Library problem with Domain name server (DNS) connection

[Anonymous]

Good morning forum,
in our firm we have a dynamic IP (dns) for reaching our server from outside of the office,up until AC17 this wasn't a problem but with AC18 we noticed that when we shared a project for Teamwork, it loaded the libraries from the bimserver library by accessing the internal ip 192.168.x.x. and this is OK because while inside the office(lan) the server cannot access our static dns. Now when we work from a location outside the office, and connect to the bimserver, those libraries are missing and we have to re-add the libraries by accessing the dynamic dns. This is a problem, because when we have two persons working on different locations (for example office and construction site) only one of them can see the objects and for the other one, the libraries are missing. In older versions this was never an issue

EDIT : changed the title

[Ed_Brown]

Anestis,

Your question is a valid one. It works down to this quesiton:

Do I really need a FQDN to have my BIM Server work?

My answer:
Well it could work without one. Take your chances, you have got a 90% chance that very soon somebody will complain about libraries showing offline. Your BIMcloud will work as designed if you only use ONE URL to access it. This one URL would be a FQDN. Not understanding the difference between 127.0.0.1, localhost, \\machinename, machinename.companyname.com, https:\\OurBIM.companyname.com in the end will hurt you.

That is, the people outside of your local area network are using a different URL to access the BIM Server than the URL that was used to share the project. For this reason the libraries are showing offline. You need to determine what the URL will be that accesses the BIM Server from everywhere. It will be something like BIMServer.yourcompany.com. Then set up your local DNS server to direct communication for BIMServer.yourcompany.com to 192.168.x.x (where ever you have the BIM Server) and your remote clients will access be directed to your router/Reverse Proxy/DNS sitting on your public IP address that is registered to "yourcompany.com". Once you have determined the FQDN for the BIM Server you will need to reshare the projects and make sure that the original entries in the client ArchiCADs for the old(bad) address for the BIM Server are removed.

In 19 this requirement has been relaxed.

[Anonymous]

Ed wrote:
It will be something like BIMServer.yourcompany.com. Then set up your local DNS server to direct communication for BIMServer.yourcompany.com to 192.168.x.x (where ever you have the BIM Server) and your remote clients will access be directed to your router/Reverse Proxy/DNS sitting on your public IP address that is registered to "yourcompany.com".

Goodmorning Ed,
thank you for the reply, to be honest I am a little confused by your answer,
because we already have COMPANYNAME.dyndns.com pointing to our server,
more specific when connecting to our bimserver from a remote location, we use the COMPANYNAME.dyndns.com:PORT which directs to 192.168.1.1:PORT
When we try to connect with a PC that is on the LAN, we cannot use the COMPANYNAME.dyndns.com:PORT only the 192.168.1.1:port , so we have to use two different (but actually the same) addresses, I hope this made sense to you.