Why can't I connect to my own website?

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Why can't I connect to my own website?

I can access any thing on the internet except the web page that I have created. I can not access the site with the other two computers in my house either: an iBook and an older clamshell with dial up internet. However, the site is accessible everywhere else but here in my house. My internet provider can't find a problem. Another website hosted by the same server as mine is accessible to me. Also, I cannot access the site through dreamweaver, which I used to create the site. My site has been up for months now. This problem occurred a few weeks ago, then disappeared by itself after two days. Any idea what is going on?

iMac Mac OS X (10.4.8)

iMac Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Feb 16, 2007 8:53 AM

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Answer 1

j.v.

Level 5

4,155 points

Feb 18, 2007 4:42 PM in response to derfie

More information please:

Are you physically hosting this webpage on a computer that you personally own and that is physically inside your residential LAN, or is your ISP or other third-party hosting this webpage on their server?

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Answer 2

derfie Author

Level 1

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Feb 26, 2007 7:25 AM in response to j.v.

Dear J.V. Thanks for getting back to me. The website is hosted on a server that is not in my house. I can connect to other websites that are hosted by that server. The problem that I am having is intermittent. I may not be able to connect to my own site for a day or two, then it connects as if nothing happened. A few days later and my browser can not find the site. I have tried emptying caches through the terminal of my mac and I have employed macjanitor. I can connect to any site on the internet except my own. It happens on all of the computers in my house, even when I bypass the airport and the modem and attack the phone line straight to the wall.
Thanks for your help.
Fred

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Answer 3

j.v.

Level 5

4,155 points

Mar 5, 2007 2:50 PM in response to derfie

The next times that you go to that site and can successfully access in one case but are unsuccessful in the other case (order immaterial), in Terminal, type dig {yourSite'sDomainNameGoesHere}⏎ and copy and paste the results into a file someplace, for both times, for later reference. Also, when you get a numeric IP address answer, do a dig -x {yourSite'sNumericIPaddressGoesHere}⏎ to reverse DNS it and save that info for future reference, too. It would be interesting to see if DNS is able to resolve your host name when you can't access your webpage. (Note: dig +short {yourSite'sDomainNameGoesHere}⏎ and dig +short -x {yourSite'sNumericIPaddressGoesHere}⏎ gives you a one-line answer without a bunch of other possibly confusing, but possibly-necessary-for-troublehooting information)

Also, assuming that your webpage is hosted on a server with a static IP address, once you know it from a "dig" after a successful connection, then the next time you have an unsuccessful connection to http:{yourSite'sDomainNameGoesHere/anyOptionalPathInfoGoesHere} in Safari, try connecting to http:{yourSite'sNumericIPaddressGoesHere/anyOptionalPathInfoGoesHere} instead, and see if you can connect to your webpage with numeric IP address as opposed to hostname. If you can connect to numeric IP address but not hostname, I would start suspecting a DNS issue at your web host, not any of your stuff. By virtue that this happens to multiple computers at the same time makes me think that, anyways.

If you can't connect using numeric IP, and a dig +short -x {yourSite'sNumericIPaddressGoesHere}⏎ resolves back to your webhost's hostname, then I'd start wondering whether something flakey is going on at the actual web server.

PS - Please accept my apologies for the latency in my reply.

(if you find that this solves your problem, or is actually helpful towards arriving at a solution to your problem, please consider clicking on either the "helpful" or "solved" buttons above)

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Answer 4

derfie Author

Level 1

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Mar 10, 2007 8:58 PM in response to j.v.

Dear J.V.
Thanks for getting back to me. Since this is an on again off again problem, I am solving it in slow motion, so your responses have been very timely. I am not sure I understand everything that you have instructed me to do, but I have copied your message and am on my way to trying it out. Here is what I have gotten in answer to my first question:
dig {electronicenglish.org}?

