Daily Cup of Tech

Your Internet connection’s IP address is like your home mailing address. It is the key to getting access to the contents of the remote computer. If you know your home IP address, it gives you the ability to connect to that IP address from any other computer on the Internet and access resources that you have made available.

One of the problems that many people run across is that their IP address changes so even if they memorize their IP address, it may be different when they go to access it remotely. This is the problem that DCoT reader Shep was having:

Dear Tim,

First of all, I’m a big fan. I check in every day. I think the kid rescue story at Disney is great!

Here’s my tech help question. I realize it’s a bit obscure. Okay, it’s very obscure.

I use TightVNC (which I run off my Cruzer using DCoTMenu) to access my networks at home and at my office. My office network has a static IP but my home network does not. If I am away and the dynamic IP at home changes I can’t access the network (as it did last week while we were on vacation).

I realize that the solution to my problem is to get a static IP, or use one of those web services which assigns a “static” IP, or use Himachi, GoToMyPC, or a similar program.

For the sake of argument, let’s say that I’m not going to do any of those things.

My question is this: Is there a way for my home network to broadcast it’s IP on a regular basis (every 6 hours) to an email account or, preferably, upload the IP via FTP to my personal webspace (which is not hosted on my home or office network)?

Thanks.
Shep

Well, Shep, this has proven to be a worthy challenge but I have come up with a solution. I have written an application called External IP that will e-mail you or upload an HTML file to a web server with your IP address information on whatever schedule you like. This way, you will always know your home IP address.

Please be aware that this is a work in progress and there may still be the odd bug lurking in the code.

External IP is a freeware application and everyone is free to use and download the application as they see fit. But, if you find it useful, a donation would be greatly appreciated!

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13 Responses to “Get Your Home IP Address From Anywhere”

1. Sam Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 6:48 am

   Just wanted to say that you could also just use a service such as No-IP.com which is free. You can keep a dynamic IP, but set up a url such as myip.no-ip.com and then you have no need to remember the IP address. Also, if you’re working remotely and need access to shares you could set up a VPN in about 30 seconds (literally) using Hamachi (http://Hamachi.cc).

2. Dan Vigliotti Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 7:36 am

   Nice little program. However, I prefer using a free Dynamic DNS service. I have used two services in the past for this. 1.) No-IP.org - provides one or two free dynamic dns entries per account (maybe more). Simply register a DNS name entry and pick a domain (such as no-ip.org). Requires a small program to be running (can be setup as a service) on a windows machine that will check the local IP and update when changed. Very simple, very fast, unobtrusive. 2.) Linksys routers (and most other brands) come with a Dynamic DNS service built-in. DynDNS.org is one of the services that a Linksys router uses and is the one I have setup. Similar to No-IP.org, you simply register a custom DNS entry with a selected domain name. The difference is, you dont need a client piece of software running on one of your computers. The Linksys firmware has the client software built-in.

   For example, I have a dynamic DNS entry called webvig.homedns.org (setup with dyndns.org. This DNS entry is being updated by my linksys router through the DynDNS.org service. Now no matter where I am at in the world if I want to get to my home network all I have to remember is webvig.homedns.org.

3. Stacey Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 8:00 am

   Ummm….Hi,

   Wouldn’t it be just as easy to use one of the many free dynamic DNS services?

   If you NEED the actual IP address you could always do a reverse lookup of the name to get it.

   Stacey

4. Tim Fehlman Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 8:16 am

   Yes, there are a number of these dynamic IP services out there that all work very well. But, as you will notice in the post, Shep does not want to use any of these services (this includes Hamachi). There could be several reasons for not wanting to use these services:

   1) Do not to have to create accounts on systems not under your control
   2) Do not want an easy to discover DNS entry pointing home
   3) Dynamic DNS services may be blocked by a proxy
   4) May not have access to the router to configure dynamic DNS client
   5) Prefer to get IP information via e-mail

   I’m not saying that there are not other ways of doing this. I am just providing a solution to the specific requirements set out by the requester. My assumption is that if there is one person who can use such a system, there are probably others as well.

   Tim

5. Shep Eddy Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 10:22 am

   Tim, this is absolutely amazing. I am the original requestor for program and I cannot wait to get home tonight and get it running and dig into what you have created.

   To the first three comments: Yes, I am well aware of free dynamic DNS services. In my letter to Tim, I asked if there was another way to accomplish what I needed. It appears that he has granted my request.

   I hope that there are lots of people out there who will benefit from what Tim has written. It looks way cool to me.

   Thank you. Thank you. Tip Jar. Thank you.

6. Tim Fehlman Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 10:32 am

   Shep,
   I’m glad that this looks like it will suit your needs. I would be interested in hearing how well it works for you and any changes that we should be looking at to make it even better.

   Make sure that you spend some time reading through the documentation (I know there is a lot but it is important) so that you are successful using it as soon as possible.

   Thanks for the great comments and thanks for using the Tip Jar.

   Tim

7. axis mann Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 12:19 pm

   My router will email log to any email address. just look at email to see what IP address router used. No extra software required. I use netgear RP614.

8. axis mann Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 12:20 pm

   It does it on hourly basis so even if IP address does change, I get the latest every hour.

9. Ryan Says:
   April 10th, 2007 at 7:14 pm

   I use LogMeIn as a free alternative to Go To My PC. I can go to one login screen and access all of my computers even office and home.

10. Dino Says:
    April 10th, 2007 at 7:38 pm

    Funny,

    I’d been playing with the idea of something like this months ago after my last trip home, didn’t get around to it though, now with the new job I just settled on DynDNS for an always direct to home connection using openvpn, since the new job it’s been rock solid, although I have run into another issue that I will be using AutoIT to solve, whave been considering sending you the results to post to everyone.

    GJ on the prog, looks just about what i was going to do, although i would suggest encrypting the strings for things like IP Passwords etc, but thats just me.

    Dino

11. Tim Fehlman Says:
    April 10th, 2007 at 8:12 pm

    I have been using LogMeIn for some time and I love the program as well. But, sometimes complete remote control is overkill. Also, I have had occasion when the LogMeIn client crashed and you are out of luck. Plus, if you have multiple systems, you need LogMeIn on all of them and accessing network services via LogMeIn can be a bit of a pain.

    What I envision is that External IP will become a complimentary way of retrieving IP information from your system.

    As for encryption, etc., this is in the works for next version.

    Tim

12. Eric Says:
    September 27th, 2008 at 9:53 pm

    I have another scenario that needs help from you guys.

    1. I am currently at home and wanting to access my office PC using GoToMyPC.
    2. My Office PC is currently in shutdown mode
    3. I tried to use Wake-On-LAN software to wake up PC up, but unfortunately I am unable to trace the external IP address of my office.

    My question is will I be able to trace my company external IP address from my home to allow me to wake up my office PC even it is in shutdown mode?

    I wish to shutdown my PC and turn on my PC anytime from anywhere for me to connect through GoToMyPC but I have some constraint

    Constrain 1. External IP address from my company, I do not know how to get it.

    Constrain 2. If I am going to install some application that will allow me to have the up-to-date office’s external IP address through email, I have to keep my PC on right? Then it serves no purpose since I am going to shutdown my PC and turn it on anytime via Wake-On-LAN for me to connet my PC using GoToMyPC.

    Does you guys have any solution for me to get my office external IP add at home even though my office PC is in shutdown mode for me to wake it up to allow me to connect it via GoToMyPC?

13. Coba Says:
    March 5th, 2009 at 9:55 am

    Hi guys. You might want to check this software “MyHomeIP”. It is a great tool.
    http://www.ekode.com/products.php

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