Is Dishonline broken again?

[JayStil]

Can't see what's on my DVR, even though it shows a status of "online". Was going to do a little housecleaning, but I guess it can wait.

edit: My DVR contents show up normally in DRA.

 

[TG2]

Not looking too good. Here is a traceroute and a ping.
C:\Users\Isaac>tracert dishonline.com

Tracing route to dishonline.com [174.129.23.207]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
C:\Users\Isaac>

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Isaac>ping dishonline.com

Pinging dishonline.com [174.129.23.207] with 32 bytes of data:
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 174.129.23.207:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss),

C:\Users\Isaac>

Unfortunately .. its not that simple. Start by using the full host name ... www.dishonline.com

C:\Documents and Settings\TG2>tracert www.dishonline.com

Tracing route to a743.b.akamai.net [157.238.91.49]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

Akamai is a front end technology for load balancing, redirection, etc.

*after* getting the initial data information and streams .. you may be on any one of a few servers..

Dish Remote Access best showed this because when you had your web page in front of you, you would see dishXX.sling.com in the URL .. the XX would be one of 1~16 (at last check 16 was the highest responding host)

There's a free tool out there called Active Ports (microsoft has TCP View with part of the PSTools/Sysinternals they took over) ... Active ports does as the name suggests shows you active TCP/UDP ports, the programs they are assigned to, the IP's connected with, etc.

After the initial web hits and redirections.. you get content from multiple locations, your DVR, Amazon, data gets reported back and forth to everything from msg.sling.com to some IP that resolves into Melita.com (foreign cable/iptv stuff?) I suspect if I watched long enough I'd also see the streams that id hulu and other content aggregation providers.

So ... while the initial "dishonline.com" gets you an ip .... its not definitive, nor is that the place you're going to go or get communication back from. Sometimes a redirector can flub.. and you'd be typing dishonline.com ... not getting anything.. but manually putting the www. in front of it you'd get there..

All of this points back to the problem... that with Dish Online ... there's not a good hard resource to track or follow as to whether it should be working or not..


the connection to actually *watch* something doesn't go the same way as Dish Remote Access does.. its reporting back to other odd ip's in different locations, and intermittently to msg.sling.com...


EDIT: I would also recommend .. that if your real intent is to watch live tv or something from your DVR .. you would be much better off, using Dish Remote Access instead of Dish Online.

Lately the divide between the two is even worse. With DRA .. you see the authentication, etc.. and within 20 to 30 seconds you have audio/video and if a DVR'd item, usually within 10 seconds of the actual audio/video, you have your dvr item playing (before then, you are connected to the Sling, but it shows the last set live tv station your TV2 was on)

With Dish Online ... since this past week, I'm noticing ... Audio starts within 10 seconds.. then I get this "loading video" whirly bob thing ... all the while the audio is going ... 30 seconds passes and *maybe* at that time the video starts .... then 10 to 30 seconds later (if you were originally coming to watch a DVR'd item) then your dvr'd item starts.

That can be nearly TWICE as long as DRA takes..

DishOnline = _FAIL_

 

[TG2]

Can't see what's on my DVR, even though it shows a status of "online". Was going to do a little housecleaning, but I guess it can wait.

edit: My DVR contents show up normally in DRA.

When ever you have this problem.. close down all other browser windows .. log into Dish Online .. Log OUT of dish online .. then re-log in .... after logged back in, go to "View DVR" if contents still haven't loaded ... hit refresh... wait.. .. if needed, hit it a second time wait.. and a third time if needed. I've never needed to go beyond 3 refreshes after logging out and back in. It seems the "Logout" actually helps the account get back to basics again (ie. re-reading the DVR's contents). If logout/login refresh/refresh/refresh doesn't work.. make sure you submit the problem via the "report problem" / "Feedback" links at the bottom of most pagets.

 

[Mike_H]

They have some web issues for sure. Disholine working fine right now. Though when I say fine, I mean I can watch a show. Mine says loading dvr info constantly never changing, been like that forever.

 

[TG2]

They just had another major hick-up ... the amazonian cloud wasn't processing logons..


C:\Documents and Settings\TG2>nslookup secure.dishonline.com
Server: cdns01.comcast.net
Address: 75.75.75.75

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: prod-secure-1111791664.us-east-1.elb.amazonaws.com
Address: 50.16.247.61
Aliases: secure.dishonline.com


Gateway Timeout

The proxy server did not receive a timely response from the upstream server. Reference #1.2593xxxx.xxxxxxxxxx138.22c2aad3


EDIT: well.. I got in.. and then tried to navigate to the "EPIX" network and got another gateway timeout ... these gateways, in case anyone is wondering aren't gateways in the user home, its gateway to the content or content provider.

See this is the other problem with having DishOnline .... once they do away with Dish Remote Access ... users would be completely stuck with no access what so ever, simply because dish is making dishonline a central failure point.