some netstat questions

my friend and i were trying to figure out which ports to forward for aim file sharing on our routers yesterday by directly connecting to eachother(not behind the routers) and doing netstat to look at the port for the new connection. we tried it several times and realized that no new connection was showing up. we knew eachother's ip addresses and neither of us saw the other's ip addy in the netstat output. whats the deal? we figured out the port was 5190 using google, but shouldnt netstat have seen a new connection with my friend's ip and the port? also my friend, scott, got some weird results when doing a netstat. there was a connection to a computer called "scott.ce1.client2.va.attbi.com" on port 4860. here's a pic: http://img21.exs.cx/img21/4852/NetstatIPs.jpg we tried pinging, telnetting, etc. to that address but it didnt respond, it seems like it was some kind of recursive connection. we thought it was wierd that his computername was "scott" and the thing started with scott. he is behind a router and the isp bill isnt in his name. why would his computername be there and what is the connection doing?

thanx for the help :D

His computer name would show up because that's what he named the computer trying to connect. Ahh, to make more sense: my comp name is SpyderWeb. Whenever someone see's me, they will see that like one of two way's

1. SpyderWeb:Myhost
2. SpyderWeb:MyIP

Now, that's how it's viewed although I'm not entirely sure as to why it appeared as so on your computer if you two aren't networked together. Now, so I know.. are you or your friend behind a firewall?

According to what I could find by default the AoL instant Messanger uses port 5190 by default but you can specify a diffrent one in the connection manager. G nailed this search strait to an aol KB that you check your self. http://www.aol.com/aim/faq/connection.html

This one might be helpful too.
http://www.aol.com/aim/faq/filetransfer.html

Quote:

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we knew eachother's ip addresses and neither of us saw the other's ip addy in the netstat output. whats the deal? we figured out the port was 5190 using google, but shouldnt netstat have seen a new connection with my friend's ip and the port?

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No. You both directly connect to the AIM servers on 5190, not to each other. This explains why you didn't see each other on your netstat outputs. You should, however, see a connection to AOL in the netstat output.

Open AIM and look at the port used for file transfer. Typically its 2500. Keep this handy. Next go into your routers and create two port trigger rules. One for 2500 and one for 4443. All outgoing triggers are 5190 and of course the inbound ports are 2500 and 4443. This works fine on my Linksys BEFSR41 router.

--TH13

what i meant was that the computer"scott.ce1.client2.va.attbi.com" had his first name/computername in it which seems wierd. his isp service is paid in his parent's name. we dont know what that connection was for and when i do, for example a "ping -a" to my own ip address i get something like 24-125-163-56.ce1.client2.va.attbi.com. (we both have the same isp)