UPS management in slave mode

[mathieu]

You are right i'm quite frustrated
And you are right i didn't do my job by verifying with the demo CD if every features useful for me were in the product i was evaluating.
I feel quite bad about myself on this point... but i still think you are facing an "entreprise" feature problem which should be in an "entreprise" solution.

Concerning the SFTP (maybe we should open a new thread from here...), i'm actually running NAS-XSR Entreprise version 3.08.XE00000000.2145 and have the firewall problem i speak of, maybe it is already corrected in an update, but i haven't seen anything about this in the updates changelog.

The FTP problem is a complex problem (I have already spent many hours studying SFTP with NAT to solve this issue), you are saying that i must open ports 1024 to 65536 on my firewall for the FTP server to answer which is completely crazy for a network administrator. (I'm sure you will agree)
BUT there is also another problem, the NAS FTP server sends its own internal IP address, so the client still cannot connect throught the worldwideweb.

I had a very interesting talk by email with "Bruce" from your mail support team in November (See issue RefID#10004112) and he agree with me about this.
I also ask him about putting the following configuration parameters in your proftpd.conf :

MasqueradeAddress  ftp.mydomain.com
PassivePorts     65530 65535

Which will allow the FTP server to send his external IP address instead of the intenal one like it is done actually, it also allow the NAS admin to define on which port the FTP server will answer to the clients, such allowing the network admin to open only a few and dedicated ports.

I'm not an FTP expert so tell me if i am wrong.

PS : I'm sure you will find my contact information in my profile on this forum or in the support RefID provided above.

Thanks for your help.

#################################################

You will find below explanation i give by email to your mail support team to explain my understanding of the SFTP problem :

Case 1 : Client is in passive mode
---------------------------------------------------- 
The client connect and then, receive the following message :
 
    [17:03:30] Command:    PASV
    [17:03:30] Response:    227 Entering Passive Mode (192,168,1,10,136,254).
    [17:03:30] Command:    LIST
    [17:03:51] Error:    Transfer channel can't be opened.
 
We can see here that the NAS server sends its internal IP address and some random TCP port for the client to connect to, but the IP is an internal IP and the TCP port are so random that i can't open them on the firewall.
I guess it would work if i could modify the following proftp server variables :
 
    MasqueradeAddress    ftp.mydomain.com
    PassivePorts         60000 65535
 
Then i could open the 60000-65535 TCP ports onto my firewall, to allow passive communication with the client.
 
Case 2 : Client is in active mode
--------------------------------------------------
The client connect and then, receive the following message :
 
    [17:04:23] Status:    Connected
    [17:04:23] Status:    Retrieving directory listing...
    [17:04:23] Command:    PWD
    [17:04:23] Response:    257 "/" is current directory.
    [17:04:23] Command:    TYPE A
    [17:04:23] Response:    200 Type set to A
    [17:04:23] Command:    PORT 192,168,2,126,16,46
    [17:04:23] Response:    500 Illegal PORT command
    [17:04:23] Error:    Could not retrieve directory listing
 
Here, the message "Illegal PORT command" tells the client to activate "passive mode", and i'm back in case 1.
 
Documentations used :
-------------------------------------
 * http://slacksite.com/other/ftp.html
 * http://www.castaglia.org/proftpd/doc...HOWTO-NAT.html
 * http://www.castaglia.org/proftpd/doc...HOWTO-TLS.html
 * http://www.ford-hutchinson.com/~fh-1-pfh/ftps-ext.html
 * http://support.ipswitch.com/kb/WS-19980722-BK01.htm
 * http://support.ipswitch.com/kb/WS-20001228-DM04.htm

[To-M]

Mathieu,

I have reviewed the case from support and Bruce is correct on this matter with sFTP, that we cannot do anything with this issue until plans for our future releases. At this point I would like you to contact our sales person at 49 (89) 800777-0 to possibly resolve your upgrade opportunities for future developments of the UPS issue with R-3. But I do not know when the update for this will be as no set date has been identified.

[jparis]

Hi,

I have the same problem as Mathieu, one brand new big MGE UPS that can communicate with all the equipment in the rack but the XSR Enterprise. And I agree point by point with all Mathieu said. When you buy a "enterprise" product you think on the 'full' thing (This is what I was thinking when I recommended it for my company). I rely on MGE because their basic communication systems works great and easy on PC's, MAC's and so on and it's very reliable, I tried APC some time ago and I find it less reliable.

I beg you to think about implementing the 'server' or the 'client' mode for MGE in your product.

Maybe R-3 is better and so on, it's OK because it's a new product and must be better that the old one, but why abandon XSR Enterprise? It was your flagship only some months ago... I bought it 6 months ago and now you are saying that, maybe, you will never implement the support for MGE ups slave or master mode... It's frustrating...

Thanks in advance.
Jparis

[To-M]

I realize the frustration level, but currently the main developments are in R-3 and as for the NAS XSR Enterprise I have no time table as if there will updates to fix this currently. The reason for R-3 is because it is based on our DSS engine - meaning one update will be for all R-3 updates including SOHO, SMB and iSCSI R-3 family. Instead for each independent update for all products of the XSR family.