What's new

Using iPhone hotspot with a server computer

Napoleon

New Member
Joined
Feb 27, 2013
Messages
1
Reaction score
0
Hi,
I am using my iPhone 4 (iOS 6.1.2) as a hotspot to access the internet from my Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server.
My Telco/ISP has allocated a public IP address (which my friends can ping successfully).
I have my iPhone connected directly to my Ubuntu machine using the USB cable, and Wi-Fi is turned off. From my Ubuntu machine, I can surf the web etc.
I've noticed that the IP of the iPhone's browser (Safari) is different from the IP used by the hotspot by using whatismyip.com.
The Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server is running LAMP on ports 80 and 8080. I can access the webserver from other machines on my LAN, hence I'm certain my firewall settings on the Ubuntu machine are correct.

The problem I'm having is that my friends are not able to access my webserver and get a 'The Connection has Timed Out' error.

I spent 4 hours on the phone today with my Telco's outsourced Customer Service but they don't understand the problem, and have no solution. They have escalated the problem but I now have to wait 3-5 days before I get to speak to anyone that has a clue about technical matters.

I am trying to diagnose where the problem is, and have a question regarding iPhone's hotspot functions.
My iPhone is allocating an internal IP address to my Ubuntu machine (172.20.10.5) which implies that the iPhone is routing packets. However I don't have any means of forwarding ports on the iPhone (or at least I can't find such settings).

Does anyone know how the iPhone handles inbound connection requests via it's hotspot modem and can explain what's going on? I'm trying to determine if the problem I've got is a limitation of the iPhone or an issue (port blocking?) by my ISP.

Cheers,
Nap
 
Top