Unable to connect to my Emby server using the iOS app from outside my network

[fboyer 0]

Hi,

 

I cannot figure out why I cannot get the iOS app to connect to my server remotely.

 

Setup: 

• I tried to configure my server to use a custom domain with a self-signed certificate but reverted back to using my external IP (with self-signed certificate) instead until I get this thing working.
• I have the default port defined (http - 8096 / https - 8920)
• I also have "Report https as external address"
• I have disabled "Enable automatic port mapping" (as UPNP does not seem to work with my router at least) and have defined a manual port forward for 8920/TCP to my Emby server internal IP (I only forwarded https)

 

Tests:

• I can connect to the server using my Windows PC/Chrome if I click either link (In-Home (LAN) or Remote (WAN)) displayed in the "Manage Server - Dashboard" (Obviously I am inside my network in this scenario).
• I can also connect to the server with my iPhone from inside or outside my network using Chrome.
• In the Emby iOS app, I set the "Host" to "https://<my external ip>" and "Port" to "8920" but I get the "Connection Failure - We're unable to connect to the selected server right now. Please ensure it is running and try again".
  • To be honest, I only got the Emby iOS app to work if I connect to my server inside my network over http using the numeric IP and http (not https).

 

I moved from Plex to Emby because of the LiveTV feature but at this point I have spent way too much time trying to figure this thing out.

 

Anyway, hopefully this is a known issue or there's something simple I am missing.

 

Cheers!

 

[Luke 40079]

Unfortunately at this point iOS will reject the self signed cert and there's no way for the app to override that. What you need to do is either use http or create your own trusted cert with something like Lets Encrypt.

[fboyer 0]

Unfortunately at this point iOS will reject the self signed cert and there's no way for the app to override that. What you need to do is either use http or create your own trusted cert with something like Lets Encrypt.

Thanks for the info, I'll try that. In the meantime I guess my only suggestion would be to provide meaningful message back to the user as there was no way I would have figured it out without your help today.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Luke 40079]

Yes that is a good idea, thanks.

[genesisforlive 7]

i think thats the same problem

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/46234-emby-app-https-connection-not-possible/?p=435409

 

but the other Apps, Emby for Windows and for FireTV must work with the standard certificate?

 

greets

[fboyer 0]

Just to confirm, in case someone is running into the same issue, that generating a valid certificate (using Let's Encrypt! or otherwise) solved the issue with the iOS app.

 

 

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Edited March 27, 2017 by fboyer

[Luke 40079]

Thanks @@fboyer !

[ToddSexington 1]

Just to confirm, in case someone is running into the same issue, that generating a valid certificate (using Let's Encrypt! or otherwise) solved the issue with the iOS app.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Sounds cool, how do I do it? It's just hanging at the connect to server part for me.

[fboyer 0]

Sounds cool, how do I do it? It's just hanging at the connect to server part for me.

In my case I got my Let's Encrypt certificate issued by leveraging my Synology NAS but I am sure you could google some sort of tutorial on how to do it using any of the ACME clients.

 

 

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[ToddSexington 1]

Hmm thanks for the tip but that looks like some deep stuff that I have never seen any of before. Durrrrrr

[fboyer 0]

Hmm thanks for the tip but that looks like some deep stuff that I have never seen any of before. Durrrrrr

Have you looked at https://certbot.eff.org/ ?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[ToddSexington 1]

Looks cool, but I don't recognize the names of any of that stuff. I'm currently running the server on Windows 7. 

 

If you have any tips as to how to complete the process of the certificate, I would hugely appreciate it!

[Luke 40079]

Looks cool, but I don't recognize the names of any of that stuff. I'm currently running the server on Windows 7. 

 

If you have any tips as to how to complete the process of the certificate, I would hugely appreciate it!

 

For Windows you'll probably find this helpful:

 

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/47335-lets-encrypt-for-emby

 

Thanks.

[ToddSexington 1]

I will give that a shot. It looks only moderately intimidating. Hope I can get the ios client going soon.

[ToddSexington 1]

It suddenly works. Anchors aweigh! Sorry for any excess activity.

[ToddSexington 1]

Back to square one. Does not work external to my home nerwork (cell data)

[fboyer 0]

Of course, because, as Luke explained, emby generates a self-signed certificate and, by default, the iOS rejects these. It worked because when your accessing your server through the app when inside your network it uses http (no certificate involved).

 

You could fix your issue by unchecking "Report(or Expose?) external address as https" and use http but then it's a lot less secure.

 

 

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Edited May 16, 2017 by fboyer

[ToddSexington 1]

Thanks fboyer; it was doing it with http and is still doing it with https. I will try and work my way through the certificate thing. Working on it now.

[ToddSexington 1]

Thanks to a super helpful network engineer, I was able to get everything all set up to access Emby from outside my home network via android or iOS. 

 

It was not straightforward at all; a tutorial or some kind of shortcut process would have been useful (but may be impractical for the majority of use cases). 

 

Basically I had to buy a domain name, set up a DDNS on it, buy a SSL cert (creating one in Windows was problematic), download the cert, convert it to .pfx, store it on my PC, then map the cert in Emby Advanced settings, enter the password in the advanced settings, then rebooted etc and finally it works. 

 

Moving to a NAS, I will have to port portions of this over to be hosted on the NAS, unless I keep running the Emby server and just use the NAS as a data source (which I don't as much want to do). 

 

It was probably the hardest process I've ever done on a computer, which isn't saying much, but it certainly took a good amount of doing. 

[Luke 40079]

Well done !

[ToddSexington 1]

Did something change with remote access in the newest build? Suddenly my remote WAN shows as an http address (with the rest of the address as before), and I can't seem to find a setting to make it https. I've lost my remote access until I can figure it out. I can see it on canyouseeme, I can see it, but I can't log in. 

 

In the meantime, I also upgraded to Windows 10, but I don't think that should affect it. It just stopped working today after the computer restarted. IP is still the same, everything still cool there. 

 

Any guidance? This SSL bit is a really tricky part to Emby. 

[Luke 40079]

Nothing has changed but I would suggest checking out our wiki on hosting settings to help you remember:

 

https://github.com/MediaBrowser/Wiki/wiki/Hosting%20Settings

 

Let us know if this helps. thanks !

[Tur0k 144]

Did something change with remote access in the newest build? Suddenly my remote WAN shows as an http address (with the rest of the address as before), and I can't seem to find a setting to make it https. I've lost my remote access until I can figure it out. I can see it on canyouseeme, I can see it, but I can't log in.

 

In the meantime, I also upgraded to Windows 10, but I don't think that should affect it. It just stopped working today after the computer restarted. IP is still the same, everything still cool there.

 

Any guidance? This SSL bit is a really tricky part to Emby.

Check your firewall rules. It is possible they were reset after your upgrade.

 

Make sure your computer still recieves a static OR DHCP Reserved IP.

 

Then check your port forwarding rules from your router to your Emby server.

 

Check to confirm that your DDNS client is still running. Confirm your subdomain's resolved IP address is correct by comparing it to whatsmyip.

 

 

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