DDNS check interval

Product Discussion Feature Requests
1

Recently I changed one of my connections method to DHCP. There are two reasons:

  • Though my ISP ONT have a bridge mode option, the ISP does not support it. I also use their VoIP phone and sometimes they change configurations or update firmware, and they can’t update my ONT if it is on bridge mode. They also can’t run proper diagnostics if I have a problem. So I decided to let the ONT in router mode, doing the PPPoE connection, and Peplink Balance One just gets a private IP through DHCP.
  • Peplink Balance One does not support PPPoEv6 and DHCP-PD, the ONT does. So letting the ONT act as router means I can use IPv6.

Peplink Balance One has an option to discover the public IP address and update DDNS. However, it does not check for IP changes very frequently. As I write this, it has been more than an hour since the IP changed on the ONT and it still didn’t realize that. Is there any way to make Peplink Balance One checks the public IP more frequently and update DDNS when it changes?

2

It looks like it won’t detect IP changes at all unless a disconnection and reconnection of the DHCP occurs. That is really bad.

2 Likes
3

@fbreve

You are right :blush: ! As for now DDNS update only happen when there is WAN status changes for the device.

I have moved your post under feature request so that Engineering team can consider the have the feature to enable the DDNS check base on user define interval.

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4

+1 for this feature request

I believe most off-the-shelf routers check every 30 seconds or at a user defined interval.

Thank you

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5

+1 user defined interval would be helpful.

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6

+1 here

A user configurable update interval OR at least the device regularly check the internet facing address semi regularly.

If providing a client remote support, and factory resetting their 4G router is necessary via paperclip, these devices reboot into NAT mode. So by default, we set them up on the Peplink as NAT devices in router mode… but dyndns won’t update regularly at all in this configuration… which means our link monitoring system will report the 4G link as down when in fact it is ‘up’.

Please please please add this basic functionality in Balance 20’s. Seems absurd to support dyndns in the balance 20, but not be checking the internet address for changes! Only checking the WAN address is a shortfall for sure.

1 Like
7

Hello Brett (@E55Technologies),
Apologies that we missed your call last week. Remember that your Peplink Partner & supplier in Australia is well equipped to look after your requests and technical enquiries, please refer back to them as emailed previously.

The RFC2136 DDNS standard was published in 1997 (RFC 2136 - Dynamic Updates in the Domain Name System (DNS UPDATE)). Peplink/Pepwave equipment is compliant with this standard. You can read more about this standard within the published standard and from Wikipedia at Comparison of DNS server software - Wikipedia.

When the WAN connection is NATed, it is not possible for routers to pick up this change as they are dependent on detecting a change of IP at the device’s WAN connection based on the DHCP given to the router.

To detect a change of a public-facing IP that is NATed would require complicated software that needs to be referencing back to an external location from the router to determine what the Public IP is. Much like when you type into your search engine “What is my IP” and the search engine returns the response based on where the enquiry came from. InControl2 is, therefore, able to do the same with showing on the devices admin page “Last Detected IP” and in offering the “Find My Peplink Service” (you can enable this by selecting “Edit” for the device admin page) based on where the connection to InControl2 came from.
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For the router to detect a change to a NATed Pubic IP itself, it would need to be regularly doing a traceroutes out and then processing the results, traceroutes are prone to issues and we are of the view Peplink have implemented the standard correctly including the frequency of updates and how these updates are done (not a single one of our clients implantation we have done has any issues), the Public Facing IP of the devices can be retrieved by use of the InControl2 API and then using your own software solution to update your DDNS provider if you wish.

In Australia we have all our customers that need a Public-Facing IP (& potentially DDNS) setup as follows:

Technology Connection
ISDN / DSL / ADSL / VDSL / FttN / FttC / FttB Purpose acquired modem bridged (as a media convertor) directly attached to the WAN of the Peplink with authentication done in the router.
HFC / Fibre / FttP Direct connection (via media converter if needed) with authentication done in the router
Cellular / Mobile / Wireless / Radio Links Providers account is an enterprise/commercially supplied service.

Another option is to provision FusionHub running from a major cloud provider such as AWS or GCE or Azure. You can then with these have a public-facing IP and route incoming traffic back to the router over a SpeedFusion link. There are thousands of deployments working like this around the world, meaning you do not need to run DDNS at the edged router and the edge router can remain NATed behind the carrier’s networks.

You have open Supports Tickets with Peplink, and we are aware Peplink is working actively with and your local Peplink Partner and supplier on resolving those with you.
Happy to Help,
Marcus :slight_smile:

8

Thanks for the email Marcus.

…maybe I’m missing something… have I posted this in the wrong area? Did I accidentally post it as a bug or service request or fault? If so… I apologise & please ignore as it was only a +1 on an existing post for feature request?

As you know, I did attempt contact last week… have I done something wrong by posting here? Your email suggests I shouldn’t have posted here, and should route this through local service agents rather than use the online community?

I’m sorry… perhaps I’ve misunderstood the purpose of the online forum / discussion?

My comment on this was just a +1 on an existing feature request. So there I was googling for others who are encountering the same ddns issue… found the feature request thread… added my +1.

I’ve explained that this is 4G, and explained why NAT is necessary and desirable, and thus why in a monitoring scenario the internet IP is necessary.

I will note that when the peplink does update, it already updates using the internet IP… but it fails to do so regularly, and seems to wait for the WAN IP to change instead? Seems to me that all the hard work in determining what the internet
IP is has already been done… what is missing is a setting to determine update frequency, or at least be smart enough to self-determine when the internet address has changed???

Other posters in the thread have pointed out that far cheaper routers have mastered the ability to report internet addresses in this scenario and for the user to determine update frequency. I too am surprised it is not already in the Peplink
given all the other code to support ddns is already in there?

Using in control 2 then writing a custom applet to pull out the last detected IP…Yes I’m sure we could all do that - we could all develop a custom app… or… a simple update interval setting could be added once by the manufacturer and then
negate the need for the same code to be researched, developed and implemented and maintained by every customer who needs this basic solution.

…seems such a simple feature request, and one that other manufacturers have easily grasped the value of… kind of puzzled why I got this response… but all good :slight_smile:

It’s just a feature request…

Have a good day :slight_smile:

Sent on the go with Vodafone

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9

Yes I had a long power outage and my Peplink Balance 30 did not connect to the DNDNS on the reboot. It missed the first connection for some reason then did not reconnect till the bridged ISP router was rebooted. Yes it should have a interval for checking.