK
Apr 4, 2012 5:36PM PDT

I would have to say that the whole iPad in education thing seems to be massively better supported in the US than it is here in the UK, everyone at apple I have been in contact with is either sales or puts me onto what I would call a 'mid level' geek - I never seem to get through to someone who 'knows', the people just tend to google the problem, and if that doesn't help them, then they are pretty well stuck, and I can achieve that level of diagnosis myself.

Don't get me wrong, on the whole, the whole project has been a technical success, just little nicities like being able to get the iPads to update over the air, which would reduce the load on us come update time, don't work, and finding out why is an issue - I'm having a similar issue with podcasts, the most frustrating thing is, its only with the iPad, the only device I really care about it working on, and can I find a definitive answer from anyone? I should be so lucky.

anyway, thanks for your guy's thoughts, I appreciate any little nuggets of information I can garner.

Thanks

Charles