Network access on HMP

Introduction

The HMP provides different network interfaces that can be accessed via HTTP when the player is connected to the network and properly configured - see how to get started with the player.

Notes:

• The HTTPS protocol can be used with HMP400, HMP400W, HMP350, and HMP300.
• The access to the player web interface is password protected - see User manager tool for more details.
• The WebDAV protocol is used for pushing content. Other protocols, like SSH, Telnet, FTP, etc., are not supported.
• For 802.1X authentication, see 802.1X Port-Based Network Access Control page.
• See the proposed solutions for remote access onto the player.

HMP addresses

Briefly press and release the player blue button to display the player addresses.

The player web interface can be accessed from a web browser using http(s)://HMP_address/ with the address being any of the following: IPv4 address, IPv6 address, or hostname address.

• To have these addresses displayed on the connected screen, briefly press and release the player's blue button.
• The players also show up in the Windows Explorer's Network view in Windows computers when Network Discovery is enabled - double-click the player's icon to access its web interface.
• The HMP400, HMP350, and HMP300 devices can also be accessed via the HTTPS protocol.

IPv4 address

IPv4 addresses may be represented in any notation expressing a 32-bit integer value. They are most often written in the dot-decimal notation,

xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

which consists of four octets of the address expressed individually in decimal numbers, ranging from 0 to 255, separated by a dot / full stop. Example: http://172.21.1.137/

Notes:

• The player is configured by default to use DHCP, so its IPv4 address is allocated automatically by the DHCP server. If there is no DHCP server found or there is an IP conflict or the network link is not detected, then the IPv4 address of the HMP is autoconfigured in the range 169.254.1.0 - 169.254.254.255.
• When Network Discovery is enabled on Windows computers, HMP400/W, HMP350, and HMP300 devices are listed in the Windows Explorer's Network view.

IPv6 address

IPv6 addresses are represented as eight groups of four hexadecimal digits with the groups being separated by colons, for example 2001:0db8:0000:0042:0000:8a2e:0370:7334, but methods to abbreviate this full notation exist - zeros can be omitted for instance.

A player can present one or more IPv6 addresses:

• [fe80::21d:50ff:fe{XX:XXXX}]
  

  Link-local IPv6 address valid only for communications within the network segment or the broadcast domain that the host is connected to. The {XX:XXXX} notation must be replaced with the last six digits of the player serial number, without the curly brackets. Example: http://[fe80::21d:50ff:fe20:b2]/

• [fe80::5e87:9cff:fe{XX:XXXX}]
  

  Link-local IPv6 address as above, but applying only for HMP400W configured for Wi-Fi. Example: http://[fe80::5e87:9cff:fe0e:3391]/

• [{ULA_Prefix}:21d:50ff:fe{XX:XXXX}]
  

  Unique local address (ULA) - a site-local or global IPv6 address using the router-advertised network prefix. The {XX:XXXX} notation must be replaced with the last six digits of the player serial number, without the curly brackets. Example: http://[fe35:299:14bc:0:21d:50ff:fe20:b2]/

Hostname address

In computer networking, a hostname is a label that is assigned to a device connected to a computer network and that is used to identify the device in various forms of electronic communication, such as the World Wide Web. The hostname of the HMP has the following format:

spx-hmp-{Serial_Number}.local

where {Serial_Number} represents the full serial number of the player. Example: http://spx-hmp-001d502000b2.local/

Notes:

• The hostname of the player cannot be modified.
• To resolve such a .local address, Bonjour™ service (multicast domain name service) has to be present on your computer - on Mac OS X, Bonjour is already installed as part of the operating system, while on Windows it can be installed via Elementi or iTunes.
• If another hostname is required, it must be manually added within the local DNS server along with the corresponding IP.
• To avoid a common behavior of some browsers of "guessing" the URL by adding "www." at the beginning and / or ".com" and the end of the URL, when the address is not reachable, you might add a trailing dot (period).

HMP internal web server

SpinetiX players feature an embedded web server offering access to different player applications, such as:

• Player web interface
• Player content server
• Player APIs

 

See the full article about embedded web server.

Remote access

The following are secure methods to access a player behind a NAT router / firewall:

• VPN connection to get access to that private network - this is very secure and allows direct access to the player, although it may be more complex to manage and may require extra hardware (VPN server).
• SpinetiX ARYA cloud-based solution allows updating the player's content and configuration settings.
• Scheduled Download or Pull mode to update the player's content from an external web server, optionally using an RPC concentrator for extended functionality.

The following methods are also possible, but discouraged because they would allow incoming connections from the public Internet and thus expose the players to Internet attacks such as DDoS (distributed denial-of-service), password cracking, or make it easy to exploit any security vulnerabilities.

• Port forwarding from your Internet router to the player - for instance, external ports 5550 and 5551 can be forwarded to ports 80 and 81 of an internal IP address to allow accessing the embedded web server and publish server of a certain player. The ports on the player side cannot be changed. See also how to publish using different ports.
• Dynamic DNS from companies such as DynDNS.org and TZO.com - this is not natively supported by the player, but typically implemented by router devices.