Soruk <soruk@bitbucket.eridani.co.uk> wrote:
> On 2008-06-19, Sinna <news4sinna_NOSPAM@hotpop.com> wrote:
> > ali.n.rammal@gmail.com wrote:
> >> this msg keeps coming :"You have been logged out because the session
> >> has timed out"
> >> and then i re-enter my pass and the whole process starts
> >> again....!!!!!!!!
> > I suppose you're talking about BetaMax (VoipCheap, JustVoip, ...)
> >
> > I experience the same issues when working with a proxy server.
> > Try without using one and see if that works out...
>
> I've had that too - try clearing your browser cache.
Betamax have a problem with their login servers. Here's how it works:
The login page at
http://www.smslisto.com/en/buycredits.html includes an
IFRAME of
https://myaccount.smslisto.com/loginpanel.php
That IFRAME has the username and password boxes. When you fill them in,
they get submitted via SSL to myaccount.smslisto.com, which (if correct)
redirects you to the control panel page also on that server. This is the
real interface where you look at your bills etc.
myaccount.smslisto.com has the following DNS entry:
myaccount.smslisto.com has address 195.27.201.2
myaccount.smslisto.com has address 80.239.136.162
Here's the important bit: these two servers don't talk to each other. If
you login to one, your login cookie isn't valid on the other. So it's a
lottery depending on your browser's IP handling; some browsers do their own
DNS caching so that it'll pick a single name<->IP mapping and use only that
for your session (unless that machine becomes unreachable, when it'll switch
over to the other IP).
If, however, your browser, proxy or other program doesn't DNS cache then
you'll pick servers at random for each HTTPS connection you make. There's a
high probability you'll hit the server which isn't the one you logged into,
and when you do you're dumped back at the login page with a 'Session timed
out' error.
Needless to say, this is broken behaviour on the part of Betamax's servers.
This was the problem I had to fix in the 'fincheck' script. The simple fix
is to refer to the server by IP, not by name. In other words, try:
https://195.27.201.2/
instead. I'd strongly recommend doing your own lookup because these IP
addresses may well change. I also note that myaccount.smslisto.cm (sic)
resolves to a valid address (which currently isn't listening on SSL) so
watch for phishing as the SSL certificate won't protect you if you're
referring to sites by number.
My experience is only with smslisto but quite possibly other Betamax/Finarea
services suffer from the same issues. The 'fincheck' script now does a
single name->IP lookup at the start, and then uses that for all operations.
I've not had any reliability problems since making that change.
Theo
can't log on to buy credits 
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