0

Windows Server 2003, IIS 6

We have a public facing website deployed and until this morning it was running fine. Now when we try and access the website from outside the network the browser is returning a 'website not found' message. We are not receiving an IIS error message, it's just stating that the website cannot be found.

Accessing the url from the internal network works fine, as does pinging the url and also the ip address internally, so it doesn't appear to be an IIS issue. tracert is just hitting internal servers as expected, so this may be a DNS issue?

Any ideas where to start looking to solve this problem would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Ciaran.

Edit: We also have another public facing website (with a different IP address) on that same server and that site is accessible externally, so the problem might be related to the IP address of our site?

2
  • Are you able to resolve the hostname from outside your network? Have you verified the firewall/nat rules that permit traffic to this host from outside your network?
    – EEAA
    Sep 9, 2010 at 5:17
  • using network-tools.com I can't ping the site. Name resolution is ocurring as pinging the sitename shows that it is trying to ping the correct ip address. Not being a server guy, I can't tell you much about the firewall or nat rules. I think we have some network people looking at the issue now, but if you can think of anything that might help, I'll pass it on
    – Ciaran
    Sep 9, 2010 at 5:43

1 Answer 1

0

Check the A (Address) record for the site.

Open a command prompt and type the following:

  • nslookup
  • set type=a [Not necessary, but gives a fuller demonstration of what you're doing]
  • server 4.2.2.2 [A well-known external DNS server]
  • www.yourwebsite.com

You should get something similar to the following:

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>nslookup
Default Server:  dns.company.local
Address:  192.168.1.32

> set type=a
> server 4.2.2.2
Default Server:  vnsc-bak.sys.gtei.net
Address:  4.2.2.2

> www.google.com
Server:  vnsc-bak.sys.gtei.net
Address:  4.2.2.2

Non-authoritative answer:
Name:    www.l.google.com
Addresses:  66.249.89.99, 66.249.89.104
Aliases:  www.google.com

>
1
  • When I do a nslookup, it comes back with the correct IP address
    – Ciaran
    Sep 9, 2010 at 5:37

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .