Yep, it works...
 

Good luck with LW though, it may be a different story!

I saw you are from Portland, I"m in Washington County, near Canada.

Lots of snow, wind, and cold this year.

Good luck NoKaOi

Later,

Angus

Cold winter in New England
 

Hi Angus and thank you for the reply. Here's my situation: I am running Mac OS X 10.2.4 and Limewire 2.8.6 Pro on a RoadRunner connection. I've set preferences on Limewire to "Force Local IP" and the IP is accurate (per 'whatismyip.com); also, on System Preferences, I've checked 'Personal File Sharing' to allow users, etc. I've checked and doubled checked my path to the shared file and it is correct. Limewire shows a green ball and that I am sharing all (the correct number) the files in my shared folder. I get lots and lots of hits, but have never had a single upload, that I can tell. I've left the computer on for well over four hours at a stretch. I've read multiple "posts" and the FAQ but don't know what I'm doing wrong. Any suggestions or constructive criticism would be appreciated. Thank you. BTW: I understand your area has REALLY had a cold winter. It is -9 here this morning and we've recorded over 70 inches of snow so far. Wind chills in the -20s. Didn't your area get into the -40s wind chill earlier this month? Best of luck and thank you in advance for any assistance with my upload concersn. I am NOT a freeloader.

Not even my neighborhood...
 

Hey NoKaOi,

If you read back in my posts you might see that I' am "personna no gratta" due to my bad attitude, besides I don't know squat about computers!

I suggest you start a new thread, post all that fancy stuff you told me, and anything else you can think of, and you will probably get a response.

The more data and the more technical the better it would seem.

Good luck, again.

As to the weather here...Ayah, been a tad bit chilly brother...

Angus (easier to give than to recieve on Limewire) MacGregor

This is odd...
 

I put my IP address into LimeWire and did the force as suggested in the very first post, my router IP not my computer IP. Well, I am still not uploading anything, not yet. However, I am downloading faster than I ever have. I realize this setting should have no effect on the speed of my downloads, and I am probably just having a good night on the network. Still, right before I did this I was not getting a single download higer than 5k, and tons of requiries. Odd.

catgirl

Lucky you CG!
 

My guess would be that volume is down due to the number of people without power right now because of the storm.

Besides which many are outside trying to shovel out and can't be on the Wire right now.

Don't know what you did because I don't personally speak "computer" - I just plug and go, hopefully.

Haven't had a successful download for days.

Later CG,

Angus (unhappy.2.8.6.pointless.2.try.anyway) MacGregor

More Amazing News!
 

The IP thing from the original post actually uploaded stuff, too. Out of 64 hits, 32 downloads for one rare song (Billie Holliday-Stormy Weather, no doubt rare on this 20-something network). I have always been able to upload something on Limewire in any given night, might be two songs and it might be ten, but I can generally get one. I should mention that I have a new 1.7PC with a cable connection. I am sure the cable helps, but I know the firewall hurts so I quess it balances out. I think I have also been helped by the "4 star" suggestion-get 4 star listings only. I think this goes double if you are behind a firewall. Hey, I will probably be back here swearing soon but so far so good, might be the storm...

catgirl

Saucer of milk for CG!
 

You were my lucky black cat tonight! I lost one at 72% (bummer) and got dozens of requeries but...

I got one! Yes, I got a song off of Limewire.

Wow, is this too much or what? Thank you CG for giving me the confidence to try one more time.

My head is spinning from the excitement and I must go lie down now or I fear I will faint onto my keyboard.

Good Luck!

Angus (the shock is nearly 2.8.6 much) MacGregor

Elated!
 

Angus and Catgirl . . I, too, have finally had one successful upload! I feel great about it, all grins! (Geezzz . . this reads like a 'birth announcement' . . hahaha, but I'm as pleased as a new parent!) Still getting lots and lots of hits, many requesting the very songs I'm trying to share . . . gets frustrating to be ignored, but now I know at least, it does indeed work. Thank you for your support and feedback. Lots and lots of snow here, in Portland, Maine. Take care!

