Spurious error message at startup?

[crueby1]

For the last couple weeks I've been getting a notification up in the Job Status icon when I start Fusion, saying that 'We are untangling some wires' and that response may be slow, check health status board for details. If I go to the status web page, it shows nothing but all fine for Fusion. So, why the notification? Finally realized that as soon as I do some action like saving a project that does an upload to the Fusion server, that notification goes away. Something stuck??

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 @One simple experiment. Disable firewall and run only Dusion, do you still see the certificate warning ? This could tell us the next direction to go. 

[crueby1]

I disabled the firewall and started Fusion. Still got the server verification warning at startup, then waited for the Untangling wires notification. About 10 minutes later, it was there. So, firewall appears not to have any effect on these messages. Hope that helps!

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 Thank you for trying this. I am bit stumped that it was not the firewall but atleast we know that is not what is causing the problem. 

Two others to also knock off is network and proxy. 

1. Not sure if we tried this already , is it possible to connect to another network like a phone hotspot and see if you get the same cert experience ? 

2. Proxy - are you aware of any proxy set on your machine ? 

[crueby1]

I only have the one cable modem, so I cannot try another network. I don't have a smartphone, so can't do a hotspot from that.

There is no proxy here, I am direct connected from the PC to the cable modem by hardwire. I did try going into the Fusion network option page and changing the connection type from Auto to No Proxy, that made no difference to either message.

I'm stumped too. Both of these messages started happening at the same time a few releases back, before that I never saw them, and nothing has changed on my end hardware-wise, same OS (Windows 10). It was something in that release (I don't recall which version number of Fusion, but it was within the last couple months).

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 Certainly we are narrowing this down but not yet there. Can you do one more thing for me. Let's reset the router and see if that sets anything straight? Certainly has helped with some other networking issues. 

[crueby1]

Resetting the router didn't help, no change.

However, I did some digging on the router/modem, and got into its own configuration app. It does have a firewall function, and turning that off made the server warning at startup go away! This is an Arris SurfBoard modem, if that matters. I'm currently waiting to see if the Untangling issue went away too... So far it looks like that went away too, past the 15 minute mark.

In its firewall configuration, it has options for enabling/disabling the whole firewall, as well as options for turning off the following blocks (these are all turned on when the firewall is active at the moment)

- DOS attack protection

- Block Pings

- IPSec Passthrough

- PPTP Passthrough

- L2TP Passthrough

This one is currently not enabled:

- Fragmented IP Packets

Its been a long time since I did any network protocol stack programming, so I am very rusty on the options. Are any of the ones currently enabled a likely suspect for the problem we are seeing? If so, I can try enabling the firewall and turning off that one option to see what happens. All these were on by default from the factory, so anyone with one of these modem/routers would have the same issue, I would think.

If we can narrow down which option might be the culprit, I could leave that off, would rather have the rest on if possible.

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 This is great progress. Thank you for sticking with us. I would have to consult with our networking experts internally but I believe there is a way you can whitelist products like Fusion so that you can have all the options still enabled but it will let class from Fusion passthrough. Here is a document on what to whitelist - https://help.autodesk.com/view/fusion360/ENU/?caas=caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Fusion-360-cannot-...

Also my curiosity is why this happened recently. It's possible that the network company pushed an update and it had some security requirements that it automatically turned on. 

[crueby1]

I have no way to know if there was a new firmware version pushed down to the router, according to Arris that is all up to the service provider. With the firewall in the router off, I have not seen the Untangling message yet (though Murphy's Law says it will be hiding to mess with me!)

Been playing in the firewall settings some more. I turned off all those options but with the firewall enabled, and the server warning did not come up when Fusion started. With them all on, it does. I cleared the logs in the firewall, and when fusion starts and gives the server warning, only two entries come up in the log:

2024-03-07 11:23:44.00 [UNPRIV TCP packet: ]TCP Packet - Source:118.123.105.93,39315 Destination:172.101.140.47,9091
2024-03-07 11:23:59.00 [UNPRIV TCP packet: ]TCP Packet - Source:216.218.206.97,48128 Destination:172.101.140.47,5938

I don't know for sure if this is for Fusion, or could just be some other Windows or other app thing, you network gurus would know.

I'll see if I can narrow down which option triggers the message at startup...

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 I will be asking but just looking at the below

- DOS attack protection

- Block Pings

- IPSec Passthrough

- PPTP Passthrough

- L2TP Passthrough

This one is currently not enabled:

- Fragmented IP Packets

Seems like this will be the block pings as all the others are passthrough? Just thinking out loud. 

[crueby1]

Correction to that last post - it does not matter which of those options is on or off, or all off, just having the firewall in the router enabled triggers the message.

The router fierwall does not have a simple whitelist like the one in Windows does, though it does have filters for allowing certain ipv4 and ipv6 ports/addresses.

[crueby1]

For your question on the block pings, this is what the screen actually looks like, full text of each option:

Firewall Enable/Disable

Enable Firewall

DoS Attack Protection

Enable DoS Attack Protection Firewall

Block Pings

Enable Ping Blocking

IPSec Pass Through

Enable IPSec Pass Through

PPTP Pass Through

Enable PPTP Pass Through

L2TP Pass Through

Enable L2TP Pass Through

Block Fragmented IP Packets

Enable Block Fragmented IP Packets

[RajkumarIlanchelian]

@crueby1 I saw your other post and closing the loop here. You will have to connect with your ISP and add Fusion to the allowed list to the firewall. 

[crueby1]

I can try to get them to do that, though one thing still puzzles me - If I ignore this warning and the Untangling warning, everything else still works perfectly - can open/close/save projects, get updates, all that. Whats different about these two connections, and do they HAVE to be different, can't they work like all the other ones Fusion makes to your servers??