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How often does your HC connect to Google? About 5000 times / hour!


speedy

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Well, i hate having to do this (and writing about it) but when (to me atleast) i didnt get a detailed explenation what Google Analytics is doing in the HC2 and how often it is used etc, i had to look for myself.

 

I do NOT use Google as DNS in my HC2, i use my gateway.

I used Debookee to analyze the traffic setting my router as "Gateway" and my HC2 as "Target" and this is what i found.

 

Summary.

This is what a HC2 does every hour, of every day.

 

HC2 does:

5000! DNS requests to Google (4924 times to be exact)

500 HTTP/S Requests to Yahoo and Fibaro (350 HTTPS requests to Fibaro and 150 HTTP requests to Yahoo for weather)

5 SSH Requests to Fibaro

 

This stacks up to a grand total of almost 130 000! Requests every day!

 

To me this is not just "Gathering som data to analyze system performance etc". 

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That can be collected 1 time / day or week.

I understand that some use home.fibaro.com and that needs a connection, but i use DDNS and that updates only when necessary so i can't see any use for all these DNS requests.

 

And as Fibaro has SSH access and the box constantly updates Fibaro via SSH and HTTPS requests it all seems like ALOT of traffic.

 

! Please correct me if I'm wrong / misstaking etc, I'm not a network admin with 10+ years of experience !

 

Here are the Debookee captures if anyone is interested..

 

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+1

 

I hope a fibaro offical can answer why it does that many request per hour. 5000 times is just ridiculous. 

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I hope a fibaro offical can answer why it does that many request per hour. 5000 times is just ridiculous.

What amount would you consider "not ridiculous"?

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What amount would you consider "not rediculous"?

Personally I find between 4993 - 4999 extremely acceptable! But would require it in writing

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Personally I find between 4993 - 4999 extremely acceptable! But would require it in writing

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Sounds reasonable, but only on Mondays!

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Sounds reasonable, but only on Mondays!

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That is a ridiculous request! Please back on topic

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I suppose HC2 doesn't want to be feeling lonely. As to pinging Yahoo, weather could change rapidly so checking every 10 mins is not too bad. Why 350 pings to Fibaro? This is mind boggling to see why there is so much traffic between hc2 and Fibaro or Google. Would be interesting to see what Fibaro have to say. How does one change setup on my router to block this? Obv I want the weather info to be accessible and want remote access to my HC2. I suppose this is what is driving quite a bit of traffic.

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Sorry guys, but some posts where made on april the 1st, you never know if someone is serious!

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I'm sorry, but my original question "What amount would you consider "not ridiculous"?" was not a joke! Never! Seriously!

I really want to know why this would be "ridiculous". To compare it with something else, please consider this for one moment. I suppose, when you monitor how many bytes a web page loads (almost any webpage nowadays), you could say: "it transfers a ridiculous amount of packets". But to give a "2016 user experience", it has to load a lot more data than the visual part. I once measured and analysed a web page, that displayed about 2 kilobyte of useful information, but needed 800 k of data. Btw it wasn't even slow, it loaded on the average internet connect in about 0.8 sec, on an average internet connection. So, do you think your router, internet connection or HC2 cannot handle the load? Then, what is your router, internet connection, HC2 capable off? Does it yous too much memory? I'm not joking... if you know something I don't then please tell me.

I have a hunch WHY it happens. Purely theoretically it makes sense to me. The 3rd LED (with the globe symbol) reflects the status of the "internet connection". How would you test if you have an internet connection? You can't do a local check, that's not the purpose of the test. So it will be some test that passes through your router/firewall so you'll notice it. Now, how fast do you want that LED to respond to changes? I'd say, a 1 minute would not work for me, that would be 60 checks per second. Maybe a delay of 1 second would be really nice. That would be 3600 requests per hour. Note, I'm not talking the 2nd LED, thats the physical connection and it can do a hardware check do determine the status of the ethernet link.

This has been discussed before, but I've tried a "search" and I haven't found "the magic words", sorry!

BTW as far as I know, Fibaro doesn't have ssh access to your box. I'm reasonably certain because support explicitly asks to open that port on your router, if they need it. The connections that are initiated on your box, connect to a reverse proxy in Poland. That server provides the remote access facility. Fibaro says it doesn't use that connection for anything else. I'd say, if you want full control, disable all outgoing traffic on your router and use your own VPN solution.

Does this answer help?

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is does run on 1min base, crontab -> */1 * * * * /opt/fibaro/scripts/checkInternet.sh

 

inside the checkInternet.sh is a single google ping and led control:

 

 

#!/bin/bash
ping -c 1 www.google.com
 
if [[ "$?" == "0" ]]

then
  show-internet on
else
 show-internet off
fi

 

the other traffic you mentioned, is as well not really important or not doing any relevant load (even not on ISDN line, or edge network). what is doing? checking for dns, weather, location, checking the remote server (when option enabled), so really nothing special. When you open yahoo webpage and compare the traffic created, you will see that single yahoo call need much more data than the idle traffic which fibaro is creating over a month timeframe (except of course traffic created when accessing over home.fibaro.com to your HC2/HCL).

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  • What amount would you consider "not ridiculous"?

     

    I think this is a very good question.

     

    So i did a test of my own computer (macbook) and my Synology NAS to compare.

     

    The Synology NAS runs:

    DDNS so i can connect to stuff behind my router. (HC2 and VPN etc)

    Dropbox client to sync files.

    Maria DB

    Webstation (for iBeacons in my home that connects to HC2)

    E-mail client with constant internet connection checks (i always get e-mail if connection goes down od DDNS updates etc)

    Its also a file server used for Time Machine etc.