Here is a scary story. You think LimeWire has problems? Well, I went and downloaded Ares just because a friend told me it was good and they have no spyware. Well, I configured everything properly, only had my Ares Shared File in my Library and in my advanced prefs as a share, etc. I am behind a firewall and I am nothing if not security aware and I reasonable savvy. All of a sudden, I notice I am downloading at blazing speeds. I got several mp3's in just a few minutes. I downloaded a program in just a few minutes. Curious, I went to the monitor feature and I saw a swarm of people, maybe ten IPs in my uploads. My computer is new and fast, but that worried me. I went to my library and I saw that MY ENTIRE C DRIVE WAS AVAILABLE FOR UPLOAD!!! Ares states in it's user agreement that only the files you select will be shared. This was either the work of a brilliant hack (did I mention I am behind a firewall AND a router?) or a major design flaw in Ares.
The point is, that scared the h*!! out me and for now I will be sticking to Limewire, whatever it's flaws.

catgirl

Chills!
 

That is scary, Catgirl. Can you tell if any files other than your 'shared' path ones, were accessed? I hope not. I stick with Limewire and Aquisition, both the latest and 'registered' (paid for) versions and believe only my designated file is actually shared, but both: lots of hits, few uploads. Interesting stuff, this p2p, and in an infancy stage. Thank you for the info on "Ares", I appreciate your post.

Ok guys, I've been having this problem. I am behind a NAT firewall, as well as Zone Alarm Pro on my PC. I can download, very slowly, but I cannot upload. I have just set limewire 2.8.6 to force my Original IP. Showing port 6346 In Limewire. It shows that it is listening on port 6347 however. The one that my ISP(cable) assigned. So, My PC is assigned the IP address of 192.whatever, but I have set limewire to force 68.whatever. Now, about the port forwarding, I am not using that. Do I have to? and how do I test all of this? Also, I'm not sure what info needs to be in the port forwarding page if I have to use it. Do I just say Limewire? or limwire.exe? or what? I really want his straightened out. Please email with info. Thanks a bunch! xBAD

Forcing your IP without port-forwarding is completely useless. You have to configure your NAT to do port-forwarding. Zone Alarm does not do anything unless you configured it not to accept incoming connection on your gnutella port.

Testing
 

I am testing because this thing has not been letting me post!

Ok, looks like we are good to go. I have no way of knowing if anything was accessed when Ares grabbed my C drive, but I do know I am telling everyone to stay away from Ares! Thanks NokaOi, and I am sorry it took me so long to reply, but this forum has not been allowing me to post for some reason or another.

Fantasy Stories...
 

Just remember kids:

Click your mouse three times and repeat after me...

"The problem is not Limewire, it is my computer. The problem is

not Limewire, it is my computer. The problem is not Limewire, it is

my computer."


There, don't we all feel better?

Angus (and Toto too) MacGregor

It's not supposed to make you feel better, - it's supposed to make ME feel better.

I just dumped the router. Thing keeps all kinds of **** from working correctly. Junk!

Aloha nui loa
 

TrapJaw & KatGirl . . I appreciate your posts and am still working on getting my rig configured correctly. It is frustrating seeing so many in-coming requests for the very mp3s I have in my shared folder . . to no avail. I'll keep this puppy running for HOURS and no uploads; I've the "force IP" option set; but no uploads. Constructive suggestions appreciated. Mahalo (thank you.) (174 days and I'm retired, out of Maine, and back in Hawaii .. going HOME .. ) but, who's counting?? Aloha, NoKaOi . .

1) Don't force your IP
2) Receiving no or only few upload requests is rather normal. There are probably hundreds of people sharing the same songs and the probability that somebody chooses to download from you is quite low.

Can't upload or download with Starband
 

I appreciate the shared knowlege here and have tried virtually everything suggested. I am using starband satelite service. I have looked through this forum for any help/problems with starband and found none. I do use a zonealarm firewall but I turned it completely off and it did not help. I tried using a push with my IP address and that hasn't helped. I have tried virtually every setting combination within Limewire to no avail. I would appreciate any knowledge on this subject.

