Reef Angel Forum

Hi everyone,

As many of you may have experienced, the problem with noip affected a bunch of us that use or used their DDNS service to resolve ip addresses.
Due to this issue, I decided that it was time to research for our own solution and I'm glad to report that we will be resolving ip addresses now
I've implemented our own DDNS service that is integrated with your controller and Portal.
This service will be available to anyone that owns a Reef Angel at no additional cost. Yay!! Free DDNS service that is easy to use
I have patched our libraries and this implementation will be pushed in the next upcoming libraries update 1.1.1, but I'd like to have a couple people test it before it is released. So, if you would like to test it, grab the latest dev branch from github.
All you will need to add to your code to enable the DDNS service is this line either in setup() or loop(), but setup would be preferred. Where you can change "subdomain" to whatever you choose to make it a unique to you.
Next time your controller sends data to the Portal, it will also create/update the DDNS record.
Your DDNS record will be your forum username with a "-" and the "subdomain" word you choose above followed by .myreefangel.com
For example, if I were to choose the word "home", my DDNS record would be rimai-home.myreefangel.com
Please let us know if you get to try it and how it works out for you.

This is an excellent idea. I think it is fantastic and will work out great for people!

I fully support this.

On a side note, I will still be maintaining the alternative DDNS domain name for people to use who cannot run the latest libraries due to their limitations of their controllers (ie, standard RA's).

In true RA fashion, we have multiple options to go with now. Pretty awesome!

Yes very nice. And also good for people who may be setting up tanks where they don't have anyway to run a DDNS client, etc.

Great job!

Great Idea Roberto.
I can't wait for the 1.1.1 libraries to come out.
Between this and the server authentication, some cool stuff happening.

Sigh... Another reason to upgrade to plus

DDNS has been working great until the power went out today.
The wireless router and internet are all back up and running and the portal does show I'm connected with a different IP address then before, expect anything the used my DNS name set up here is not working.

The Android, U-App and my IP Camera will only connect with the internal IP address or the current external IP address, but not the DNS name.

It shouldn't be an issue with the new IP address propagating thru the internet. That's the point of the DNS name, it's already propagated thru the internet and when it gets a new IP address from the WiFi unit it makes that change automatically.

Reeftronics is still showing my dns name as having and IP address of 65.3.96.176.

Again I;m sure it's something over her, I just don't know what.
I've rebooted about 3-4 time and no difference.

Thanks for the help.

Sounds like the ttl for the records arent set correctly.

It's working now. So either Roberto fixed the issue or it took some time to make it's way thru the internet.
I hope Roberto fixed it because waiting a 1/2 to full day for an IP change to make it's way thru the internet shouldn't have to happen.

Doing a query on your hostname, the TTL is set for 3600 which is 60 minutes.

So there should only be a delay in finding the new IP address for 1 hour.

Bot it certainly seemed like longer than that.

Yes.

In comparison my dyndns address has a 60 second ttl.

Let me check the server. I did not do anything, so it's got to be the time-to-live setting.

Does this look ok, Lee?

Yeah but I'll double check a host within the domain.

The specific entries no longer have a TTL associated so it would follow the default which looks correct to me. The only way to verify would be to have an entry change IP and see how long it takes to refresh the DNS outside.

This should be a sticky!

--Colin

Except it doesn't seem to be working.

--Colin

What's not working? I've been using it since September with no problem.

I guess the "_" got changed to a "-"?

--Colin

Yes it did. There was a problem with the android app or the portal with the "_".

Roberto, could you update the original post and make this a sticky? It will certainly help the new folks.

--Colin

Sacohen wrote:Yes it did. There was a problem with the android app or the portal with the "_".

the character violated the dns name specifications, so the character was changed to be in compliance with the dns standards.

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cosmith71 wrote:Roberto, could you update the original post and make this a sticky? It will certainly help the new folks.

--Colin

i just updated the OP and changed the "_" to "-" and made the topic a sticky.

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Thanks, Curt.

--Colin

I'm still having problems with my portal. i cant seem to access it outside of the app or on reef angel website. ive tried posting my ddns into the address bar and even tried the ip address for my wifi attachement. im lost

vvjosh06 wrote:I'm still having problems with my portal. i cant seem to access it outside of the app or on reef angel website. ive tried posting my ddns into the address bar and even tried the ip address for my wifi attachement. im lost

The Portal (website) and the apps are the only ways to access your RA right now. Accessing the controller directly is still in beta and doesn't work very well.

--Colin

If you want to access it directly add /r99 to the URL (http://www.xxx.yyy.zzz:2000/r99)

If this works with your internal IP and not your external IP then your port forwarding is not working

I changed my subdomain from the default in a continuing set of things I'm doing to improve security a bit. Anyone know how quickly it gets updated by the RA server in the zone file?

Edit: It gets updated right away if you get the ReefAngel.Portal() syntax right. I forgot to put a comma between the username and portal key, so it never took affect until I fixed it. Doh.

I am SO confused with out to make my RA accessible from anywhere outside of my network. I do not understand all of the jargon(dns, tcp, ymca, smtp). So far I have not found a thread that helps in simple terms how to set this up. i contacted reef angel and the guy has helped me with the wifi box connecting but he doesnt have any support for the port forwarding. i have a netgear router and i added the ports and ip address to port forwarding but still it doesnt work i have to assume its not as easy as typing in the port and ip address. because i did that and it doesnt work so there must be more to it. can anyone help with this? im willing to trade a zoa frag for information if need be.

What model Netgear router?
I want to try information on it online.

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