Get Me out fo here.

[MrBert]

I am at my college and they seem to have some sort of a firewall blocking ports. and not allowing me to do such things as chat with you all or use any sort a chat program. So if some one could steer me into the correct direction. So that I may increase my learning by talking to you.

-MrBert
Thanks.

[problemchild]

Your best bet is probably a polite e-mail to the admin asking the reasons for the restriction and explaining the problem it's causing you. The fact is, it's the school's network and it's their perogative to decide how want to use their bandwidth and what their acceptable use policy is. If they aren't willing to allow the kind of traffic you're needing, I don't advise trying to sneak around it because you could find yourself in some hot water very quickly.

It may be that you could find a cheap local ISP for chat and such things. That's what I did in college because the university's network resources were overloaded.

[zaggy]

Remember when explaining to them why you want to be able to chat here that you explain this is a security site, rather than have them misunderstand what this site is all about.

Unfortunately sometimes AO gets a bad rap because people don't understand what we are really about.

[Tedob1]

one legal way of doing it would be to find a computer outside the network, who's owner would be willing to set up a re-director to take input from port 80 or 21 and send it out to 6667. there's one, oddly enough, called redirect

[Joey_Batch_File]

You know its not a better suggestion, but it is a simple way around it. You could always use dial up for certain tasks.

[avdven]

Honestly, to me, it does make perfect sense that such "uneducational" activities would be blocked. Not necessarily blocking specific sites, per se, but blocking ports to prevent access to chat clients, IRC, P2P networks, etc. is actually a good way of (in a limited way) keeping the systems somewhat free of virii and trojans. Many infections occur through these mediums, and by limiting access to them, the admins will likely prevent the majority of infections. Also, I'm not sure what sort of policies are in place at your campus, but it is also a means of keeping students from installing various programs (such as chat clients, etc.) which may either carry infections or cause other system problems. My recommendation... if you want to access sites or participate in other online activities which are restricted by the admins, take it home. I wouldn't want to do anything like that from a campus system anyway, considering the logging features which many networks have. Just do it from the security and privacy of your own home...

AJ

[problemchild]

Just do it from the security and privacy of your own home...

Unless, of course, he lives in the dorm. That's the impression I got, but maybe I imagined it.

[retoor]

I would personally go for the redirector! How many of us here can say that we haven´t installed a IRC client or so, where it wasn´t allowed? I would of course start with the polite letter, but that probably won´t work! IRC isn´t something that takes up a whole lotta bandwith... But always ask before you venture into unknown waters!

[avdven]

Unless, of course, he lives in the dorm. That's the impression I got, but maybe I imagined it.

Good point... I didn't think of that, problemchild. In that case, if you are in a dorm, I would do as Joey_Batch_File suggests, and use dial-up for such features. If dial-up is too slow for you (I know I can never go back... I hate when I'm on a trip and have to use my cell phone to connect my Pocket PC or notebook to the Internet to check e-mail, stocks or something else), you may want to consider investing in some sort of broadband (either DSL or Cable) for your dorm room...

AJ

[Joey_Batch_File]

Originally posted here by avdven
you may want to consider investing in some sort of broadband (either DSL or Cable) for your dorm room...

As far as I know, I do not think Broadband internet access is available in the dorms. I had two friends look into it. One attending Florida State and the other attending the University of Connecticut. These two were told it was unavailable in the dorms according to the phone company and had nothing to do with the colleges guidelines/restrictions.