; <<>> DiG 9.2.2 <<>> {electronicenglish.org}?
;; global options: printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NXDOMAIN, id: 53447
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 1, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;{electronicenglish.org}?. IN A

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
. 10800 IN SOA a.root-servers.net. nstld.verisign-grs.com. 2007031001 1800 900 604800 86400

;; Query time: 114 msec
;; SERVER: 204.255.24.254#53(204.255.24.254)
;; WHEN: Sat Mar 10 23:35:19 2007
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 117

I'll get back to you as I learn more. Thanks again.
Fred

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Answer 5

derfie Author

Level 1

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Mar 11, 2007 6:59 AM in response to j.v.

Dear J.V.
I tried to connect to my site this morning and could not. I typed the same dig command into the terminal and got what looks like an identical response:

Last login: Sun Mar 11 09:34:22 on console
Welcome to Darwin!
dfsmrzs-imac:~ DFSMRZ$ dig {electronicenglish.org}?

; <<>> DiG 9.2.2 <<>> {electronicenglish.org}?
;; global options: printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NXDOMAIN, id: 33541
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 1, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;{electronicenglish.org}?. IN A

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
. 10800 IN SOA A.ROOT-SERVERS.NET. NSTLD.VERISIGN-GRS.COM. 2007031001 1800 900 604800 86400

;; Query time: 45 msec
;; SERVER: 204.255.24.254#53(204.255.24.254)
;; WHEN: Sun Mar 11 09:53:15 2007
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 117

dfsmrzs-imac:~ DFSMRZ$

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Answer 6

j.v.

Level 5

4,155 points

Mar 13, 2007 8:26 AM in response to derfie

OK - I should have made clear that my use of curly brackets meant to substitute what was inside the curly brackets, plus the curly brackets, with what should actually go there. Sorry about that. So you literally want to type,

dig electronicenglish.org

When I do that, I get a result back that says, among other things,

;; ANSWER SECTION:
electronicenglish.org. 86400 IN A 72.22.82.196

So 72.22.82.196 is the IP address.

When I do this:

dig -x 72.22.82.196

I get back a result that says, among other things,

;; ANSWER SECTION:
196.82.22.72.in-addr.arpa. 3600 IN PTR vz12.securehostserver.com.

This tells me who is hosting your website.

Now, I'm rapidly getting out of my league here, because when I do a

dig vz12.securehostserver.com

I get an entirely different IP address back still. I would guess that it has something to do with them hosting a gazillion websites. I have my own dynamic host name and I'm hooked up to DSL, so when I dig my domain, I get my dynamic IP address back, and when I dig -x that, I get my a domain name that is a composite of my ISP provider's name and my dynamic IP address. And when I dig that, I get my same ol' IP address back. Anyhow, I'm kinda gettin' off on a tangent here.

So, next time when you can't connect to http://electronicenglish.org, try this same procedure and see what you get. See if you get a result back from dig electronicenglish.org. If you don't get back a result, then I would claim that something is hosed with securehostserver.com's DNS. If you do get something back (and let's pretend that the IP address is static, so you get 72.22.82.196 back as an answer), then in Safari, try to connect to http://72.22.82.196 and see if that is successful. If that is, but trying to connect to http://electronicenglish.org isn't, I would suspect something is up with your webhost, but I'm not sure what. If you get nothing, then I would suspect something is up with the webserver itself.

(if you find that this solves your problem, or is actually helpful towards arriving at a solution to your problem, please consider clicking on either the "helpful" or "solved" buttons in the header of this post above)

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Answer 7

derfie Author

Level 1

0 points

Mar 19, 2007 3:32 PM in response to j.v.

J.V., you are the best. Thank you for hanging in with me. I figure the easiest way to let you know what is going on is to copy what I'm getting in the terminal utility.

Last login: Mon Mar 19 17:57:05 on ttyp1
Welcome to Darwin!
dfsmrzs-imac:~ DFSMRZ$ dig electronicenglish.org

; <<>> DiG 9.2.2 <<>> electronicenglish.org
;; global options: printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: SERVFAIL, id: 62808
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;electronicenglish.org. IN A

;; Query time: 23 msec
;; SERVER: 204.255.24.254#53(204.255.24.254)
;; WHEN: Mon Mar 19 18:23:57 2007
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 39

dfsmrzs-imac:~ DFSMRZ$ dig -x 72.22.82.196

; <<>> DiG 9.2.2 <<>> -x 72.22.82.196
;; global options: printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 3807
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 1, ADDITIONAL: 1

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;196.82.22.72.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR

;; ANSWER SECTION:
196.82.22.72.in-addr.arpa. 2239 IN PTR vz12.securehostserver.com.

