Cannot find server or DNS Error

[Guest]

Hello,

I have recently started having trouble viewing a website that I visit daily.
(http://www.myleague.com/the_exiles) Some parts of the menu on the left
connect to pages that have .php in their url, and those are the pages that
are not showing up for me. (Has been a week now.) I get the "The page
cannot be displayed", and at the very bottom it says: "Cannot find server or
DNS Error".

A tech support for that website suggested that it might be my firewall
causing issues, but I have tried it without the firewall, and still the pages
will not load.

Someone else suggested that since php is a side language for servers (or
something like that...) that the problem was on their end, and not mine.
This might have made sence if it wasn't for the fact that the other people
who use that website do not encounter problems viewing these pages.

Anyone have any suggestions? I'm at a loss at this point. If you require
more information in order to help, don't hesitate to let me know.

Thank you.

 

[Robert Aldwinckle]

Hello,

I have recently started having trouble viewing a website that I visit daily.
(http://www.myleague.com/the_exiles) Some parts of the menu on the left
connect to pages that have .php in their url, and those are the pages that
are not showing up for me. (Has been a week now.) I get the "The page
cannot be displayed", and at the very bottom it says: "Cannot find server or
DNS Error".

A tech support for that website suggested that it might be my firewall
causing issues, but I have tried it without the firewall, and still the pages
will not load.

Someone else suggested that since php is a side language for servers (or
something like that...) that the problem was on their end, and not mine.
This might have made sence if it wasn't for the fact that the other people
who use that website do not encounter problems viewing these pages.

Anyone have any suggestions? I'm at a loss at this point. If you require
more information in order to help, don't hesitate to let me know.

What happens if you try one outside the menu?
E.g. here is the first one: Getting Started

http://www.myleague.com/php/page.php?p=start&t=myleague&lng=eng&l=the_exiles&g=st&svr=cgi9&pl=

Alternatively, assuming that your DNS error is occurring in the main frame,
is there any difference if you press Shift while you click on the link?
E.g. do you then see the above link in the Address bar of a new window?


HTH

Robert Aldwinckle
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[Guest]

Hi Robert,

I have clicked on the link you wrote, which brought me to a "getting
started" page.

I can access the menu on the left (of the url I previously gave) and see
those pages fine. What I'm having trouble with are the player's data
themselves. For example, on the left menu there's "Daily Results". When
clicking on it, I then access the next page with no problem. Where the
problem starts is when on *that* page I click Daily results (or daily news),
or even when I type in the nick which I want to view the results of. (Any
player data.) Holding down the shift key when trying did not help.

Another player data link that doesn't work for me is the "Standings" link on
the left menu. When I click on it, it brings me to the next page fine...
where on the top of that page you can get the 50 top ranks or players, etc.
It's when I make a choice of which data I want to see... I can not then view
the results.

I have uninstalled my firewall, but it's not making any difference.

 

[Robert Aldwinckle]

Hi Robert,

I have clicked on the link you wrote, which brought me to a "getting
started" page.

I can access the menu on the left (of the url I previously gave) and see
those pages fine. What I'm having trouble with are the player's data
themselves. For example, on the left menu there's "Daily Results". When
clicking on it, I then access the next page with no problem. Where the
problem starts is when on *that* page I click Daily results (or daily news),
or even when I type in the nick which I want to view the results of. (Any
player data.) Holding down the shift key when trying did not help.

I just picked that one because it satisfied your hypothesis that
the problem was related to .php files. Apparently not?

Then the common factors there (and more likely to indicate
a legitimate DNS problem) is the site name and the non-standard
port which is being used:

http://www3.igl.net:81/perl/match.cgi?ladd=the_exiles&genre=st&svr=cgi9&template=myleague

Another player data link that doesn't work for me is the "Standings" link on
the left menu. When I click on it, it brings me to the next page fine...
where on the top of that page you can get the 50 top ranks or players, etc.
It's when I make a choice of which data I want to see... I can not then view
the results.

That would involve the same site and port number.
To see that press F6 while viewing that page
so the frame which contains the buttons is enclosed in hached lines
and then press Menu-V (or right-click somewhere inside which is safe
and select View Source).


Let's test first whether you have a problem with that site name.

Open a cmd window and enter:

nslookup www3.igl.com

FWIW here are my results for that

<example>
Non-authoritative answer:
Name: www3.igl.net
Address: 12.129.199.230
</example>

If you get that too but only after a timeout that could indicate that
your DNS isn't keeping that lookup but is having to do a secondary
lookup itself and then perhaps IE isn't reacting well to that delay
either.

Also, you should try ping'ing that site, not because you want to test
connectivity with it but because you want to make sure that your dnscache
has a chance to get it before you try using one of the problem links again.

ping -n 1 www3.igl.net

FWIW I see that the lookup is done Ok but ICMP is blocked somewhere
on the path to that site:

<example>
Pinging www3.igl.net [12.129.199.230] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 12.129.199.230:
Packets: Sent = 1, Received = 0, Lost = 1 (100% loss),
</example>


I also saved the contents of my dnscache (in XPsp2) right after that
but couldn't tell if there was anything in there to help with future lookups
of that site:

ipconfig /displaydns >displaydns.txt
notepad displaydns.txt


In any case if these possible assists to the combined lookups
for both your DNS and your dsncache aren't sufficient to help IE
do its lookup you may have to create your own temporary lookup
for this site name in your HOSTS file. E.g. edit that file and add
a line which looks like this:

12.129.199.230 www3.igl.net

Before saving HOSTS you should also check to see if that site name
is already in there pointing to another address and delete it if so.
(That could be the case if you previously had some kind of network
accelerator program active and the old address is now being reused
for something else.)

After saving HOSTS reload it in the dnscache

ipconfig /flushdns

and verify that your lookup is now available there

ipconfig /displaydns | find /i "igl"


Another possibility is that non-standard port (81) is causing
a problem (e.g. if you have a firewall configured to block
non-standard outbound connections). To test that case
you could use telnet and specify that port.

telnet -f telnet.txt www3.igl.net 81

When the screen cleared I found it was sufficient to enter
just GET / (That's GET<space><slash><Enter>)
The response from the server then made it clear that
I was connecting to the right one.


If you still need help please report your detailed
observations from trying the above diagnostics.


Good luck

Robert
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