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Date:      Sun, 21 Oct 2001 01:32:13 -0400
From:      Allen Landsidel <all@biosys.net>
To:        Kal Torak <kaltorak@quake.com.au>, FreeBSD Stable <freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG>
Subject:   Re: ICQ with NAT problems
Message-ID:  <5.1.0.14.0.20011021012339.00b2b3a8@rfnj.org>
In-Reply-To: <3BD2538D.80604@quake.com.au>
References:  <3BD21435.4060605@quake.com.au>

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At 02:48 PM 10/21/2001 +1000, Kal Torak wrote:
>Thanks for the replies, but let me make it clear what I
>am saying..

I read your problem.. now let me state that you are mistaken.

ICQ does not operate this way.

Let me elaborate:

The first thing ICQ does is create a connection to the server.  This is an 
outgoing connection to TCP port 5190 on login.icq.com.

After this, it opens listening TCP ports in the (default) range of 
1024-65535.  These are used only for client-client communications.

UDP is not involved anywhere.  I know the "dumb" FAQ for ICQ still says 
that, but the detailed FAQ @ 
http://www.icq.com/icqtour/firewall/netadmin.html makes no mention of it.

So, you have two options.

#1 Run a Socks proxy.  You have said you (for whatever reason, it's really 
not a bad idea) don't want to do this.

#2 Configure ICQ to use a certain range of listening TCP ports.  Use a 
different port range on each machine that will be running ICQ, and 
configure NAT to forward connections to these ports appropriately.

I've done both things on connections from a T1 all the way down to 28.8kbps 
multiuser modem connection, and they work fine.. I really would suggest the 
proxy though, they exist to solve just such problems.. trying other methods 
is really a bit like trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole; 
You're behind NAT, and you have to deal with it.


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