CDDB problems with firewalls

[rananite]

Using Winamp v2.73:

1. CDDB lookups will not work across my firewall, which restricts all but HTTP access on port 80. For the sake of all us firewall users, you should support CDDB's protocol for HTTP access using the CGI at http://us.cddb.com/~cddb/cddb.cgi (see http://www.gracenote.com/stats.html for details).

2. When the CDDB "searching..." status box pops up, I cannot click on the main window to (for example) change the volume. CDDB pauses for a few seconds while it checks its server, during which time the Abort button does not respond. CDDB should use an unintrusive notification mechanism, perhaps piggybacked onto the winamp status bar, instead of the clunky and ugly dialog box (which causes these delays and doesn't even match my skins!).

3. Why are the CDDB settings hidden in the CD/LineIn plugin configuration screen? They were almost impossible to find. Information on CDDB was also difficult to find on the winamp web site, since the documentation is out of date. Please update your documentation and put the CDDB settings under their own pane in the preferences dialog box.

Better still, you could make a new plugin class for CD data retrievers, so I could switch from CDDB to any other CD database provider.

________
rananite

[DJ Egg]

Check this thread from Tech Support Greatest Hits & follow the links from there.
http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?threadid=36850
[RE: "Problems with CDDB & proxy/firewalls" section]

[rananite]

Thanks for the link, DJEgg... I hadn't been able to find those posts. I have now tried everything listed in the three relevant threads, to no avail. In Prefs:Settings I am using the correct proxy setting, and have selected the LAN option; I have tried setting the CDDB options to use port 80 and I've even tried editing the .ini file by hand. Nothing works. I agree with pacopaco, who has made the best analysis of the situation that I have seen (http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?threadid=36677). Conclusion: it's not going to work in this version.

I will look forward to seeing this fixed in the next version.
________
rananite

[mmd]

If it can help the SUPPORT to understand our problem:

First of all: YES, i'm behind a firewall blocking all 8880 ports requests, and that's why winamp can't even get
the CDDB list.
To pass thru this, i've tried to modify the winamp.ini at [CDDA/Line Input Driver] to use a server using port 80
as provided here: http://www.gracenote.com/stats.html#sites

But it seems that the plug-in doesn't understand a url like us.cddb.com/~cddb/cddb.cgi:80. In fact it seems to
try resolving the complete URL (us.cddb.com/~cddb/cddb.cgi) as a domain name !!!

I've tried this without success:

[CDDA/Line Input Driver]
sample=1
rt=/~cddb/cddb.cgi:80
use_cddb=1
rver=us.cddb.com
er=winampuser@nullsoft.com

=>"error connnecting to us.cddb:0" !!!

and THIS:

[CDDA/Line Input Driver]
sample=1
rt=80
use_cddb=1
rver=us.cddb.com/~cddb/cddb.cgi
er=winampuser@nullsoft.com

=>"error resolving host"

But if I ping us.cddb.com it works...

So what can i do to make it work ?

For now the Only Way i've found is to use a tunneling software to redirect all Winamp TCP/IP Ports Request throught the port #80:

Winamp CDDB requeston port 8880=>127.0.0.1 proxy socks (ie HTTPORT or SOCKSCAP)=>external sock proxy listening on #80=>CDDB request

But you'll agree that it's really not the easiest way !

Thanks...