RPC/HTTP connects internally, not external to firewall

[Guest]

Hi,

I've got an interesting problem. I can open and connect Outlook via
RPC/HTTP on our intranet, but offsite, it doesn't work. I get the
authentication screen,but it won't connect if I'm outside the firewall.

Running SPS2003 w/Exchange behind our web server (RPC Proxy).

Also, I ran RPCDIAG while connecting on the intranted, and an https
connection is established.

Thanks in advance for any direction.

Tom

 

[neo [mvp outlook]]

Hi Tom,

Based on the subject and what you are describing, it sounds like the
firewall (e.g. Microsoft ISA, etc.) is interfering with the connection.
Without going into much detail and spilling the beans on how the network is
setup, have you taken a peek at the firewall to see if it could be
interfering with the connection process?

 

[Guest]

I did take a look, but nothing has changed. It worked great before.
Wednesday we started having troubles with or primary server (SBS2003 &
Exchange), which also knocked out our Citrix connectivity. There was also
some weird stuff happening to Exchange (kept dismounting) and permissions on
a couple of accounts. Added to that was that something was eating up any
available disk space and throwing it into the pagefile. I thought the lack of
disk space was knocking out exchange. The more space I freed up, the more it
would eat up. I rebooted the server which stopped the latter. It was then I
discovered the Citrix problem and the RPC/HTTP problem.

I eventually found the Citrix problem was due to a security patch released
by MS which locked-down the virtual directories in IIS. I changed that back
to scripts and executibles and Citrix was fixed. I was thrown by the
internal only abilities of RPC/HTTP and spent hours trying to figure it out.
At last resort I thought I'd try the same approach as with exchange - i.e.
changing the permissions on the RPC virtual directory. Changed that to
scripts and executibles and it worked.

I have no idea why.

Somebody please educate me.

Thanks

Tom