What problem are you having exactly? More information would be useful.

Can't upload or download with Starband
 

The only activity I see is connections occur, my shared files receive hits, and my downloads say "Requery Sent Waiting 999s for Results". I don't know what it takes to make it work.

Update
 

Hi, did you resolve your problem?

Lost The Thread
 

Hi Guys

I think this thread has wandered off the original point so, as one of those guilty of asking silly questions to start off with, I think the problem lies in people's expectations. It is commonplace to buy or acquire packages off the shelf that perform in a predictable way. In fact, so confident has this made the manufacturers, that they no longer supply helpful written manuals - we are all supposed to be able to intuit how the "thing" is supposed to work. This has skewed the modern users' expectations so, when they come to something like the Gnutella system, they expect LW to work without them having to invest any effort. This is a problem with LW's marketing. If it announced itself more clearly as a work-in-progress and advised more honestly on the kind of operating system adjustments that will be necessary, some (but not all) of the initial questions would be avoided.

You can now carry on the debate about LAN users. Sorry to have interrupted.

Hi David--good point! I've been thinking such a post is needed, especially since OSX standards spoil the user and frustrate casual developers. LW should market to user expectations. Even Apple learned that the hard way when they didn't clearly explain what it meant that Safari was beta. The .Mac services too seem to be suffering from the same problem. We're adults. If we can't handle the truth. . .

Back on topic . . . trap_jaw is really helping me work through the upload problems here

I could imagine a couple of improvements to the LimeWire on LAN problem. For example it's not really necessary to have the "force ip" option at all. There are ways to acquire your true ip address from the network. Once the gnutella network is performing acceptably well, this will be something to address.

Constructive Comments
 

Thanks david for your thoughtful and considerate post. I have to agree with you that the major issue is one of expectations. This problem is common no matter what p2p service is in question.

Just testing the advice
 

While downloading music files, the download falls to 0kb and then resumes and the back to 0 and so on. DSL, XP and it still takes 14 minutes to download. I'm a rookie to the pro. I didn't have any probs on my old 98system and modem connection last year. Also; whaasup with the skipping playback?

Quick Answer
 

If your configuration has not changed then it is possible that there is a problem with the source you are downloading from. I would advise trying to download another type of file (something with a lot of sources) perhap limewire and then see if you experience the same behavior. If not, then my first theory maybe correct.

Hope this helps.

All smiles
 

I bit the bullet, deleted Norton Systemworks 2.0 from my system, as it does not (regardless of what Symantec says) work well with 10.2.6; erased my hard drive (after backing up stuff, of course; and re-installed everything from scratch (except Norton.) Then, all the updates to everything. Almost a day-long job. I'm now running Limewire 2.9.11 Pro and am having success with both up and downloads. I'm convinced Norton fudged up my OS X system and that was the culprit. I've got a copy of DW 3.0 ordered and will use Norton Anti-virus 9.0 (new and native) for anti-virus protection. My intuitive sense tells me that was what the problem was. Also, as an aside, I joined .Mac (as that is the only means to get the newest and native Virex (7.2.x)) and was that ever a mistake! McAfee and Apple have a "letter of agreement" so one cannot purchase Virex 7.2 without going through .Mac. As always, it remains about $$$$. Anywho, now, all's well. Thank you for your suggestions, insights, feedback, and assistance in this matter. I am very grateful for access to a great pool of knowledge . . thanks everyone!

A good move
 

None of Symantec's product range is relevant to Macs and, as you have discovered, will often damage your machine's performance. For most practical purposes, you have been immunised against viruses, worms, etc by buying a Mac and, while the PC world lives in justified fear of disaster (whether from hackers or Microsoft itself through its spyware) Mac users can take a more laid back view of the world. While the act of joining your machine to the web will always have an element of danger about it, downloading the security patches from Apple on a regular basis will meet all the everyday forms of attack and then some. Save your money on antivirus products and enjoy the sunshine in your part of the world. If your Jaguar acts up, try www.macattorney.com/tutorial.html as a good source of helpful tips to put things right.