     

    Id say that this is actually very similar to the HC2 in terms of internet usage.

    It needs an internet connection check, IP updates via DDNS and constant connections to dropbox for syncing files. (or sending usage data if it was a HC2)

     

    I ran the same test for 1h and this is what i found.

     

    The NAS does:

    100 DNS requests

    18 HTTPS requests

    22 TCP requests

     

    Now this adds up to 140 request / hour.

    A bit different to the HC2.

     

     

    My computer on the other hand runs a lot more stuff.

     

    Its a mac connected to iCloud with every feature enabled.

    All apps where open and active.

    notes, reminders, calendars (5 different), e-mail (6 accounts), dropbox, keychain, Synology sync etc, etc.

    I have power nap enabled so it checks for stuff in the background.

    I also have it connected to my NAS and 2 apple TV´s.

    I also had a browser window in Safari open.

     

    My computer does:

    164 DNS Requests

    72 HTTPS Requests

    130 TCP Requests. 

     

    Of the 130 TCP requests 12 where to devices outside my network so id say its 12 requests.

     

    This adds up to 248 requests to outside my network in 1h.

    Also very different from the HC2.

     

    So what is "not ridiculous"?

     

    Recap connections /h:

    HC2 = 5500

    NAS = 140

    MAC = 248

     

    Well for the HC2 i think from my own testing about 150h / hour when running "idle" i acceptable.

     

     

    But i have a personal opinion that this number should also be able to be 0.

     

     

    In the end I want options to all of the outside connections that the HC2 does.

    Use Google analytics yes/no.

    Check internet connection X / min.

    Check weather connection X / min.

    And all other connections it does with SSH and TCP thats not apparent to me what it does but needs more network time that my mac and my NAS combined!

     

     

    Just my opinion, choice.

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    Now we are talking!

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    Thanks for putting your issue in perspective. Much clearer now. You consider other types of machines and other types of traffic as a baseline for the number of connections. Fair enough! Personally, I'd consider bandwidth but thats just me...

    So... Most part of the 5000 connects is a "ping" to make an LED work. If the HC had an option to disable this LED, that would make the number of connections more reasonable for you, because that would make the HC connections per hour much closer to the number of connections on your NAS and MAC. Unfortunately, no such option exists.

    So, yes, I think the options you propose would solve your issues with all this. Yeah, good idea! You might want to enter this at bugzilla.fibaro.com. I doubt it will get a lot of priority, judging from the posts on this forum a large group wants stability, performance and device support. Oh, and firmware updates.

    BTW can't you block this traffic on your firewall/router, and wouldn't that make you happy? May seem an odd question, but the router I have is a managed one, so I cannot add a rule to block the connection test. I have installed and managed Watchguard firewalls for many years, so sometimes I feel tempted to install one. But until now, I was able to resist and have a beer instead.

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    Fibaro, as usual we find that the users have to speculate - could you please confirm or shed some light?

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    So... Most part of the 5000 connects is a "ping" to make an LED work. If the HC had an option to disable this LED, that would make the number of connections more reasonable for you, because that would make the HC connections per hour much closer to the number of connections on your NAS and MAC. Unfortunately, no such option exists.

     

    I have seen this before on critical devices, that they use a kind of watchdog to verify the network connection to be available.

    At systems that are used internally, the (router) gateway IP address is used to validate presence of connectivity. i.e. UPS systems

    For critical systems that requires short response time on alerts, and that use external communication, an external network addrress with a high availability is used to validate connectivity.

    1 to several seconds can be used.

     

    This might be the same here. 

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    I have seen this before on critical devices, that they use a kind of watchdog to verify the network connection to be available.

    At systems that are used internally, the (router) gateway IP address is used to validate presence of connectivity. i.e. UPS systems

    For critical systems that requires short response time on alerts, and that use external communication, an external network addrress with a high availability is used to validate connectivity.

    1 to several seconds can be used.

     

    This might be the same here.

    Yes. Am I allowed to tell an anecdote? I promise, it's a little bit "on topic". I once had that customer that had to use a certain payment system. He told me that it wasn't reliable, so I devised a way to test whether it was his internet connection or his network infrastructure. So I set up a kind of ping logger to various destinations, including the secure server of the bank. One month later, I had almost forgotten about that. I was on site, and the manager rushed in while I was checking his servers. He looked upset, and he wasn't the kind of guy to be easily impressed. He almost shouted: "We have been hacked! Our data may have been stolen". I was convinced there was nothing to steal, but he continued: "I got a call from the bank! We have been hacked! Please call the security officer at the bank, because I didn't understand a word of what he was saying". So I did! The guy explained to me that they had found "suspicious activity in the log files". And indeed, his explanation sounded convincing, but I still didn't link that to my ping logger. Then he said: "It *has* to be malicious: a connection is made, then aborted, every one second!". Then it dawned upon me: ah! Indeed, I was doing a TCP handshake test every one second! And I started to laugh, rather loud and the security officer wasn't amused! So I pulled myself together and explained the situation. He still wasn't amused. Finally I asked him: "How did you find this, intensive security check I presume? Bank grade alert system?". "No!" he replied swiftly, "You are filling 1% of our firewall log file!".

    So maybe you now understand why I asked that question, in all honesty: "What amount would you consider "not ridiculous"?

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    Ridiculous or not ridiculous that the question 

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    I have faced customers who wanted their device to be polled for all the relevant data via snmp every few seconds.

    At a couple of 100 devices it's a challange 

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    Many stories to tell, but they will be all off topic 

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