Factory Talk Activations: Using remote desktop to program (ping problems)

[AutomationTechBrian]

For my first time, I put a copy of Studio 5000 and Factory Talk Activation Manager on my customer's machine (On-logic Windows PC), then use remote desktop to login to program. When I'm onsite, I give my PC a wi-fi static IP and share the activation from my laptop (just like I do for my VMware). I can't believe how great it is to work on the program this way. I can go anywhere in the building, and it's like I'm directly hooked up to the PLC through my laptop... the latency is barely noticeable. Then, I talked to their IT guy, and he configured a VPN for me to work at home the same way. It's fantastic! Again, the latency is barely noticeable at all. I just have one more hurdle to overcome...

At home, I can't ping my laptop from the customer's PC, so I can't get my FT Activation Manager to share the license (yet).

I tried using my IP, and I tried using the computer name. I worked with Rockwell to make sure it wasn't some server setting that I didn't know about. I can ping their PC, but can't ping mine from their PC. Since I'm working with a simple home setup, all fingers seem to be pointing at my customer's firewall. So while I wait for their IT guy to call me back (notoriously slow), I'm contemplating the solution. Did any of you experienced this issue, and what you did to fix it. Maybe my router is the cause after all... is there a port I need to open up in my router to make this work? What do you guys think? Anyone have experience with this?

 

[chelton]

ICMP (Ping) is not a good diagnostic tool. If your using windows have a look at windows "power shell" and the test network connection (TNC) command.
Example TNC -p 44818 192.168.157.xxx
FT Activation manager will need a TCP port open in the range of 27000-27009 or port 22350 for codemeter activations.
Port 44818 will be required for ethernet/IP too.

 

[AutomationTechBrian]

I still haven't had success serving the Codemeter activation through my customer's VPN, but I spent more time yesterday researching it. To be clear, the activation communicates when I'm on-site, on the same network, but not when I'm remotely connected through the VPN. I explored the CodeMeter WebAdmin utility, and the help files for it. I thought that the solution would be to open up port 22350 through their firewall, so I contacted their web IT provider to help. (These are the same guys that set up the VPN for my remote connection to the machine's PC.) I gave them remote access to both my host laptop, and the client PC (on the machine), plus the CodeMeter web admin pages for each. I loaded the FT Activation Manager on both machines and let them troubleshoot. They repeatedly refreshed the activations and looked at the traffic through the router and firewall. What they found was that with the VPN setup, they did not have a DN server on my side that resolved the traffic to my laptop, and that the solution would be to put a firewall on my side that served that function. This is slightly above my understanding and experience, so I'm at their mercy. It sounds logical, but the solution would be a stand-alone firewall and a monthly service fee, which make me wonder....

...This setup is certainly not that unique. Having the Rockwell software on the remote, client PC and activating it through a VPN, to use only when needed, seems like something that would be routinely achieved by scores of others that participate on this forum. What are those people doing?

Can someone enlighten me about how they connect remotely? When I leave the jobsite, I leave Studio 5000 running on the PC, then connect from home without re-starting the software. That works OK, but when the PC closes that program, I have issues restarting it, and it's not reliable (7-day grace period). Everything else about the remote connection is great! There is no noticeable latency. It's as if I were at the jobsite, using the machine's keyboard. If I can master this one issue, this would make it perfect. Any thoughts?

 

[harryting]

Bump for this thread. Studio 5000 software is on a firewalled plant network and need access to the license server on the company's enterprise network. Do we need

"TCP port open in the range of 27000-27009 or port 22350 for codemeter activations."

All that above to make it work?