Hmmmm . .
 

I'm sure you are right "on the money" . . so to speak. Symantec is definitely a part of the Microsoft world force, with Mac as an add-on. Again, they tout the their new Norton AV 9.0 as built strictly for the OS X 10.2.x system. I've not received as yet, nor of course, installed it. You think I'd be better of sending it back? My gut tells me Norton hides things all over the hard drive and that is the reason behind my OS X system having to be completely reinstalled. I surely do not want to go through that again. I liked some of the features Virex 7.2 via .Mac had, but it did not seem to run except when connected to .Mac and would not scan email nor websites as I surfed, only at startup. So, while I paid Apple for it, I don't own it. Thank you, for your insight into these issues.

Hi again
 

Advertising is a wonderful thing and, in the best snake-oil tradition, Semantec will claim many things to promote their products. I don't know what the law is in your part of the world but, if you can get your money back for goods unused, my advice would be to do just that.

If you want to use something sensible, for example to block pop-up ads while you're surfing and to manage those annoying cookies, switch to http://www.Mozilla.org right now rather than continue with Explorer or the unmodified Netscape. There are also some good e-mail scan packages out there, but whether you can install them will depend on your general skills and knowledge around Macs.

Mustn't ramble on.

Good luck

David

1 Busy
 

I've found a file I want to download but for days have had difficulty. I constantly get LW to try to connect only to receive a message saing "Waiting (blank seconds) for 1 busy." What does that mean? Do I just hang tight and await a connection or is there something I can do to speed things along?

beyond the usual "repeat search", sometimes in 2.9.11 I noticed "rare" files would seem to get stuck downloading. Perhaps it was coincidence, but killing the download in the downloads pane and redownloading it from the search results sometimes helped. Command click to show vendor and location--you might see a pattern in which ones get "stuck" and don't respond to lists of new vendors found by "repeat search."

Aloha

Ha!
 

Well, in theory, it means that you are in the queue being run by this host. I run with 15 slots on offer and four or five people queue waiting in turn to be one of the 15. I run a stable and efficient host so the wait is usually rewarded with a slot, but many hosts are unsociable. For example, they may screw down the bandwidth allocation so that little if any remains for uploading. So, if you are really "lucky" and can actually start downloading a file from such a host, it might take hours. If you're in that queue, you might never get to the end of it before you lose the connection. Frankly, I rarely wait very long. I run a long want list and, if something is taking up one of my active slots inactively, I tend to go for the next file on my list and come back to the original search later on. If you leave anything over 15 minutes between repeat searches, you should find a different set of hits assuming you are not searching for something particularly rare. If you are in search of the rare, you will have to try at "off-peak" times when fewer people may be trying to get access to what you want. However, I have things on my list that have been there for months but, since I have a collectors mentality, half the fun of this game lies in the hunt.

Next?

David

Interesting times . .
 

You are very patient, David and I appreicate your kindness. Your words of wisdom will be heeded and I'll get there, eventually. Thank you for some very good ideas. I guess the saying "May you live in interesting times" can be either good tidings or a curse. These are, for sure, interesting times. Mahalo and aloha.

Thanks
 

You're making me sound like one of those cargo gods that made a bit of a splash during WWII — occasional goodies hitting the mark and building up a rep. Good luck in your searches, my friend. Sometimes I think the times are too interesting but at least boredom is kept at bay.

David

"all the way" 82nd Abn
 

Things are going very well, indeed. Files are coming and going. Thank you! I appreciate your patience; now, I'll not press my luck and say 'roger that and out!'
Aloha,
LP

Re: Re: Maximizing upload/download Success LimeWire
 

How can I avoid failed downloads?

HELP!
 

How can I avoid failed downloads?

Gee!
 

