Connect to a Gateway

To connect to a DINGO gateway via the DINGO-Manager, the user simply selects the gateway from the System Tree and clicks the Connect button inside the DINGO-Manager.

When connecting, a dialog might appear, asking: "Display mixed content?". Choose "Yes", to continue. The reason for this question is that the Go-IoT Cloud runs under HTTPS and the communication to the DINGO gateway is over HTTP.

If the connection is via OpenPort, then an attempt is first made to give your IP address access to the gateway. See the troubleshooting section below for problems connecting to gateways via OpenPort.

Troubleshooting

When connecting to a DINGO gateway, the first request is for a security policy file (clientaccesspolicy.xml). If the request fails, then a connection-retry has to wait for 60 seconds. This is in accordance with the Silverlight security policy. It is however possible to connect to another DINGO gateway first and then do the retry.

These can be reasons for connection problems:

  • Check if the DINGO-Stack is running.
  • Is the gateway connected to the local-network or Internet.
  • If using hostnames - are there DNS problems? Try to ping the hostname.
  • Check if the Gateway connection properties are correct.

Gateways that are connected via OpenPort use reverse SSH tunnelling. They will connect to a OpenPort server, on start-up, and keep a SSH tunnel open at all times. When we connect to the gateway, we will first connect to the same OpenPort server, and will then be routed through the open SSH tunnel, back to the gateway.

When there are problems with the connection, then these can be the reasons:

  • If the connection fails on the first attempt, then try once again. In the second attempt, the connection will try a different method to retrieve the security policy file.
  • The DINGO-Stack is not running. In this case try to connect to the gateway, with an SSH terminal and check the status of the DINGO-Stack.
  • If the gateway cannot connect to the Internet, then it cannot open the SSH tunnel at the OpenPort server, with the consequence that we cannot connect to the gateway. Internet access depends on the network configuration of the gateway and possible restrictions by the owner of the network where the gateway is located.
  • If the gateway experiences DNS problems, then it cannot open the SSH tunnel at the OpenPort server. See the reason above and consult the owner of the network where the gateway is located.
  • Gateways that use OpenPort, have a script running that will check its connectivity to the OpenPort server. It checks every hour and if it experiences network problems for 5 consecutive hours, will reboot the gateway.
  • if there are problems connecting to the gateway via the OpenPort server directly, then try using the Device at server side option in the Gateway connection properties. This can however lead to higher traffic on the server where the Go-IoT Cloud system is hosted.