My client cannot connect to the WorkgroupShare server.

Symptoms

• When installing the WorkgroupShare client I get the error ‘Unable to get users from WorkgroupShare server! Please make sure the server is running on the correct computer’.
• When synchronizing, the WorkgroupShare client displays the ‘Connect to WorkgroupShare server’ dialogue box.
• When running the diagnostics from the Administrator the following error is reported ‘Unable to create socket to test connection to the WorkgroupShare server on localhost.’

Detail

• Make sure that the WorkgroupShare server, and not just the Administrator, is running on the server computer. Refer to the FAQ
  How do I check if the WorkgroupShare server is running?.
• If the following error is reported during client setup ‘Unable to get users from WorkgroupShare server! Please make sure the server is running on the correct computer’ then it is possible that the client setup program is looking for the server at the wrong address. If the server computer is using DHCP then the IP address may have changed since the server was installed. Rename the file ClientSettings.dat, located in the ClientSetup folder on the server computer, and then run the client setup once more. You will be prompted to enter the correct server address. If using DHCP enter the computer name (hostname) of the server, rather than the IP address.
• Please check that you do not have a firewall product on the WorkgroupShare server or client that could be blocking the communications. If you are running Windows XP SP2 please check the built in Windows firewall. This can be found and configured in the TCP/IP properties for the local area network. Please refer to the FAQ
  WorkgroupShare: What should I know about Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2)?
• If you run WorkgroupShare as a Windows service and it fails to start, run it as an executable by clicking Start, Run and selecting WSService.exe from the WorkgroupShare installation folder. The error reporting is more direct and problems related to licencing or database access will be immediately apparant.
• Manually check that the WorkgroupShare server computer can be contacted from a client computer. Open a command window on the client and run the ping and telnet tests as detailed below.

To open a command window Click Start, Run, type cmd and press ok. A black command prompt window should open up. Under Windows 95/98/ME use command rather than cmd.

**NOTE** In the following lines WorkgroupShare_IP_Address should be replaced with the actual IP address of the WorkgroupShare Server.

Type

Ping WorkgroupShare_IP_Address

If you do not get four replies then check your network connectivity. If Ping works OK then start a telnet session as follows. Type

Telnet WorkgroupShare_IP_Address 8100

If you do not get the following response, or similar,

OK WorkgroupShare 2.1 server ready

then you are unable to contact the WorkgroupShare server, or a different program is running on this port. Check that you do not have a firewall blocking port 8100. Check that another program is not running on this port. Type netstat -ap tcp to check this.

If you do get the correct response from the server then type SERVERVERCAP to query permitted client versions. This will test that the server responses are correctly passed back to the telnet client. The correct response will be similar to the following

OK 102 103

If this response is not received back then your network connectivity from the server back to the client should be tested. Type “Quit” to disconnect and “Exit” to close the command window.

• Check that you are running the correct version of the client setup for this version of WorkgroupShare. If necessary, un-install the WorkgroupShare client before re-installing the correct version.
• If the ping and telnet tests work OK then repeat them using the computer name of the server in place of the IP address. If this then fails make sure that your connection to the server is made using the IP address rather than the computer name.