How can you ask this question at this point in the thread? Ah, well. The answer is that you can't. You have to sit in front of that little boxy thing they call a computer and work to get your downloads now. Read around the forum to find out how to maximise your success rate.

Matter of timing & luck
 

Here's an idea: I'm not sure there's a consistent method to avoid failed downloads (that always works.) If you are downloading, for example, and your host disconnects, your download stops then and there. What you've downloaded so far will be in your 'incomplete' folder and remain there. The beauty of Limewire is, that 'incomplete' piece of mess that you can't do much with at the time, can be added onto later, when you either re-connect with the same host and request the same item, or connect to another host who has the exact same title in his/her 'sharing' folder. Also, your own connection to your ISP (especially if dialup) can be a culprit. The more shakey your own connection, the more likely you'll have failed downloads. I may be incorrect; I hope I've not given you bad info but for me, this has been my experience. Also, stay current with most recent version of Limewire and go ahead and pay for a Pro edition. LSS: Most download failures I've had came from the other end . . they (the hosts) just exited Limewire and left me hanging. In preferences, one can set Limewire to close, only after activity has stopped, but I don't think many take the time to select that option. Best of luck.

Speaking of age/IQ
 

Hi David91. I truly do not believe your age is 91 and know (I've a PhD in Clinical Psych) that your IQ is significantly higher but the reaon I'm posting, is I have to respond after your last post on this thread. Get this: When I first moved to Hawaii, divorce in hand and all, I thought about meeting a nice island lady with some grad school behind her, a good job, nice looking, great sense of humor, etc. By the end of my first 3 years here, I had modified my requirements to "if all her tattoos are spelled correctly and her IQ is as least as high as the room's temperature, she'll do." The only thing that doesn't change is that there will always be change. Life is GOOD! And . . thanks again for all your help in the past.

Hi NoKaOi
 

We'd better switch to private messaging before we get too far off topic. Go to "user cp" at the top of the frame.

And I can see we might soon be recruiting you into our team of advisors — not only giving advice but explaining it as well:D

kewl, as the locals would say:D

thank you!
 

thanks for that. sorry that i interrupted the thread.

Running away thread
 

i think that you should not get too far off the topic.

trapjaw, or anyone else. I read that in order to do successful pushes, you have to "forward your NAT". What is this? How can I do it?

LW 2.9.11. I'm a UP. Mac G4 DP 1.25 Ghz. OSX.2.6. Cable modem on this computer connected to a 2wire router.

What brand router? The router needs to allow Port 6346 ("mapped"/"forwarded"), at least. Do other computers connect to the modem too?
Then there's the OSX firewall (System Preferences->Sharing->Firewall->Other->Gnutella/Limewire (6346)--or risk leaving it off altogether.
Then there's the Limewire Prefs->Advanced->Firewalls->Force IP [add the external static IP assigned by your ISP, not the internal IP of your Local Area Network].

[edit: the following is no longer relevant: If your ISP connects you with an IP that changes (DHCP--dynamic host connection protocol), you'll have to find a way to check what IP the outside world sees every time you connect. This is something that is difficult to describe from here--perhaps your ISP can help you to find what your external IP is and how often it changes. If you connect via DHCP, you're better off forgetting about using the "forced IP" setting. ]

An obervation . .
 

Running LW 2.9.11, OS 10.2.6, and with "FORCE IP" checked, whenever I crank up this puppy, LW autoloads the new IP that my ISP is dishing out. I'm on a RoadRunner cable and using DHCP: they change the router evertime I power down/up. Same thing when I land line dialup (after changing some settings, of course) with Earthlink.

I go to "http://www.whatismyip.com" and that way, I know what my true IP is, looking from the outside, in. LW makes the change for me automatically, when I have Force IP checked, and it is always right. However, I might know just enough to get myself in trouble. I've learned to leave LW running several hours, not just power on for a little while. I've also learned to "remove" some connections in the connections screen, if nothing much is happening in sufficient time, and new ones will be assigned. Hope this helps.