Three-minute timeout during surfing?

[Derek D. Martin]

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At some point hitherto, pll at lanminds.com hath spake thusly:
> >  Shutdown everything.  Place system on an isolated network.  Start packet
> >sniffer (no filter).  Start any services Apache depends on (e.g., a local
> >DNS resolver).  Start Apache.  Send a single web client request.  Watch to
> >see if the system is sending any packets (other than the HTTP request).  If
> >so, find out why, and see if the (lack of) response is the problem.  If not,
> >the problem must be local -- database problem, maybe?
> 
> Ahhhm, just curious here, but why would a web server be sending out 
> *any* packets, including HTTP requests.

LOTS of reasons, depending on what it does:  DNS queries to look up
client addresses;  auth lookups (identd) to look up client
information; database connections for content or data entry; LDAP or
other protocol for network-based authentication, etc. etc. ad nauseum.
Also I'm pretty sure Ben meant "other than answering the HTTP request"
above.

> If you're seeing requests *initiated* by your web server, you've got 
> a major problem (unless it's something you specifically condone and 
> (allowed to be) configured yourself.

That may or may not be true, depending on one's interpretation of the
latter half of that statement, how the system is used, and the skill
of the person maintaining it all...

- -- 
Derek Martin               ddm at pizzashack.org    
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