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
82.22.72.in-addr.arpa. 2239 IN NS rdns2.ipowerweb.net.

;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
rdns2.ipowerweb.net. 1775 IN A 66.235.216.64

;; Query time: 42 msec
;; SERVER: 204.255.24.254#53(204.255.24.254)
;; WHEN: Mon Mar 19 18:25:43 2007
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 131

dfsmrzs-imac:~ DFSMRZ$

I can not connect if I type <a class="jive-link-external-small" href="http://">http://electronicenglish.org in my browser. If I type in http://72.22.82.196, I get a website that displays the following:

This is the Plesk™ default page

If you see this page it means:

1) hosting for this domain is not configured
or
2) there's no such domain registered in Plesk.

For more information please contact Administrator.

So...it seems to me that the problem is on the server end, right? I have learned that this problem hits about once a week, usually on Mondays, and only lasts for 24 to 36 hours. I usually work on my website on Sundays, so I wonder if I'm triggering some kind of block on their end.

Thanks again, J.V. for all the time you are putting into this.

Fred

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Answer 8

j.v.

Level 5

4,155 points

Mar 19, 2007 7:38 PM in response to derfie

Hey derfie:

Looking at your dig electronicenglish.org, notice that you got no ";; ANSWER SECTION:" and you also got a line that had "status: SERVFAIL" in it.

Compare your dig's output to mine:

powerbook:~ jv$ dig electronicenglish.org
; <<>> DiG 9.3.2 <<>> electronicenglish.org
;; global options: printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 62641
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 1, ADDITIONAL: 1
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;electronicenglish.org. IN A
;; ANSWER SECTION:
electronicenglish.org. 85959 IN A 72.22.82.196
;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
electronicenglish.org. 85959 IN NS ns.electronicenglish.org.
;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
ns.electronicenglish.org. 85959 IN A 72.22.82.196
;; Query time: 27 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.254#53(192.168.1.254)
;; WHEN: Mon Mar 19 19:35:40 2007
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 88

After I ran my query, I checked to see if I was able to connect to http://electronicenglish.org, and I was. I was also mildly surprised to see that when I tried to connect to http://72.22.82.196 (the IP address that dig gave me back), I got the same "Plesk" error page that you got. OK, so something up with commercial web hosters that I don't understand (no surprise there!). With many websites, I can just specify either a hostname or an IPA and get there either way.

But, that aside, your cut-n-paste of Terminal window stuff shows that you were unable to resolve electronicenghlish.org to a numeric IPA. I don't know why, or what is the cause, but there was a DNS failure somewhere along the chain of DNS servers. It is interesting that you find this happening the day after you modify stuff on your website. I would question my web host about this the next time you have an active failure; perhaps before you do, I would see if a friend, peer, or other associate has problems connecting to your website at the same time that you do. It would be best if said friend/peer/associate was on a different ISP (to help ensure that you both aren't querying the same DNS server (SERVER: 204.255.24.254).

(if you find that this solves your problem, or is actually helpful towards arriving at a solution to your problem, please consider clicking on either the "helpful" or "solved" buttons in the header of this post above)

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Answer 9

derfie Author

Level 1

0 points

Apr 5, 2007 4:50 AM in response to derfie

Dear J.V. The problem that I was having with my webpage server has not shown up in over two weeks. Usually it is a Monday thing, and it has skipped two Mondays. So I guess I need to call this thread completed with an answer. The folks who own the server had some major problems with it around the time I stopped having my problem. Perhaps when they fixed their server it ended whatever was temporarily blocking me out. You have given me plenty to work with in case this problem ever comes back. I will take what you wrote directly to my server guys. In the meantime, thank you so much for your help. It really straightened out my thinking about the problem, and I appreciate it.
Fred

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