open ports mac firewall - PORTS not APPS
In the OS X Snow Leopard firewall interface, there is no longer a menu or dropdown in the preference pane that allows you to open specific ports. I previously used this option with other versions of OS X when I wanted to manually open a specific port. I am now getting ready to host some services that will be accessible from outside. I have verified that all of the necessary ports are not blocked by my ISP, and I have also verified that these ports are being forwarded correctly through the NAT and firewall of my router. In other words, if I turn off the OS X firewall, I can go outside my local network and access the ports (they respond as "refused" because there is no service running, but they can't respond as "refused" unless the port is accessible.) But if I turn the OS X firewall back on, and go outside my local network, the requests all time out, showing there is not access to the ports.
So it is definitely the OS X firewall doing the blocking. Here is a screenshot of the Snow Leopard preferences pane, where in all OS X versions before you could add a new service by creating a service and specifying the port.
One would think you could add a service simply by clicking the plus sign. But you do not get that option anymore. Instead, the plus sign opens a file browser that lets you select an app. According to what I've read, selecting an app automagically opens the ports for that app. But this does not seem to apply to things that you cannot browse to.
Thanks.
