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[Solved] Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 29 Jan 2012, 15:46
by nickh
When I am travelling my work laptop is bolted down so I can't install anything, but I discovered it could still boot off a USB stick which is why I use Porteus. I am still at 1.0 as I could not get 1.1 to boot on one of my PC's and have not had the time to troubleshoot.

One thing I would like to do is voice chat to home when I'm in a hotel. You often have free WiFi access but things like VoIP/Skype is normally banned (blocked?). I have a server at home and run OpenVPN on it and I have OpenVPN running in Porteus so I have a direct connection from the laptop to home. This effectively bypasses any hotel filtering. What I need now is a program which can do an IP to IP voice connection. In Windoze, NetMeeting used to be able to do it, but it is no longer distributed with Win7. Does anyone know of a Porteus (or related) package which can communicate voice to a WIndoze package? Also which WIndoze package would be compatible with it and Win7?

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 29 Jan 2012, 16:24
by fanthom
in the past i have succeed with skype + squid + ssh tunneling for that purpose.
on the home server you must have ssh service running and proxy (squid) listening on for example 3128 port.
on the client side you need to create a tunnel:

Code: Select all

ssh fanthom@SERVER_IP_NUMBER -L 8080:localhost:3128
which opens a 8080 port on your local PC and redirects all traffic to remote PC on 3128 port.
all what you need to do is to launch linux skype client and (before you login) go to Options -> proxy settings and type 127.0.0.1 as proxy IP and 8080 as a port.

should work :)

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 29 Jan 2012, 16:40
by nickh
I don't think a tunnel should be an issue as I can contact my home PC directly from the Porteus laptop because of the OpenVPN tunnel or are you saying this won't work.

Does Skype support direct IP <-> IP conversations without having to go via Skype? I've hunted round their site and documentation is not obvious.

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 30 Jan 2012, 21:06
by brokenman
I don't think a tunnel should be an issue as I can contact my home PC directly from the Porteus laptop
Using which port? If i understand correctly ... your problem is that the hotels are blocking certain ports (like skypes port) and you have to find a different door to use. Fanthom's solution will use port 8080 while you are in the hotel. This will not be blocked. After setting your local skype proxy (as per instructions) to localhost you will be directing all traffic through port 8080 and to your home box. Can't fail really.

I have also used reverse tunnels to bypass firewalls from work. I guess you won't know until you try from the hotel.

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 31 Jan 2012, 20:21
by nickh
I don't think was a bit of an understatement. I know I can use OpenVPN so I can establish a point to point connection to home (port 1194). I don't know what the hotels do about blocking Skype (if anything). It would not have to be a port block. It could also be a protocol block. Until I get a chance to try Fanthom's I won't know. I just need to give it a try.

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 01 Feb 2012, 12:10
by Hamza
If you setup a real SSH Tunnel..your hotel firewall should not be able to track down which protocol you are using as everything (except DNS Queries) are encrypted and forwarded to local ssh proxy before to go at your home ssh server.

Re: Packages for Voice Chat

Posted: 05 Feb 2012, 21:28
by nickh
I've managed to build Ekiga (formerly GnomeMeeting) and I've managed a one-way conversation with NetMeeting on my LAN (my laptop has a built-in microphone, but I don't have one for the PC yet :( ). It is looking promising. I now need another microphone then I can try it over the VPN.

[edit]
Ekiga does what I want.
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